Moderate Anxiety turns into full blow Anxiety

[Tiki]

Hi everyone,
First off I'd like to introduce myself, I am 30 years old and since last December I could for the most part keep my anxiety and depression on a leash, but something happened last year that changed everything, I developed chronic pain where I can't sit or lay on my back, there are treatments available that could or could not work, and if all else fails I am faced with surgery which will accompany a very long and painful recovery and about 70-85% success rate. My anxiety has been off the roof, I have muscle stiffness all over my body, more so on the right side of my face and back. pinching pains in my legs and my right eye, overall weakness, panic attacks, and overwhelming anxiety and depression. Doctors tell me all of these symptoms are from anxiety as it all began about a month after I started to experience my chronic pain. I worry that it could be MS or some type of other disease, I can't relax much without anxiety meds, and I just switched to citalopram 10mg from celexa 10mg, I really hope that this switch helps to bring down my anxiety level where I can stop constantly worrying.

Tiki the sufferer.

[mrslizzyg]

Hey there Tiki! My name is Lindsey. Nice to meet you.

I don't have a lot of advice for you but I wanted to welcome you here! There are a lot of people here that can relate to you on this forum, I'm sure of it.

[needtogetwell]

Hi Tiki,

Welcome to the forum.

I am the self proclaimed Queen of the back pain around here.

I know exactly how you are feeling and exactly how the anxiety spikes so badly with the pain, reading your story could have been reading my own.

A bit of background, 3 herniated disks in low back. L2-3, L4-5, L5-S1. Also there is stenosis in there. I thought that surgery was going to be my only option. Well guess what? 2.5 years later, no surgery and I have very little pain. Once in a while it acts up but that's pretty rare.

I would be happy to tell you how I got to where I am today, also the anxiety is almost entirely gone too.

Just know that there is a light at the end of this tunnel you are in, you just haven't found it yet, but you will!

Cheers for now!
Pam