Meds, Meds, Meds!

There are generally three types of opinions when it comes to mental medication. First there is the anti medication movement. These are people who believe that medication is poison and created solely for the purpose of drug companies to turn a profit. They believe that we are slaves to the government and it's corrupt drug companies. They do not take medication and feel others would follow suit.

Then there is the pill popper movement. This movement is the extreme opposite of the anti medication movement. These people feel all mental illness sufferers need medication. They feel people should take the medication in spite of severity of symptoms. They believe drugs make everything better.

Then there is a group of people that are neither anti medication or pill poppers. They feel there is truth to both parties but the also false beliefs in both parties. Kind of like political parties, where things are lied about and misrepresented and you have to weed out the truth.  These people feel medication can be helpful but do not agree to the concept that everyone needs to be medicated. There are diagnoses that require medication for stability. There is nothing wrong with that. There are some that do not need medication and there is nothing wrong with that either. What has happened is between the movements of these beliefs the mental illness sufferer is confronted with unfair judgments. You are judged if you do not need medication and judged if you do. It's a damned if you do , damned if don't situation and it is unfair.

Medication is not an easy out. Not only is it a coin toss which ones will work, you also have to combat the side effects they can cause. You have to deal with dosages and refills. Deal with others snickering about what types of medications you are on. You may have months or even years of being a guinea pig to find out what if any medications work for you. It is not easy.

Not needing medication is not an easy out. Without medication there can be other issues such as panic attacks or other symptoms that are hard to control or foresee. It is not easy to combat your mental issues without the help of a medicinal aid and only go with therapy. It is hard work to constantly be aware of your issues.

Both medication and not medicating are very hard roads to go down. They both take bravery and strength. Neither one is better than the other. Neither one is an easier situation. We should stop making judgments on those who medicate and those who don't. It doesn't matter, we both suffer.

I have been medicated on and off all of my life. I had many side effects and issues that I dealt with. I also had mixed results of effectiveness.

These are a list of medications I was put on and my side effects. This is my experience and may not reflect other people's experiences. Many of these medications did not work for me that does not mean they will or will not work for others.


My first mental medication was a little triangular blue pill. I have no idea what it was or what it was supposed to do. I was in the mental hospital in the children's ward. We all were different and I know I was the only one who suffered from OCD. However, it is my belief most of these kids did not suffer from mental illness. Many were truant and compulsive liars or kids that ran with the wrong crowd. A few simply threw fits. They were not what I would class as suffering from anything that was admitting worthy. Neither was I. I was admitted because my doctor and the hospital was fraudulent. They lied to parents and scared them. Then we were kept until our insurance ran out. Every night we all had to line up at the water fountain and take the little blue pill. Then a nurse would inspect our mouths to make sure we swallowed it. We all did because we did not want to spend the night in restraints or the "quiet" room. A room that was white and consisted of only a bare mattress, that we would be locked in if we did not follow the rules. I believe that this was a drug trial. There is no reason we all had to take the same pill. I believe it was also illegal. Illegal because my parents were not told that I was being medicated. They never were informed or signed anything that would allow the hospital to do so. They were shut down for fraud a few years later. I was ten.

At fourteen I had my actual diagnoses and was put on Prozac. I was only on this medication for about three months. I do not remember it doing anything for my OCD but I do remember it causing me to become extremely manic and hyper. I had hot flashes so bad that I would stand out in the snow in shorts and a tank top and still sweat. I developed twitches and became fidgety. I looked more like an intravenous drug user rather than a fourteen year old who was trying medication.

At sixteen I was put on Luvox. It really didn't seem to help me with the OCD issues as I became more concerned with washing my hands. I washed them until they cracked and bled and burned. My hair started to fall out and I gained a gorgeous receding hairline. My nails became so brittle that they would break off to the quick and cause me agonizing stinging in my fingers. I also dealt with such constipation that my stomach bloated and I became unable to eat much due to the constant stomach pain. I do not remember how long I was on this medication exactly but I do believe it was around three years.

Then they prescribed me a low dose of Xanax. It made me unable to function. I started drooling and falling asleep. I was unable to stay awake. I was taken off of it right away.

