Vent: Tried an antidepressant, forgot what words are

[rosenwasser]

I've had a bad week. The suicidal thoughts became very intrusive and vivid over the period of just a few days, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't really function in any meaningful way. So I went to a psychiatric ambulance on Friday. They were all quite nice, I talked with a young doctor barely out of college and she really took her time with me without looking too alarmed at the suicidal ideation. Props to her. Left that place with a prescription for depression meds (Wellbutrin). It has to be the worst thing I've ever taken in my life and I tried to poison myself once so that's something.

Headache unlike anything I've ever experienced was the first thing but it only got worse from there. I don't really remeber yesterday. There is nothing in my head whatsoever. Today I woke up and felt like there was a part of me missing. My head is still hurting, I've been sweating the whole day but the worst of it all is that it somehow took away my ability to form thoughts in a way. I'm not able to form coherent sentences the way I'm used to and it's hard typing this now. I looked at a case in my law book today and realised that I can't subsume anymore. It's a thing you do with cases in continental law. I do it for hours, daily. It's like breathing for me, in a way. I know I learned it when I started uni but it's a mental process I've done so often that it became like an automatic muscle movement, it became something my brain just *does* when confronted with a case. I can't do it now. It feels like my right hand has been cut off in a cognitive sense. I'm so afraid it's not going to come back. I don't know what I would do, it's my autistic special interest, it seriously is the only thing that makes me happy. I stopped looking in the mirror because I don't recognize myself. Not sure if this is a psychotic episode but it sure feels like it.

Definitely not going to the hospital with this because I'm 99.5% sure that they wouldn't like my strategy of getting rid of this. They would probably give me *more* medication. So I'm staying home and waiting for the substance to get eliminated. It's taking its time, I feel it leaving my system very slowly now. I ordered a pizza and a large salad now somehow hoping that a lot of food can diffuse whatever this shit is doing with my brain. At least the pizza is the best I've had in a long time.

I will have to tell my therapist about all of this on Tuesday and have an apointment at psych on Friday. I guess I have to go there because I'm a suicide risk and they will look for me if I don't show up but there is no way in hell I'm taking one more of those things. I know that they always say stuff like this side effect is very rare and random and probably the drug didn't do anything bad and it's just my depression and anxiety. I will think about navigating this when I hopefully have my intellect back.
If I don't get my legal thinking back I don't know what I will do. It really wouldn't make much sense for me to live anymore if that was the case. I'll look at some show now and hope it comes back. I will even do a happy totally not depressed dance chereography with my least favorite law book if that happens.

 

[NumbItAll]

I'm sorry you are going through that. For whatever reason, some people have a severe adverse reaction even after just one pill. You are correct to abstain from more medication as that would just confuse your nervous system even more. The best thing is to keep things as stable as possible while you recover, which will hopefully be soon. The brain is very good at healing, although there's not really any set timeline for it. I really have to wonder how rare these supposedly rare reactions are.

 

[rosenwasser]

I'm sorry you are going through that. For whatever reason, some people have a severe adverse reaction even after just one pill. You are correct to abstain from more medication as that would just confuse your nervous system even more. The best thing is to keep things as stable as possible while you recover, which will hopefully be soon. The brain is very good at healing, although there's not really any set timeline for it. I really have to wonder how rare these supposedly rare reactions are.

Thank you. It really doesn't seem so "rare" to me.

 

[Scattered-Soul]

Good on you for stopping the meds immediately and also for realizing that the doctors would only push more meds on you or tell you to increase the dosage. The same exact thing happened to me when I started taking Escitalopram, only that my stupid self trusted the doctors to know what they were doing instead of taking matters in my own hands and they kept me on the meds for 9 months. Felt like I was getting poisoned every single day, by the time I stopped them it was like my brain had been burned in acid, stomped all over and reduced to nothing. Now more than 3 years later, I'm left with severe brain damage and a progressive neurocognitive disorder with no other option but to CTB. I pray you heal and return to being yourself with time.

 

[WAITING TO DIE]

I don't take meds anymore because of nasty side effects and because they do little to help anyway.
The worst one for me was venlafaxine because of the horrendous withdrawal effects after I stopped taking them.
The doctors don't care and are happy to keep pushing more pills on us because they get paid for doing so.
Meds have messed me up, and Im now suffering from pssd because of them.

 

[Kore]

Jeeez wtaf. I'm so sorry to OP and the others that shared their horrible experiences, that really sounds awful:( I've actually been mentally preparing myself to speak to a doc and ask for medication options, but this has totally and utterly put me off

@eatyouryoung rest up, eat lots, drink lots, and I hope you're back to yourself as soon as possible! I would think you're right that it will wear off, one single OTC pill shouldn't (surely) do any permanent damage

 

[rosenwasser]

Hello everyone,

thank you so much for your thoughtful comments and your shared experiences There are a lot of horrible side effects that people experience on psych meds and to me it's just negligent that they never get mentioned properly. Worse than that, when you tell the doctors about them and look for solutions, you get gaslighted and told it's all in your head.

