Day 12

I did not have any trouble sleeping last night. Since I have switched to taking the pill in the morning, most of the sleep problems have stopped.

With that said, I only got 6 hours asleep and woke up tired. For the first time in a few days, I did not feel like getting out of bed. But I forced myself out and slowly got ready for work. On Fridays, everyone goes into the office, so I did not work from home.

All morning I was yawning. I had a little bit of energy, probably fueled by the people around me, but I was really really tired. However, after lunch I felt a little better.

I noticed something today during my afternoon at work and this evening when I was debating going out with my friends. I have much more energy now when I am actually doing something or forcing my self to focus on something. Like I become productive when I actually focus on stuff at work and I actually have more energy (and more fun) when I am out interacting with my friends. However, the second I become distracted or become inactive, I crash. For example, the second I look out the window at work, I become really tired and find it hard to refocus. When I came home from work I sat down and became really tired on my couch to the point where I thought I would not go out tonight. I tried taking a nap for an hour and couldn't fall asleep, so I forced myself up and out of the house. As soon as I got to my friends, I had more energy. This tired feeling is the exact same as when I wake up and do not feel like getting out of bed.

This fluctuation in energy could be caused by my lack of good sleep late this week, but I do not know. I will be sleeping in tomorrow so I guess that will be able to tell me. Even though I am having these tired spells, I do feel like my energy has increase significantly from two weeks ago. So far the positives outweigh the negatives, but that is the point of me keeping track of my progress. Now that I am actually going to work and going out on the weekends, my next big test is going to the gym or try going jogging. That will take alot of energy to do, especially by myself, so we will see.

Day 11

Once I feel asleep I slept straight through until my alarm went off. I wanted to sleep in an extra hour, but once I was up, I couldn't fall back to sleep. I had a smaller breakfast (oatmeal and a banana) and took my 10 mg.

I worked from home today (no one goes in on Thursdays at my office). For the second day, I was not too productive but I did have energy. Once I did focus on work, I was able to get some stuff done in a short amount of time.

I have been feeling better everyday but I hope it isn't a placebo effect.

I noticed this a little last night before I went to bed, but I have had a drier mouth. I already drink a large amount of water, but my mouth is drier. This seems to be worse in the evenings and after I brush my teeth.

I am being put on a new project at work starting on Monday. I am not anxious...yet.

Update about me and my current situation

I did not want to include the information below with my day to day progress on lexapro. I do not want to mix my personal problems with my Lexapro experiences, since the point of this blog is to share my experiences with Lexapro, especially the side effects, and not turn this blog into me venting about my depression. With that said, I believe it is important to make notes where I feel I have made break throughs or changes with my depression so people can understand where I am coming from:

I think I have also found the source for my depression. Now its not like I have had a break through, because I have realized this for a while. The more doctors and the more friends I talk to the more obvious it becomes. I like being surrounded by people. I get my energy from working with and interacting with people. I do not get this with my current job or my current living situation.

In college, I was always stimulated by the large amounts of people I lived with / near. I always had something I could do and always had someone to do it with. Studying, projects, eating, going out, out door activities, working out, etc. I would have to purposely close my door when I wanted to be by myself. Now, I am living the exact opposite.

At work, most people are traveling or working from home. If I go in, its me and my office mate and we are lucky if one other person in our hall comes in that day. I am one of the first ones in (around 9 am) and I turn on all the lights in the kitchen and in my hall. My office mate comes in around 11 - noon. My company is very flexible with hours and working conditions, so I can also work from home. When I do that, I am by myself because my roommates also have 9 - 5 jobs.

I use to come home and go straight to the gym, by myself. Almost everyone at this gym speaks Spanish, so I am even more alone there. I didn't think I would mind this, since I am the type of guy that likes to get into the gym quick and be done with it. I use to go to the gym by myself at school and in my parents town and it was fine. However, I always knew people at these gyms. So though I was going by myself, I usually would run into people and still say hello.

At home, one of my roommates is gone before I get up and the other leaves around the same time as me, but we barely see each other. He is in shower when I am in the kitchen and vise-verse. In the evenings, one of my roommates stays in his room all the time while the other sits on the couch and is on his computer the entire time. We talk, but its small pointless talk. Its not like these roommates are strangers; they are friends / roommates from college. I just always had other people around that I never noticed how weird their social habits are. My other friends that did not go to college with me, think my current roommates are like hermits and again, I never noticed this because I always had other people around.