I started self medicating with St.John's Wort at the insistence of my ex husband. It did not work and I became much worse.(NEVER SELF MEDICATE)

I was then placed on Depakote. A seizure medication that they felt would make me less prone to anxiety and intrusive thoughts. They were right, I no longer had anxiety or intrusive thoughts because I became basically an Alzheimer's patient. I lost all reality. I was missing days and losing time. I was confused and scared. I became angry and irrational. I could not remember how to function on my own. I was unable to speak certain words as if my mind had erased them from my vocabulary. I could no longer comprehend what was going on around me. I was twenty years old.

I was then put on Zoloft. It seemed to calm me a bit. My only side effect was weight gain. It did not work as well as I had hoped.

Then I was placed on Riseperdal. I was told it was a seizure medication but I learned later it is used to treat schizophrenia and bipolar. I am not Bipolar or Schizophrenic. I assume that is why the doctor told me it was a seizure medication so I would try it.  Again they felt that this would help me. I became confused. I  lost time again. The worst part of this drug was that I became dizzy and faint with no warning. I would just be walking and fall over. I would feel like I was going to pass out and my legs would completely collapse on me. I believe I was on it for about two months.

Back to Zoloft. I was again placed on Zoloft as it worked to a degree and my side effects were limited. I stayed on it for around five years.

After my first child was born I developed OCD Postpartum. Zoloft did nothing for this. My then psychiatrist who was unfamiliar with OCD suggested Haldol......Seriously. I was terrified. I suggested a pill I had heard had great reviews and I was able to try it instead. It worked.

Celexa was by far the best medication I had taken. It made my intrusive thoughts and images become much quieter and less. However, the dosage I was taking and had built up to was highly dangerous. I was taking four times the dosage the UK recommends as safe. I was taking twice the recommended safe dosage from the US. And I did so for ten years. Not realizing that my medication at that high of a dose could stop my heart.

So I am no longer medicated. The only drug that I found that worked for me is not able to help me because my tolerance is too high. I have tried a lot of medications but this is fairly common as we try to find what helps us. Right now my OCD is under control so I do not feel the need to take medication. That does not mean that I will always be that way.

Basically what this post is about is to show that whether we are on medications or not that the road we walk down is a twisted and bumpy one. There are no easy answers. There is no magical power that makes every issue go away. That either way, we are dong the best we can to function.

Some people need medication and they should not be judged for it. You have no idea the hell side effects can place on a person. It's hard work to find something that works without making you completely miserable at the same time. It could take weeks, months, or even years to find the right one.

Those that do not take medication should not be judged either. Most of us have tried medication and we all have our reasons for doing so. I am not biased on this issue because I tried medications for many years and I have also been medication free. Both ways are hard. Both ways are challenging.

The most important part is to be open and honest with your doctors. It is important to take medications if they say you need to. It also is important, in my opinion, to research the drug you were prescribed and keep an eye out for updates on side effects. That way you are knowledgeable about what you are putting in your body and can talk to your doctor about it. Ask questions! Always ask your doctor about any and all concerns you have. That is their job. Getting off of your medications without your doctor's advice and consent is dangerous and should never be done.

We need to stop being divided on this issue. Whether you take medications or don't we both suffer. We both are equally mentally ill. We need to stop judging each other. We need to support each other. After all, who knows how we suffer better than ourselves?

Neurotic Nelly

The Devil's In The Details.....

After midnight I spent an hour or so laying my head on the bathtub edge, my feet under me in an angle, wrapped in a blanket, with the air on, in the dark,with the door shut, next to my toilet. I had a severe migraine, again. When I sit up I am in danger of redecorating my furniture with the items I last ate and when I lie down my nausea is gone but my head feels like hot pokers are being shoved into my eye sockets. My migraines are debilitating and I try not to cry because crying only makes the pain worse. So I lay there in the quiet, dark, cold room and will my pain medication to wash over my body and relieve me of this hell.


I have been not medicated for almost two years now. I am not a doctor and I do not suggest going off your medications without the help of your doctor. Medications can be life saving in my case when I started taking this one it actually, I believe, saved me from myself. I had been on several other medications for my OCD since the age of fourteen. After I experienced my postpartum OCD  I was told by my psychiatrist that he wanted to put me on an anti-psychotic medication which I was appalled at and told him I would rather try something else I had heard had great reviews. I wanted to try Celexa. I had no bad side effects to report,in fact I thought this drug was amazing. For me it literally got me over the postpartum OCD and greatly helped with my regular OCD. Gone were the days of severe anxiety. Gone were the times of sitting and crying curled up in a ball from my intrusive thoughts. I felt, for the first time in my life, stable. This must be what normal people feel like, was all that ran through my mind.