@Scattered-Soul I'm so sorry about what you went through and had the exact same thought - it did feel like I was poisoning my brain. But I also totally understand why you would trust doctors' advice - they should be experts on this after all. I think I would also be inclined to "try the meds out" and deal with the side effects if they didn't fuck up my cognition as fast as they did.

As for my health: I'm doing much better now The study I work as a research assistant on had a hard deadline today and I managed to spend the whole day at the library and put together a source list with over 100 sources, so we're on track I'm proud of myself and actually feel content for once The whole nightmarish experience made me appreciate what my mind can do (See, the meds helped after all! )

I still stumble over words and lose my balance if I move too quickly. It is a little bit scary because from what I've read most of the substance should be eliminated in 16 hours and in 32 hours there should be virtually no traces of it. Since it's been five days now I do think that the stuff actually did damage to my brain. But I'm also positive that I will make a full recovery.

My therapy session was positive as well. My therapist said that she believes everything I was telling her and that while she has many clients who have been helped by meds, they aren't for everyone and we don't understand the way people react to them fully. We also talked about psych meds not being able to cure my trauma or loneliness caused by autism and that for me to get better long-term, I need to work on coping mechanisms and living with my challenges.
She also said that considering suicide in my situation doesn't sound like an illness but as an understandable reaction to my circumstances and seems to have no issues discussing the topic with me whatsoever. This was an enormous issue with my last therapist who would panic and talk about psych wards as soon as suicide came up. Now I have the feeling that there is a person that supports my recovery in the way I want to shape it, trusts my judgement and genuinely wishes me well.
Maybe this can give a bit of hope for some of you with negative experiences in the mental health system - there are people like her out there. Unfortunately I know from experience how much time and money it takes to find them.

 

[NumbItAll]

Hello everyone,

thank you so much for your thoughtful comments and your shared experiences There are a lot of horrible side effects that people experience on psych meds and to me it's just negligent that they never get mentioned properly. Worse than that, when you tell the doctors about them and look for solutions, you get gaslighted and told it's all in your head.

@Scattered-Soul I'm so sorry about what you went through and had the exact same thought - it did feel like I was poisoning my brain. But I also totally understand why you would trust doctors' advice - they should be experts on this after all. I think I would also be inclined to "try the meds out" and deal with the side effects if they didn't fuck up my cognition as fast as they did.

As for my health: I'm doing much better now The study I work as a research assistant on had a hard deadline today and I managed to spend the whole day at the library and put together a source list with over 100 sources, so we're on track I'm proud of myself and actually feel content for once The whole nightmarish experience made me appreciate what my mind can do (See, the meds helped after all! )

I still stumble over words and lose my balance if I move too quickly. It is a little bit scary because from what I've read most of the substance should be eliminated in 16 hours and in 32 hours there should be virtually no traces of it. Since it's been five days now I do think that the stuff actually did damage to my brain. But I'm also positive that I will make a full recovery.

My therapy session was positive as well. My therapist said that she believes everything I was telling her and that while she has many clients who have been helped by meds, they aren't for everyone and we don't understand the way people react to them fully. We also talked about psych meds not being able to cure my trauma or loneliness caused by autism and that for me to get better long-term, I need to work on coping mechanisms and living with my challenges.
She also said that considering suicide in my situation doesn't sound like an illness but as an understandable reaction to my circumstances and seems to have no issues discussing the topic with me whatsoever. This was an enormous issue with my last therapist who would panic and talk about psych wards as soon as suicide came up. Now I have the feeling that there is a person that supports my recovery in the way I want to shape it, trusts my judgement and genuinely wishes me well.
Maybe this can give a bit of hope for some of you with negative experiences in the mental health system - there are people like her out there. Unfortunately I know from experience how much time and money it takes to find them.

I'm glad you are doing better. It is definitely possible to have long term effects from just a few pills. I'm still struggling over a year later, but part of that is because I was dumb and did things that reaggravated my symptoms (specifically microdosing psilocybin). It is extremely unpredictable. You should make a full recovery though. And yes I understand what you mean about how they "helped"... once you experience that, things didn't seem so bad before haha. The trial and error process is much riskier than we are led to believe.

 

[ClownWorld2023]

forgot what words are

Aphasia?

I had experienced the same in the past, but it was caused by something else (not medicines).

Sometimes I still experience this and brain fog.