nervous breakdown / depression

[daisyji]

Hello,

I suffered a sudden breakdown 10 weeks ago due to a crash in HRT, i've not re stabilised at all after putting the patches back on and I have been advised to come off the high oestrogen as it's thought it's contributed to my high anxiety. I do have a background of living with severe chronic pain, but i've coped fine with this for 20 plus years and I had no mental health warnings prior to this collapse.

Long story short i've gone being a fully functioning, working mum to a total nervous wreck over the last 10 weeks. I'm in a really bleak and desperate place and I don't know what to do.

I've got a condition called Ehlers Danlos and I'm really sensitive to medication. A psychiatrist advised that anti depressants won't help me at all.

But I can't function, I just cry all day, it sounds pathetic but I literally can't motivate myself to do anything, I go back to bed as soon as my children go to school, I can't face school runs or do anything. I manage to walk my dog, weeping at some point in the day. I've had to stop work and I'm at my wits end, just can't go on like this, it's like a living hell, keep trying to pull myself out of it, but I can't.

Can any of you lovely people let me know if antidepressants helped you to get through such a bad time. Thank you x

I'm afraid I can't help on the medication front as I'm trying to get solutions/get back on with life myself, but I didn't want to leave your thread unanswered. It's scary when your mental health nosedives. Have you tried mindfulness/meditation for your anxiety while you're waiting for medication? I find Russell Brand's "Awakening with Russell" meditations are helpful. Any idea why the psychiatrist advised that antidepressants won't help? Was this a psychiatrist with your local community mental health team?

Hi OP, sorry to hear you are feeling so bad. I'm curious that the psychiatrist said meds weren't an option for you. I also have EDS (hypermobile type) and have taken sertraline for years. It keeps me on an even keel.
Anxiety is a common symptom with EDS and if you are menopausal it often gets worse or starts for the first time. I wonder if it is worth speaking to your GP about anti depressants?

Hi I don’t have any advice as such but just showing solidarity as my mental health is currently the same. In face it’s just nosedived again this last couple of weeks and it is scary as I become very paralysed by it. This time last year it happened and I took ciralopram just over winter for six months. This saw me through and I was pleased to come off them in May. Just enquiring with GP to go back on. I’m also peri menopausal I think but have a history of depression, anxiety and overthinking. I feel like it is a genuine illness in the way it affects me, no different to a physical one. The GP did say when I came off my tablets that I may have to use them every winter.

• in fact not in face