I told my therapist all this and she believes its time for me to quit my job. My family has been telling me this for a while, but its easier said than done. I am very anxious about telling my bosses I am quiting since they have been so good to me. At the same time, I tell myself I would quit in a heart beat if I had health insurance to last me between job transitions. I am also anxious about doing the interview process all over again and afraid of finding a new job and realizing the job is not the source of my problem.

Day 10 - First day of new therapist

Last night I went to bed with an awful headache. This kept me up for awhile. I took another Ibuprofen (I took one early that evening) and this did nothing. Knowing I had to get up early, I finally took a Xanax. This put me out. I don't want to rely on the xanax, but it has recently been my go to drug for sleep.

For the first time in a few nights, I had a pretty consistent night sleep. Though short (6 hours), I only woke up once between 1 am-ish to 7 am-ish. This is much better than the several times a night I have recently been experiencing. This maybe since I switched my pill schedule to the full ten mgs in the morning with no mgs in the evening, but I will not know for sure until a couple days.

I went to my new therapist today. I clicked much better with this individual, so I think its going to be good. She is out of network, so my insurance will only cover ten sessions in a year. I asked if I should space these sessions out over the year, or maybe just see her every other week. She said this was up to me, but she recommended that I see her consistently for the first month on a weekly basis to avoid that 'get to know you phase' each time I come in. Making sense, I will be seeing her once a week for the next month. Again, I cannot stress this more that Lexapro is my short term solution to my depression / anxiety while therapy is my long term solution.

During my initial consultation, she believed (like my psychiatrist) that lexarpo is the right drug for me. She believes I may have had anxiety all my life, but I was able to always deal with it since I was happy with my surroundings. She believes my panic attacks may have started because my body could not deal with the depression and the anxiety together. She said that very often these two problems piggy back off each other and can take someone down a bad spiral.

After therapy, I went to work and had a pretty good day. Now I was not productive at all, but I was happy and I had a good amount of energy. After work, I spent a few hours doing work around the house and went to bed. I laid in bed for awhile, watching TV, because I did not feel tired. I probably fell asleep around 1 30 am.

Day 9

It was very hard getting out of bed today. I ignored my alarm and did not realize it. Luckily I was at my parents, so my mother woke me up since she was leaving for work. However, this caused a very weird experience.  When my mother woke me up, I was very very confused. I had difficulty sleeping and mentioned before that I would be confused when waking up in the middle of the night, but this was different.  It took me awhile to adjust and realize where I was.  My Mother kept telling me, "its ok, its ok, you are at our house..." I finally snapped out of it and just felt really tired, but it was very weird.  It was like waking up standing up, I do not know how else to describe it.  Like when you get your wisdom teeth pulled, and the medicine used to knock you out is wearing off.  It was like that.  This tired feeling disappeared within 30 minutes and I decided to work from my parents house.

This is the first day of taking the full ten mgs in the morning with breakfast.  (I am not longer going to list what I have eaten because I haven't had problems mixing any food with this drug other than caffeine and alcohol).

My energy is still fluctuating up and down.  The ups are a little higher and I feel slightly more productive but my downs can really cause a crash.  The fatigue is no worse than before, but then I do not know what could be lower.  

I have noticed a slight decrease in appetite.  I am eating less often and less portions.  Nothing I am worried about, but something I thought I should share.  

This evening, I had a real rush of energy. I ate dinner around 7 pmish and  I re organized my entire room, which took several hours.  

I started having a headache around 10 PM. It started really hurting, so I took a Motrin IB (Ibuprofen), and tried going to bed. 

To make the rest of my posts time accurate, I am going to stop here and continue with my next day posts. 

I have caught up with my dates, so all future post will be current

For anyone reading this, the previous 9 days were posted by the day they occurred. For example Wed 18, 2009 postings occurred on Wed 18, 2009.   

I have now caught up with my dates and all the following records will reflect the previous night and current day, and I will write my post before I go to bed. I am sure it can be confusing when sometimes I am using words like today, yesterday, etc and I get lost with the days.  So now I will post things reflecting from when I go to bed, throughout the night, and the following day.  So any problems I have at night will be reflected accurately. 

Thanks and I hope my poor writing isn't too confusing. 

Day 8

I was exhausted when my alarm went off at 9 am.  I emailed my boss and said I would either be coming in late or working from home.  I went back to bed and was able to sleep straight from 9 15ish to 12 30ish.  This was the longest period of undisturbed sleep I had for that night.

When I finally got out of bed, I took a shower and started to feel like I had more energy. I was able to talk to my Doctor on the phone about the buzzing.  She recommended taking my dose only in the morning and trying the full ten mgs at once, rather than five in the morning and five at night. I was still suppose to take mine tonight, but to start taking the full ten tomorrow (Tuesday).  She also said stop taking the xanax each time unless I need it.

