supersized
07-13-2016, 12:38 PM
Hi everyone,
Though I've been dealing with terrible anxiety now for about 6 months, I'm finally taking definitive steps in helping to address it. Here's my story, wonder if anyone can relate. I had an anxiety or panic attack (not sure about the difference between the two still) after taking 102 mg of Concerta to help me study. Terrible, naive decision, I know. If I could go back and not take it, I would, but I also wonder if it just brought out inner anxieties that I always had but chose not to address. I also believe that my anxiety hasn't been overly prohibitive, and that I can return to my "normal" levels within a few years.
Anyways, shortly after taking the Concerta, I was having ridiculous head rushes and an elevated heart rate and thought I might have been having a stroke. For the next 3 or 4 months, I had non-stop lightheadedness, prolonged tingling in my scalp/head, as well as random stints where I felt my heart racing, almost as though I was having a heart attack. Because of this, I have had extensive head and heart tests done and everything has come back fine. No brain damage, heart damage, or stroke. The neurologist I saw was only able to recommend small doses of Lexapro, which I took it for a while but felt no real difference while on, so I stopped taking it. Fast forward to today, and the lightheaded sensation has mostly gone, except during the night, when I often get a hypnic jerk and am unable to sleep for hours. The days after I have trouble sleeping, I usually have a mild headache and a little bit of lightheadedness.
Instead, I now experience terrible anxiety, guilt, and fear. So often it is from stuff that I know for fact I would have not worried about just a year ago. I am always feeling as though I need to "resolve" these problem somehow or convince myself that it is not a problem, and this can become an obsession. Here is a list of some, but not all of the things that give me this anxiety...
-A reckless driving charge I got simply for speeding in a draconian state gives me anxiety because:
-I worry that I might be unable to find a job I want or get into a desirable law school, even though I have read from multiple places this charge won't affect anything
-I worry that I am somehow driving on a suspended license even though I already took a defensive driving course after the charge
-I worry that if my housemates throw a party at my house next year, I will get a noise violation and that will further harm my chances at anything
-Not having work this summer because of the lost motivation to apply to jobs:
-I feel like I am super behind in the rat race to find employment
-My parents are pissed/disappointment and not really sympathetic to my circumstances
-Forgetting to pay rent on time and losing my housing or getting served papers or something... idk
-Random small things like having my house get robbed while I'm not there
-That I won't be able to achieve my life ambitions, including somehow ending up loveless and alone
-My loved ones' health and well-being will terrorize me. Even if someone has cough, my mind jumps to seriously dark conclusions
Okay, that's all I can think of right now that's bothering me, and I'm not sure what the point of this post is, but I definitely needed to get all this information in one place and have it read. Writing this post itself was therapeutic, probably in realizing that there is more-or-less an end to the list of things that haunts me. I've also realized that I mostly have anxiety about things that COULD go wrong, not things that have gone wrong. This to me is the worst, because if something does go wrong, I can never know how terribly wrong it will go.
Going to start reading through this forum and figuring out what I can do, but I really needed to post this. Hope you all understand.
Though I've been dealing with terrible anxiety now for about 6 months, I'm finally taking definitive steps in helping to address it. Here's my story, wonder if anyone can relate. I had an anxiety or panic attack (not sure about the difference between the two still) after taking 102 mg of Concerta to help me study. Terrible, naive decision, I know. If I could go back and not take it, I would, but I also wonder if it just brought out inner anxieties that I always had but chose not to address. I also believe that my anxiety hasn't been overly prohibitive, and that I can return to my "normal" levels within a few years.
Anyways, shortly after taking the Concerta, I was having ridiculous head rushes and an elevated heart rate and thought I might have been having a stroke. For the next 3 or 4 months, I had non-stop lightheadedness, prolonged tingling in my scalp/head, as well as random stints where I felt my heart racing, almost as though I was having a heart attack. Because of this, I have had extensive head and heart tests done and everything has come back fine. No brain damage, heart damage, or stroke. The neurologist I saw was only able to recommend small doses of Lexapro, which I took it for a while but felt no real difference while on, so I stopped taking it. Fast forward to today, and the lightheaded sensation has mostly gone, except during the night, when I often get a hypnic jerk and am unable to sleep for hours. The days after I have trouble sleeping, I usually have a mild headache and a little bit of lightheadedness.
Instead, I now experience terrible anxiety, guilt, and fear. So often it is from stuff that I know for fact I would have not worried about just a year ago. I am always feeling as though I need to "resolve" these problem somehow or convince myself that it is not a problem, and this can become an obsession. Here is a list of some, but not all of the things that give me this anxiety...
-A reckless driving charge I got simply for speeding in a draconian state gives me anxiety because:
-I worry that I might be unable to find a job I want or get into a desirable law school, even though I have read from multiple places this charge won't affect anything
-I worry that I am somehow driving on a suspended license even though I already took a defensive driving course after the charge
-I worry that if my housemates throw a party at my house next year, I will get a noise violation and that will further harm my chances at anything
-Not having work this summer because of the lost motivation to apply to jobs:
-I feel like I am super behind in the rat race to find employment
-My parents are pissed/disappointment and not really sympathetic to my circumstances
-Forgetting to pay rent on time and losing my housing or getting served papers or something... idk
-Random small things like having my house get robbed while I'm not there
-That I won't be able to achieve my life ambitions, including somehow ending up loveless and alone
-My loved ones' health and well-being will terrorize me. Even if someone has cough, my mind jumps to seriously dark conclusions
Okay, that's all I can think of right now that's bothering me, and I'm not sure what the point of this post is, but I definitely needed to get all this information in one place and have it read. Writing this post itself was therapeutic, probably in realizing that there is more-or-less an end to the list of things that haunts me. I've also realized that I mostly have anxiety about things that COULD go wrong, not things that have gone wrong. This to me is the worst, because if something does go wrong, I can never know how terribly wrong it will go.
Going to start reading through this forum and figuring out what I can do, but I really needed to post this. Hope you all understand.