Would ADs help? (May be triggering)

[mynameiscalypso]

I'm currently receiving counselling following a traumatic event several years ago. Although my therapist hasn't said anything specific in terms of a diagnosis, I have a lot of the symptoms of PTSD (flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive thoughts, high levels of anxiety, self harm etc).

I've been seeing her for about 4 months now and, after a month long break where some of the symptoms seemed to get a bit more acute, she wants to move forward with trauma-focussed CBT over the next few weeks which I think is probably the right approach and timing.

At the moment, the anxiety and everything that comes with it is pretty relentless and exhausting. The only way that I've been able to manage it to get to a point where I can function is to self harm and I've been struggling to find other ways to reduce the anxiety (although that's not really the point of this post). Her concern about moving forward is that the process can make the anxiety worse before it gets better and that the self harm may escalate.

At the moment, I'm not on any medication and haven't talked to my GP about it as I'm paying for the therapy privately. My therapist hasn't really mentioned medication at all (other than saying in the first session that, as a psychologist, she didn't have anything to do with medication).

What I was wondering though was whether it was worth going to talk to GP about whether there's something that I can take which will help to manage the anxiety levels given that I'm generally a bit crap about finding ways to manage it myself?

I was on citolpram about 15 years ago but that was after a messy break up and my symptoms were more depression than anxiety at the time. It definitely helped a lot then though. I feel like ADs may help give me the breathing space to be able to cope with the therapy but I also (stupidly) feel like talking about it with my GP without mentioning it to my therapist first is 'cheating' on her.

Has anyone been in a similar situation or can offer any advice?

Thank you very much for any help and apologies for the length of this post.

I've never got on with therapy but was diagnosed with PTSD a couple of years back and found antidepressants did help.

I am very pro-medication though (I fully believe they saved my life) it does sound like you have a good relationship with your therapist, maybe ask her view on them rather then "cheating on her" so to speak.

Anxiety is shit, I have bi-polar on top of the PTSD but I personally found anxiety harder to deal with then the two put together.

I'm sorry for whatever it was you went through

Thank you very much for responding and for the flowers, I really appreciate it and I'm sorry for what you've been through too.

I am generally pro-medication so not sure why it's taken so long to think about it in this situation. I guess I thought I could handle it but clearly, I can't. I'm not seeing my therapist for another couple of weeks because of holidays but I think you're right that I should discuss it with her as well. I'm finding the whole therapy thing really hard at the moment which is also something I should probably raise with her too!

Thanks again for your wise words.

Hi, I am recovering from PTSD myself. I found Mirtazapine took the edge off my anxiety, it was the second AD I tried, Flouxitine which I have used successfully for depression in the past did nothing for me this time.

Glad that you are progressing well with your psychologist, is she a trauma specialist? I only ask as I saw the work psychologist who was not a trauma specialist and although he told me things might get worse before they got better and I thought I was prepared for this I wasn't. It just got worse and worse until I saw someone else privately for IEMT ( similar to EMDR ) who resolved all my symptoms in 2 sessions. I've since seen a different psychologist since for family therapy with DH and his approach was very different and much more gentle. So I wonder if the first psychologist was just not a good fit with me or just not good with trauma as other collegues highly reccomend him.

I'm so sorry for the delay in replying NoLonger especially after your kind message. Work all got a bit crazy and I ended up being signed off last week, probably until the end of October. I had a psychiatrist appointment today and she formally diagnosed PTSD and secondary anxiety disorder (although I'm not sure why those are two separate things really) and put me on sertraline and amitriptyline (the latter as a temporary measure to help me get some sleep). She and the psychologist are going to work together to come up with the best treatment plan. All rather exhausting and overwhelming really but hopefully it will help. Thanks again for your advice and I hope you're progressing well in your recovery.

Thats great that you are getting a joint approach from the psychologist and psychiatrist. My recovery is going really well thanks. I've not had any anxiety or PTSD symptoms since my second(and last) session on IEMT in January. The recovery itself started from that point I feel and is progressing well.