Though the day was half over, I still went into work.  This is a big step for me, because I am still anxious about going into the office since no one is ever really there and it just makes me more depressed. 

I had a semi productive day, but I think I was more motivated knowing I was only going to be there for four to five hours.  I did get tired in the middle of it, but again, I feel like this is from boredom. I decided to sleep at my parents house, hoping maybe change of environment could help my sleeping.  

I was able to easily fall asleep but I still occasionally would wake up. I have noticed that each time I wake up my vision is very blurry, I am pretty dizzy when  I open my eyes, and I can become very confused.  Once I realize where I am and what is happening (though I can still be pretty confused), I try and force my self to fall back to sleep.  If this does not work, I will take a xanax.  This night, I did not have to take the Xanax and was able to fall back to sleep each time, but I am not getting good rest and I am very frustrated that I cannot sleep straight.   

Day 7 - Research my sleep problem - sleep problems continue

After an awful nights sleep, I still woke up and took my prescribed xanax and lexapro.  Maybe I over did the xanax and that caused the buzzing, but I spent most of the day researching this problem.

Being Sunday, I could not call my Doctor about my experiences. My Aunt is an RN at a Hospital in New York.  I have continued to ask her questions about my experiences before and during lexapro. When she asked her doctor friends, they all said similar things about people experiencing buzzing when they are going through withdrawal from lexapro. I looked this up online, and sure enough, people complain about a buzzing when they are winding off lexapro.  

I had little energy today, probably because of my lack of sleep the previous night.  I only ate two meals, taking my pills with both and went to bed between 10 and 11 PM.

Problems from Previous night reoccur

Around 2 am, I suddenly woke up again with the ringing and buzzing.  It was awful. I also felt a shortness of breath, and I was so frustrated I felt like crying. I was beyond exhaustion and just wanted to sleep.  I felt like I was going to have a panic attack, so I took a xanax and tried to relax.  I eventually fell asleep, but I continuously awoke through out the night.  I am pretty upset because I use to feel good when I slept and is one of the few things I currently enjoy.

Day 6 - Real Sleep problems begin

I slept soundly, but woke up slightly dizzy around 12 30 PM. This went away after a few minutes. Though I did not do much, I felt like I had a little more energy than usual.  I took my medicine with lunch (too late for breakfast), and relaxed for most of the day.

I went out to an early dinner with my roommates, came home and took my lexapro and xanax.  Around 5 PM, I decided to take a nap, because I knew I was going out tonight.  Laying there, watching TV, I began to get tired but couldn't fall asleep.   I took a shower and got ready to go out. I took an extra xanax and brought some more with me when I left the house.

Altogether, the evening was fun.  I was not drinking, since my Doctor does not want me to drink alcohol or caffeine.  I was home by 2: 30 am and in bed by 3.

Real Sleep Problems began this night

I first woke up around 5 am.  I had an awful ringing in my ear.  I was at a bar earlier in the night with loud music, so I assumed it was from that. However, when I would try to fall back to sleep, the ringing turned into a buzz in my head... almost like my head was shaking from the inside.  Nothing violent, but I could slightly feel and definitely hear a buzz sound.  This would happen right as I could feel myself drifting off to sleep.  This kept me up for about 30 - 40 minutes, so I finally took a xanax and was able to fall asleep.  Between 7 am and 11 am I woke up numerous times. 

Day 5 - I actually went into work

I woke up a little before 8 am and took my xanax- lexapro combo. I felt tense and a little tired, but I felt confident that I would have a good day. I took a shower and ate a breakfast of two eggs, a bagel and a banana.

My tension increased as I drove to work. Listening to the radio, specifically talk shows, seems to relax me. I think talk radio gives me the false impression that someone else is there with me and I am apart of the conversation. However, by the time I parked my car, I was really panicky and did not want to get out of my car. I was not having a panic attack, but I could feel the tension getting worse and worse and I wanted to escape the situation and go home. I called my father who convinced me to ride it out and try to go into my office. I was by myself in the office and my tension would come and go. I took another xanax, did some controlled breathing, and began to relax. Within an hour more people started to arrive in the office (people come in between 9 30 and 11), and I started to feel more comfortable.

Other than my morning experience, my energy was up and I almost felt like normal me. My energy disappeared in the afternoon, but so did my office mate's. Our work is boring and we were practically done for the week.

I came home around 4 30 PM and tried to take a nap. I could not fall asleep, but I just laid on my bed watching TV.

