New To Anxiety Lifestyle

[GSW]

First let me say that I appreciate so many of you sharing on the forum. I am not very knowledgeable regarding anxiety and/or forums but thought that I might see if a few of my questions could be answered in association with this topic. First I guess a short history lesson may be in order. Seven months ago I had an incident with my heart due to the use of over the counter decongestants. It caused a rapid heartbeat of 160+BPM. I went to the emergency room and suffered through my heart cycling between 120 BPM and 180 BPM for 12 hours. After extensive testing no issues were found with my heart which was a huge blessing. I had a couple of attacks after the initial attack that were considered panic attacks and given clonazepam to control them. I did go through a very traumatic divorce about three years ago and may have been suffering from some depression. Not really sure? PCP diagnosis. The first of May my PCP decided to start me out on 50mg daily of Zoloft. After 1 week, I had a very terrible breakdown compounded by suicidal thoughts. I was told to immediately quit taking the Zoloft. Since then I have had the strangest feelings of anxiety. There is no thoughts, situations, or reasons that I can pinpoint that bring the sensations on but it starts as a nervousness in my abdomen, sometimes a slight tightness in my chest, and finally a horrible foggy, desperate feeling in the frontal lobe of my brain. It can be completely debilitating. I take the clonazepam to counter it and it normally does but I don't want to continue taking the benzos unless I absolutely have to. Switched PCP and have just started taking Busparin HCl. I never had these until the incident following the Zoloft, not even after the heart issue earlier in the year. Can anyone explain to me what I might be dealing with? Is the Busparin HCl going to help? Is the anxiety a symptom of depression of the depression a symptom of the anxiety. Any thoughts would be appreciated. God bless.

[Stress Mess]

Hello. I may be able to offer a little bit of clarity to your issue. After having a panic attack, it is common to feel quite anxious anticipating another attack and not knowing when it might happen. It sounds like the anxiety may have been triggered by your ER visit. Buspirone is a pretty safe med for anxiety as it is non-addictive. Because of this, however, you may not notice the effects until you have been taking the medication for several weeks. One thing to note is that if you are wondering whether or not you may have depression, avoid taking any benzos as these tend to trigger depression and may make things worse for you. Additionally, it may help if you get an assessment from a therapist or psychiatrist because they can do a more formal assessment and provide a clearer diagnosis. It sounds like you have more symptoms of anxiety than depression but many times they co-occur or one leads to the other. If you get a more accurate and comprehensive diagnosis then you can find the best medication that will not aggravate the symptoms of a condition you and your PCP are unaware that you have. Hope this helps and you begin to feel better soon!

[GSW]

Thank you for replying. I don't really feel any depression. Things are not perfect but I don't feel that they are really bad either. I just started the Buspar less than a week ago. By the second day I was more nervous than I had been in weeks so I cut the dosage in half. I am now taking 3.75 mg, three times daily. I am planning on increasing to the full 7.5 mg 3X daily after the first full week and my body has had a chance to adjust. I don't believe that I can give up the benzos just yet due to the extreme attacks that I am currently enduring. They have actually gotten worse since starting the Buspar. I wanted to quit at first but decided to reduce the dosage so that I could continue to take the medication. Is the increase in nervousness normal? Will the Buspar begin to work.

Thanks for your reply and I welcome any advice.