How Zoloft helped me realize I was depressed, and alleviate my social anxiety.

So, I have been gone a long stretch of time lately and a lot has happened int that time.

The title might be a little bit confusing considering I have stated many a time that I am very against drugs, prescribed or other wise, but I will get into detail what caused my jump from trying to naturally alleviate my anxiety to medically alleviate it in another post. This post in all about how Zoloft helped me realized I was/am depressed.

Okay so I'm going to jump right into it. About a month before I graduated college (Yay for me, I actually did it!) I went to a doctors appointment an actually talked to my doctor about my anxiety which was a big deal. After we spoke for a bit she wanted prescribe me with Zoloft to try and help my anxiety, and while I was little bit apprehensive, I decided to try it because at that point I was so fed up with how my anxiety was acting up and the herbs I was using just weren't doing enough. She prescribed me with 25MG because of my height and weight and she didn't want to overwhelm my body I guess.

I stayed on these for 4 weeks before I went back for a check in, check up. The 25MG didn't do anything for me except make me the drowsiest I have ever been in my life, and give nausea. My nausea was so strange too, I would sporadically get nauseous through out the day, and also when I laughed. It was the strangest sensation to fell nauseous because of a laugh. Luckily the nausea cleared up after week three, unluckily the 25MG's didn't do anything for the SA.

When I went in for my check in, I told all of this to my doctor and she suggested  try out 50MG for another four weeks and come back in with another round of check ups. I was not optimistic after having failed with 25MG and having read so many stories about how sometimes Zoloft only works for certain people.

Boy, was I surprised. The first thing I noticed that it severely lessened was my depression. I knew that I would become depressed sometimes but I had no idea to what extent I was depressed until I started taking Zoloft and I wasn't as depressed anymore. I think I was so used to living with it that I didn't even notice that something was wrong. The differences I felt in myself were shocking, because I hadn't even realize the my depression was a part of the problem because I was so focused on my SA.

 I noticed a difference in my attitude towards myself and others. I realized how much more lighter I felt, I can't even pin point the exact things it changed I just know that overall I felt so much better  about myself and my situation.

It also helped with my SA. I work for my sister now (we'll get int that in another post) and she was always pushing me to make these calls so certain clients and I would just refuse to do it because my SA would not allow me to, but on Zoloft while I wasn't comfortable and the anxiousness was still there, I was at least able to actually call them.I was also able to walk into a store or order something at a restaurant without freaking out on the inside. I felt a lot more in control of my life, and my decisions.

I'm not saying that it was a cure, I still had anxiety and depression, but it did help me out a lot with having some sort hold on my life, and since I have had SA since as far back as I can remember that was a big deal to me, I had never felt like that before.

Even though the Zoloft had helped me tremendously I am no longer taking it. I took the 50MG's for about a month and a half before I stopped. There are a multitude of reasons why I stopped, which I will get into in another post where I will update my personal life.

I also want to address the brain zaps. I remember reading about the zaps happening when taking Paxil but I can't remember if I read about them happening on Zoloft, but for me they did happened. It's so hard to explain the exact feeling, it doesn't hurt, it kind of feels like feels like of you squeeze your eyes closed very tightly and tighten your whole body to the point where it starts to shake. Except it's that feeling only in you head. lol that's the only way I can think to describe it. It's such a strange feeling. They happened about two weeks after I stopped taking them, and only last about two weeks as well. They were very random, at first I didn't connect the zaps to the Zoloft, I wasn't really keeping track, so I can't say exactly how many times they happened.

I am kind of sad that I no longer feel the same way I did when taking the Zoloft because when  stopped I actually noticed how depressed I am, and how bad my SA can be.

It sucks having both SA and depression and I found this post which put into words what I have been feeling my whole life:

talesfromagirlwithsad.tumblr.com

Pass me the herbs please!

Before I lay out the specifics of my plan with self medicating, I just want to say that I am in no way telling people to copy what I am doing. I have decided to do this on my own with out the help of any doctors or therapists involved.

Now I would also like to say that I know there is no magic cure for SAD. I know that I'm not going to wake up tomorrow suddenly a different person. My goal is to reach a point where my anxiety level is manageable enough for me to get a job. That is my ultimate goal, getting a job and working towards being more independent and moving out of my sisters house.

As I said in my last post, in my research about medication to help treat SAD I came across this article: socialanxietydisorder.about.com/treatmentoptions

After reading up on each of these herbs, I decided to try a combination of Chamomile, Valerian root, and Rhodiola rosea.