I ate dinner with my pills. I was suppose to go to a birthday party, but I had no motivation or energy to go. I ended up watching a movie with my roommates and going to bed. I had no trouble sleeping.

Day 4 - 5 mg in morning, 5 mg at night

I continue with the same schedule as the previous day: I took a 5 mg dose with my .25 xanax with breakfast. I am continuing to work from home, since going into my office depresses me. No one is ever there anyways, since everyone chooses to work from home.

Through out the day I experiences ups and downs. My energy peaks and then falls back down. I compare it to a sugar high or caffeine rush where I am super excited, especially thinking, 'gee, this is really working!' followed by a crash and then wanting to take a nap.

My mood is more positive, but it is still hard to find the energy or motivation to do much.

I finally returned to my house and took my lexapro - xanax combo and went to bed. I am a little anxious because I am going to go into my office tomorrow, since a majority of people go in on Fridays. It will be the first time I have been there in over two weeks.

Forgot to mention during first three days

I forgot to mention, during these first couple days, I have had a weird high like feeling.  Like a bad marijuana high, like I was there, but I felt I was physically behind myself.  There is no other way to describe.  It was bearable but not enjoyable.  This feeling went eventually went away and only returns when I am occasionally really really tired.  

Day 3 - 5 mg in the morning, 5 mg at night

Around 10 AM, I took 5 mg plus .25 xanax with my breakfast. I have more energy than usual and have been able to accomplish more work than I have in awhile. This could be a placebo effect, but I do feel better than I did 24 hours ago.

I grow tired as the day goes by, maybe because of boredom with my work or maybe because I work alone. When this would happen, I would get up and walk around. This would temporarily relieve me, but I would again grow tired.

I ate dinner with my parents around 7 - 7 30, taking the same cocktail as before (5 mg plus .25 xanax with food) and relaxed before going to bed. Again, no disturbances of sleep.

Day 2 - 5 mgs at night

After getting off the phone with my doctor, I worked from home. I was tired most of the day and felt worse than I have in awhile. This most likely had to do with my lack of sleep and my body being introduced to Lexapro. I was confused, dizzy, and could not focus on the simplest of tasks. I was sick of being alone, so I went to my parents house for dinner and ended up spending the night there.

I took 5 mg of lexapro with a .25 mg of xanax during dinner. Small talking with my parents I regained some energy until I went to bed around 10 30 pm. I had no disturbances during my sleep and woke up around 9 am the next day.

Day 1 - 10 mgs

Trying to avoid any possible side effects by sleeping, I decided to take the 10 mg of Lexapro the night I was prescribed the medication rather than wait for the next morning. The instructions say "...anytime, with or without food...", so around midnight I took the pill and went to bed. I had no difficulty falling asleep, however, the drug was not yet in my system.

I woke up around 3:55 am with awful nausea, similar to hunger pains but 100 times worse. 20 minutes later, it became unbearable so I ate half of a banana and tried to fall back to sleep. 5:15 am rolled around and I was still unable to fall asleep and the same nausea was bothering me. Again, I went into the kitchen, this time eating half of a bagel. I climbed back into bed and remembered last looking at the clock at 5 :55 am before I finally fell asleep.

My alarm went off at 8 am, and I decided to sleep in until 9 30 am. I was able to reset my alarm and easily fall back to sleep. When I did wake up, I was in a daze but I believe this was caused by my lack of sleep the previous night.

I called my Psychiatrist and she recommended the following:

• divide the pill into two, taking 5 mgs in the morning and five in the evening
• since my prescription of xanax is so small (.25 mg), take a xanax whenever I feel anxious taking the pill
  
• always take the pill with food

My Prescription information

So you don't have to read through my background information if you don't want to, here is my basic information.  I will update my dose and times of taking these pills whenever it changes:

David.Lexapro@gmail.com

23 year old male

40 hour work week

Lexapro 10 mgs in the morning

Xanax .25 mgs when needed

Nexium 40 mg for stomach acid in the morning, but switching to Omeprazole soon

Told not to drink Alcohol and caffeine

Quick Background

Why I started this blog:

After being prescribed Lexapro (like anyone else reading this post), I decided to do some research about this drug. I was horrified to find that the internet is flooded with negative feedback, with continuing themes of "STAY AWAY FROM THIS DRUG", "I was better off before Lexapro", "...awful side-affects...withdrawl...", etc. After about two hours of reading individuals' scary encounters (enough to give anybody nightmares) I had to ask my self, Why would anyone take this horrific pill?

