Looks like it has worked out famously.

 

Talk to your doctor, there are others you can take that may not affect you that way.

 

I took Zoloft for about a year or so and took myself off it.

They said sex drive would drop but I had an opposite reaction and was horny 24/7 which caused other problems (yeap too much sex is just as bad). I hated the shit because I had no emotions anymore at all.

Things were going shitty? Who cares I just keep smiling
Things going great? Who cares I have the same dopey smile on my face as if things were going shitty.

Made me a fucking zombie with no variance in mood or emotion. I have begun to wonder if depression is a hype thing with 80% of people diagnosed with it and the pills are just to keep people in a docile mode.

 

I think that being on antidepressants alone is not very helpful--from personal experience and by reading studies.

Counseling + antidepressants has shown to be a ton more effective.

 

I think there are a few factors. With the advent of Prozac, which was fairly safe (and hard to overdose on) GP's felt that prescribing these sorts of drugs is fine and dandy. Before that the antidepressants and drugs of the sort were very dangerous (remember when a bunch of people died by combining an MAOI with cheese?). This can be seen with the ritalin boom in the early 90s (prozac was introduced to market in 1986 I believe).

Then you have the insurance companies which would rather have you take a pill than go for expensive counseling. And shopping around for a GOOD counselor that works. They would rather have people take a pill which they know will work within ____ weeks and have little variation in a patient's reaction.

And then you have the pharmaceutical companies. They are like any industry and want to make money. They would love to have the entire globe diagnosed as depressed. It would keep their pockets lined. There's a very good reason I have chosen to not become a pharmacist. I couldn't live with myself knowing that the reason I am making a large amount of money is due to not my ability to help people, but to be used in selling people lies.

Oh, and the FDA is not doing its job of protecting the consumer. Drugs that are ineffective are being passed because the pharmaceutical industry and the FDA are buddies.

And then there are the patients. Taking a pill is easier than taking action. It's easier to say, "I have a chemical imbalance" than to say, "I have a chemical imbalance because I am doing something wrong." Hello Cholesterol commercials? It's not that you're a fatass and eat poorly--it's because your mom and dad were fatasses that ate poorly as well. Bummer. People don't want to blame themselves, especially a person that's already depressed. Although that's what they ultimately have to do if they want to get better. Not directly, but they have to own up to some hard facts about how they are thinking, acting and reacting.

In recent years it's become "okay" to take drugs for depression, but you are more crazy if you go to see a counselor.

And I could go on and on.

 

It's true. I saw a therapist for about...6 months and people would take agasp to it. Then when I said "I'm also on antidepressants" they would just say "oh."

The characteristic smile. My ex-roommate brought his g/f to stay for a night at my apartment while still in school. She asked shortly after I met her "Are you on antidepressants?" I asked, "Yes how did you know" and she responded, "You have this constant grin on your face."

Then there was the 2 weeks I couldn't fill my prescription. I couldn't sleep because I would hallucinate, I couldn't stay awake because I would hallucinate, I barely ate because I was nervous...jesus.

Although therapy was suppose to help, it just reinforced what I believed was the source of my depression. Although I was unsure of when I "became" depressed, we did realize that it was building up to this moment.

I'm just glad instead of saying "That's life!" and going the rest of my life depressed, I took action and yes it involved drugs - but they worked and I'm glad that it's over.

 

To continue...

What amplified my depression was school. There was so much pressure on me to succeed and do well that I couldn't make mistakes. So I would lay in bed all night and just worry, worry about school, about the future, about money, about this and that, about school, about the future...So I started to develop an anxiety disorder. And all this worrying just made it worse because I couldn't focus on school but just worry about it.

So because I couldn't focus, I started to do bad, when I did bad, I got even more nervous. The more nervous I got the less focus I had and it resulted in me just giving up and letting it get worse.

A terrible, terrible positive feedback loop that I wish on nobody. Once I started taking therapy and she tried to get me out of the anxiety loop by making me realize that yes, I can make mistakes, mistakes can be corrected - I have my entire life to figure out what to do. This broke that anxiety loop I was in. Then the prescription helped me train my focus on school. The spring semester I started the prescription I was loaded down with the most work I've had my college career. I blew it up: assignments turned in on time with in-depth analysis, term papers were stress but completed, etc and I was actually making the effort again.

 

Find a natural solution? St Johns Wort is a herbal antidepressent... with... from what I understand.. no side effects. Or combat your problem in a healthy way. Exercise.. meditation.. etc.

Antidepressents = No effing good.

 

im on effexor right now for social anxiety and depression...I just can't find a medicine that works...ive been on paxil/zoloft/lorazepam...none of them work...they just make me sleep all the time....I need to talk to a therapist but I don't know where to begin

 

do these meds help out shyness and fear of public places h: