What medication helped relieve your anxiety?

[Aquabi]

I am at my wits end. Have been diagnosed with generalised anxiety disorder. I constantly have a pit in my stomach and butterflies. It causes me to be very socially anxious as well. Upset stomach, loss of appetite- so many horrible symptoms.

I have been on so many different meditations I have lost track.

I have decided to renew my efforts at tackling the anxiety. It is no way to live. Going to restart therapy and stick with it.

Please share what medications worked for you. Have an appointment booked with my old psychiatrist

My doctor prescribed Alprazolam 2 and a half years ago and it has really helped me. Also sleeping pills - Zopiclone.

This is so difficult because everything is patient dependent!
For me:

Citalopram - took me from mild anxiety to full blown depression with suicide attempts. Meanwhile it was my best friends miracle drug.

Fluoxitine (prozac) - Just didn't really do much at all.

Sertraline - Fine for a while, then needed the dose increased. Then fine and again dose increase. Got to maximum and effects waned but hair started thinning drastically.

Venlafaxine - Did nothing for me, but had consequences for my liver and kidneys. Took forever to sort.

Mirtazipine - Gave me restless legs so bad that I didn't sleep... which of course had huge detrimental effects to my MH.

Trazadone - My miracle drug. Every single thing about it was perfect for me. It increased my appetite when I struggled to eat. It made me sleepy and sleep WELL when I suffered insomnia. It helped me to no end and I finally found a medication which made me me again. I will forever be thankful for staying on the path to find the right one. Now though? If I needed it again? I'd struggle with it, because the drowsy side effects would not suit with my three year old. Thankfully, touch wood, I've been off them around 7 years and see no need at the moment to start again.

But Trazadone for my friend? Worst drug in the world and made her infinitely more unwell.

All this is to say that whatever one person's miracle cure is, bares nothing to what might be yours. It really is a horrible case of just trying each and finding what does and doesn't suit you. Its a really tough (and sometimes long) journey but it is one that is so so so worth it.

I felt awful on citalopram, but sertraline worked really well for me. It just felt like every day was a good day.

I'm not sure @Aquabi, it used to be prescribed to many but I think it's use has been replaced by SSRIs. Not an opioid, it's a benzodiazepine , but definitely addictive and use should be limited.

No medication helped what helped me was -

CBT
Mindfulness
Hypnotherapy
Yoga

Sertraline is worrking reallywell for dh. The first few weeks were hell but he was warned (be reading the sertraline threads here, thank you ll very much!). He's a changed and I'm so glad!

Propranolol works for dd. She getsreally anxious but she takes the propranolo as and when, iyswim, and finds it helpful though it's possible that it's placebo if shee's not taking it every day. She did at first for quite a while, but then she started taking it onlywhen she needed it. No idea whythat changed, but she still finds it helpful.

Hope you find what works for you.

Diazepam but not easy to get hold of!

Sertraline really helped me (general anxiety, panic attacks & health anxiety), but anaemia & low vitamin D made it a lot worse - hopefully you've had those checked?

I also found tea with valerian in helped a lot with my 'going to sleep panic' & I had it when I felt an attack coming on during the day (this was pre-sertraline) too. I'm not wholly sure if it was a placebo effect but it definitely helped so doesn't really matter if it was.

Quetiapine saved me.

Methylphenidate - taken to treat adhd symptoms. Completely helped my anxiety. Some days I have no symptoms. That's zero anxiety related symptoms, let that sink in. I could never have imagined a day without anxiety before, and I've tried a lot of medication for it through the GP. My anxiety must have been adhd related, so anxiety meds weren't doing anything for it.

Paroxetine for 19years. I have been told that they don't prescribe it these days unless you are already on it as it's quite old hat and there are better drugs out there (I tried to change to one of these and lasted 3 days!).

Duloxetine works great for my anxiety.