Needless to say, I called my Psychiatrist and she put things into prospective. Do a google search on almost any drug (Tylenol, Advil, etc) and you will find mostly bad reviews. And its true, we as a society rarely publicize the good, while openly complaining about the bad.

A week ago, I decided to start taking Lexapro. I am hoping this, combined with cognitive therapy, I can be happy and function normally once again. This first week has been a tough roller coaster and it is very hard to stay positive. I am experiencing those side effects that only "10% this" and "12% that" will experience, however, I have enjoyed a slight increase on my everyday mood and energy levels. With these negative side effects, I find myself waking up in the middle of the night searching online to see how people have dealt with these negative effects. But yet again, I only find the same haunting stories and I end up popping another xanax and finally, thankfully, fall back to sleep.

Well enough is enough. I am going to post my day to day experiences of what Lexapro is doing to my life. In a few weeks, I will hopefully be able to report how wonderfully Lexapro has cured my anxiety / depression or at least I will know, Lexapro is not for me. The point of this blog is simple. I want others to be able to see what Lexapro can do to an unbiased individual trying to get his life back. I would also appreciate any support and advice for me and any anyone reading this looking for help with their experiences on Lexapro.

Why I am on Lexapro / My Background:

I graduated college this spring (May, 2008) and luckily had a job lined up to start early July. Within a month of working, I moved out with some college friends (yet still close to home) and was enjoying life. Working, exercising, drinking coffee during the week, alochol on the weekends.

Come late August I had my first panic attack. I went to the hospital, thinking I was having heart problems, but everything was alright. The ER Dr. didn't even mention the word Panic attack. A week later I had a similar panic spell at work and my sister had to pick me up and take me the hospital again. After checking all my vitals and x-rays, the Dr. started talking to me about my stress levels. He said he couldn't diagnose my problem as panic attacks but that is what he believed was causing my problems. The next morning I saw my General Doctor and she prescribed Xanax.

September, October, November all flew by with a few stressful experiences but no panic attacks and no experiences where I felt necessary to take a xanax. I noticed a decrease in tolerance to coffee (going from a few cups a day to being able to barely down a cup) and I began experiencing a build up in phlegm when I would lift weights.

Come late December I started getting terrible hangovers from drinking alcohol. No matter how much water I drank the next day, I would have awful flu like symptoms and awful pain through out my entire body. Mid January, I barely would drink. It had gotten to the point where if I drank a beer, I would throw up an hour later.

Mid to late January is when I realized I needed help. I was taking a Xanax every other day and I was barely leaving the house. I had no energy, I was always tired and looked forward to going to bed every evening. Being able to work from home, I never went into my office and took naps during the day. I could no longer concentrate on simple tasks and couldn't even look at a page long enough to read a book. I stopped going to the gym and I never went out on the weekends with my friends. If I had to leave my house, I would get one of my roommates to drive because I was afraid of driving any where by myself in the car. I was always tense behind the wheel since I am so tired, afraid I will pass out or get stuck some where and no one will be able to help me.

Not wanting medication, I tried seeing a therapist PH.d. After two sessions, I was not clicking with this individual and am about to start with a new one. At the same time, I tried acupuncture and some herbal medicines. Though the acupuncture was relaxing and the Dr. was very helpful, I still had zero energy and was very unhappy.

So I finally saw a psychiatrist. After an hour session I felt very comfortable and on the same level as she. She believes that I have a mild case of depression with some general anxiety. She is the one who has recommended and prescribed my Lexapro. She warned of the some side effects: nausea and lowered sex drive. She mentioned others but I was so tired that I don't remember all of them. She has also put me in contact with a Psychologist who is more my age.

Useful Links:

I will add links as I find them, please do the same:

General Information

• http://www.plunk.org/~grantham/public/lexapro.html
• http://depression.emedtv.com/lexapro/lexapro.html
• http://www.pdrhealth.com/drugs/rx/rx-mono.aspx?contentFileName=Lex1642.html&contentName=Lexapro&contentId=303
• http://www.dizzytimes.com/forumdisplay.php?s=72fc393946c381f948a057deb9188508&f=20
• http://blog.mrmedsaver.com/2009/02/from-weasel-drug-rep-use-my-100-drug.html
  

Alcohol related:

• http://depression.emedtv.com/lexapro/alcohol-and-lexapro.html

Sexual Side effects:

• http://depression.emedtv.com/lexapro/lexapro-sexual-side-effects.html
• http://clinpsyc.blogspot.com/2006/12/sexual-side-effects-of-ssris-even-more.html
• http://www.drugs.com/forum/featured-drugs/how-overcome-lexapro-sexual-side-effects-41717.html