I realized that celexa took away the details. It numbed me to them, which is what helped my OCD. You see, for me the devil is in the details. I am distracted by textures, smells, dirt I see that no one else notices. It made me numb towards them. No longer did I try to clean grout with a toothbrush and bleach for hours. I simply ceased to care. I ceased to feel a lot of things. It wasn't unpleasant that finally I was able to be more functional.

That being said ten years later I was having an issue with my insurance. I knew that I was going to loose it and have to fight for it so I started to wean myself off my medication. I don't suggest that other people do this without a doctors permission. I was off of them for six months when my insurance was approved and then I started slowly back on them. After taking 5 mg a day for a week my husband saw a post from the UK that my medicine had killed people due to a rare arrhythmia.  People would be walking have no idea something was wrong and just drop dead. No warnings that they were aware of. I promptly took my medication and flushed it down the toilet. I did this because the UK paper said any dose over 20mgs was dangerous. After much research I found the the American dosage over 40mgs was dangerous. I was on, are you ready for this, 80mgs. I had been on 80mgs for ten years.

Now, some of this is my fault. I was given 80 mgs by my psychiatrist and after about two years I stopped going to him and went to my regular doctor and she would prescribe the dosage since I had a script. My folly was not realizing that a general practitioner may not know when the dosage rules for mental medications change. So I had no idea I was possibly poisoning myself. I had an EKG done and I do not have an arrhythmia.

However, after two years of not being medicated I am back to the older OCD me. I occasionally have panic attacks and I suffer anxiety. I have mood swings because I can become more easily aggravated. I have through therapy done rather well maintaining my OCD. It's not perfect, but what is? I am as functional as I can be right now and I happy with my progress. If I thought otherwise I would seek attention immediately.

The details are back and I believe that although they can bother me, I am happy to be able to "feel" my emotions. Although, I do miss the "stable" feeling that I was getting used to.  I do have some major issues since I have stopped the celexa and I believe that taking the medication may have altered something in my brain. I am not a doctor so I can not be positive but the only thing that has changed drastically in my life, is stopping my meds.

 I do not remember withdraw symptoms. I think I sweated a lot. No pains or aches. No being sick to my stomach. I really do not remember any adverse reactions. However, even after two years I have migraines. Earth shattering migraines that make me unable to function. Before I stopped celexa I have never had a migraine. Ever.

I spend much more time on my bathroom floor pleading for mercy. I now, have migraines once every three to six months. I have no idea what triggers them, just that they happen randomly and when they do I will suffer like I have never suffered before. I have no advance warning. I have no reason why. The migraines usually last twenty four hours and then mysteriously fade away. It is a living hell when they arrive and continues to be a living hell until they leave.

My other issue is that I cry. Not when I am sad or stressed. I have some inappropriate emotional response to things that make me cry. Not tear up, mind you, cry like a baby. Commercials, something nice said to me, a kind gesture can all make me cry. My husband now will watch me when we are watching a movie and see if I am going to wipe tears away. It chokes me up when talking and I find it highly embarrassing. I have always been a sensitive person but this is ridiculous, even for me. It is not a wanted emotion and it makes no commons sense what I am crying about. I once cried about a commercial that was a little boy reading a book. It wasn't sad. There was no sob story background. It was a commercial about reading and I had a waterfall coming out of my eyes and my voice cracked as I tried to talk.  It happens quite often and so I avoid sad facebook stories, sad movies, stories, or try to limit anything overly emotional  looking to when I am alone. That way I feel less embarrassed. This also started when I stopped taking celexa and had never happened before.

I am grateful that I took celexa when I needed it most. I really think it saved my life at that time, but in turn it could have killed me. I am grateful that I am no longer on it and that I still can maintain a semi-normal life. All I can offer is to please research your medications and keep track of what is being said about the safe doses. I do not know if the crying and migraines will every go away. It has been two years and they are still present in my life. I guess I will have to wait and see. The devil is in the details and I am afraid that I didn't pay enough attention to the details and may now always suffer for it. I can live with the migraines and the crying, but it could have been much worse. It could have been the arrhythmia and I might not have lived at all.


I'm not warning against taking celexa, in my case it was the only medication that ever truly worked for me. I am not saying you should take it either. I am saying that you need to be aware of all medications and their side effects. That you need to keep up with your doctor and make sure they know the current information. Research and educate and never stop updating yourself. Stay safe.

Neurotic Nelly