I know that there are medications the help with dealing with social anxiety, but I am personally really against medication. So before I try any prescription medication I would like to try a natural remedy.

Part One

The first part of my self medicating plan (SMP) is to take each of the herbs listed above daily.

I ordered these a couple of days ago, and I just received them yesterday. I ordered them from pureformulas.com they have free shipping and the prices are really low. I would have just gotten them from Amazon but because I am a vegetarian I had to do a little searching around for vegetarian capsules. The brands I ordered are Nature's Answer for the chamomile, 650mg. Nature's Way for the Valerian root, 530mg, and Now for the Rhodiola, 500mg.

Although the backs of the bottles suggest taking more than one capsule, or taking it more than once a day I'm just going to ignore that lol. Because I am taking these all together and not alone, I think that if I were to take more than one of each I might be over doing it. The only that I might take two of is the chamomile because its the one I'm most familiar with.

The bottle of rhodiola says to take it before bed, because I suppose it makes you drowsy but I think I might do a trial taking it in the morning with rest of them and see how I feel after a week. If I'm to drowsy then I'll switch it to night time.

I think that taking these daily will help decrease my anxiety.
Onto part two.

Part Two

Part two of my SMP is to start to eat right again. I don't think I can fight my anxiety with out getting my mind and body on the right track. I used to eat very good until I moved in with my sister and started to feel like my move was being watched. Now I just hurry up and make what ever will take the shortest amount of time and go back to my room. I Need to get back to the way I used to eat.

Part two of my plan involves eating healthier foods, and drinking more water. A while ago after I did the lemon cleanse I stopped eating preservatives and artificial colors. I would like to get back to this way of eating. My ultimate goal is to eat majority of fruits and vegetables for all my meals. Because I'm already a vegetarian this would not be that hard of goal to reach. I was raised a vegetarian and have never tasted meat or fish in my life.

The only problem with this is that I don't feel comfortable eating the food in my sisters house, so I'm going to figure out a way to be able to pay for the fruits and vegetables I want to eat.

I really think this combined with the herbs will go long way in reducing my anxiety.  I think that I'm going to have to work from the inside out to get the results I want, and that's going to start with eating healthier.

Part Three

Part three of my SMP is to start doing yoga again. For me, yoga works as a way to calm mind.

I used to do yoga all the time until I moved, and the house was to crowded, and I didn't really feel comfortable doing it in front of any of the members of my family. So I stopped. But now that we moved into this bigger house and I semi have some privacy in the room I share, I think that I would be able to find the time to start again.

The only way I'm going to be able to get a handle on my anxiety is to calm my mind. The three things that work in calming my mind are yoga, reading, drawing/painting, crafting and other art related stuff, and daydreaming (maladaptive daydreaming to be exact, but we'll get into that another time). Because I already do the other two I think I need to add yoga back into the mix.

Not only does it relax my mind, but it also relaxes my body. Which will also be big help because my shoulders are always so tense because of my SA.

I really believe that that these three in combination will help me with my anxiety.

Part four

The fourth and final part of my SMP is to go outside at least once a day, even if its just to walk the dog. No matter how short the amount of time, I need to get outside everyday.

Not only do I feel like I need to get sunlight everyday, I don't think me spending days at a time in the house is doing me any favors. Even if I don't interact with anyone while I'm outside at least I got some fresh air for the day. I think this is another thing that help with calming my mind.  I don't think staying cooped up in the house is helping at all, infact its probably making me worse. So I plan on going outside everyday, even if its just for a little while.


I think that with all of things working together, and with trying to improve my outlook and setting a goal ( getting a job, so that I can move out of my sisters house) will really help me to get a better handle on my anxiety.

When I came across the article I mentioned earlier I was in a really bad place and I think finding that article helped me to dig my self out of that spot. I think I have hope now, where as before I has none and I had basically given up on ever getting better with out using drugs (prescription or recreational).

I will be posting weekly updates on how this working out for me.

I really think this is going to work. Fingers crossed.

And it's just the beginning.

 My childhood was very confusing. I knew there was something different about me and yet I didn't know how to deal with it. Elementary school was a really rough time for me. I cried every time my mother left me. Sometimes the teacher would have to hold me while she left because I would hold onto my mom and not let her leave. 

 When all the children would play I always wanted to join in but was to afraid to ask. I figured if they wanted me to play with them they would have asked, so I spent many a playtime alone, playing with blocks. 

 Another big part of kindergarten experience was the bathroom. I dreaded the bathroom. The bathroom was in the classroom, which I guess is convenient when you're dealing with four and five year old's, but very inconvenient where I was concerned. Because the bathroom was in the classroom you could everything that was going on in there, and that really bothered me. I was not okay with anyone hearing me pee. So to avoid the embarrassment of letting others hear me pee, I would just pee on myself. Apparently five year old me thought peeing on myself was less embarrassing than letting others hear me pee. I peed on myself so much that my mom started packing extra clothes for me in my backpack.  

 My grades even suffered because of my SAD. I would never raise my hand, even if I knew the answer. I was always extremely embarrassed of talking in front of other people, and I hated when the teacher would pick me. And what made it worse what that I didn't understand why I was so afraid to raise my hand. I would see the other children raising their hands, ooh-ing and ah-ing for the teachers to pick on them , and I was so confused. Because class participation was a part of the grading process my grades where suffering from what I didn't understand and didn't know how to explain. 

 Middle school wasn't much better. But by that time I had come to the realization that while in most social situations I felt embarrassed an awkward, other people did not. So I begin to pretend that the things that really bothered me, didn't. I started participating more in school, although still not as much as the other students in the class. I still avoided the bathroom like the plague. Having stalls wasn't much better than the classroom bathroom. Everyone could still hear everything because of the huge gaps and the bottom of the doors. So I would just hold it until I got home (I had become a master pee holder by that point), or if couldn't avoid it, I would go during class because no one was usually in there. I made some friends that I felt comfortable enough around, and I pretended to be just like every else while in side I was still just as nervous and scared. 

 The worst part about middle school was the hormones. It was the time when other children started to get boyfriends and girlfriends, and that absolutely scared me. My friends all had dated at least one person by seventh grade and I felt like if I didn't date anyone they would know something was wrong with me. So of course I jumped on the bandwagon. The first and only relation I have ever had lasted three months.  One day he walked up to me and said, "Do you want to be my girlfriend?" and of course I said yes.When ever I saw him I was terrified, I had no idea what to do and I often avoided him. The only time I did see him was in class, and even then I barley spoke to him.  My first and only relation ended quite tragically, his friend (we'll just call him M) broke us up in front the whole class and it was extremely embarrassing. M and and my boyfriend where sitting at the table ahead of me and in front of everyone he just said  " You don't like her, she doesn't like you, so you guys aren't together anymore!" and that was the end of our relationship. But I did like him, I just didn't know how to handle a boyfriend, It was entirely too much pressure for me. 

 High school was a way better experience. I had moved to different school in eight grade so by ninth grade I was fairly comfortable with the people I knew. Class participation was still an issue as was the bathroom, but at that point in my life I had perfected the " I'm just like you" persona. I had a couple of guy friends and  when ever any talk of relationship would come up i'd flee the scene (not literary, of course). While much of my day was spent being nervous or embarrassed or scared, no one ever knew. Not even my best friends, I was too afraid to tell them. And that's not to say that high school wasn't fun, because it was. I had a blast in high school I honestly can't say there was ever a dull moment. But there was always this fear inside of me no matter what I was doing. 

 I would have to say that high school was the time when I  took the most risks with deciding how far I could push my self out of my "comfort zone" (and I use quotation marks because I use that term loosely, my real comfort zone is sitting at home by myself reading a book). I joined Art club, Key club, my schools literary magazine club, and I even went on to be the president of the National Art Honors Society. I also was a part of my schools play for three years ( just background signing and dancing)  and the last year of high school I did stage crew (I was even stage manager). But while it was fun being in the clubs and hanging out with friends I was still scared, and I still didn't know why.

 For most of my high school experience I didn't want to believe that there was anything wrong with me so I just kind of ignored it. I didn't tell my friends or my family because I didn't want to admit to myself that there was a real problem. But in twelfth grade I finally decided that I couldn't pretend anymore, because it wasn't going to go away by pretending it wasn't there. So I started doing research on different types of anxiety disorders and I  finally came across Social Anxiety disorder and it was like such a relief and burden all at the same time. It was very over whelming finally putting a name to everything I had been feeling for so long and I actually started crying. I was relived because I felt like I wasn't crazy and there was actually something making me feel the way the way that I was. And it was burden because I felt that now that it had a name it was real. And I did not want it to be real.