I don’t know what to do about my sertraline prescription

[thenewaveragebear1983]

I have been having ongoing health issues over the last few years: chronic fatigue, palpitations, hair falling out, anxiety, general low mood. I eventually went back to my gp and said I’m so sick of feeling like this all the time, and she has said to try sertraline. However, I have just read the leaflet (and a thread on here) and oh wow, I am now terrified of the side effects. She did not mention that I could feel so much worse for several weeks.

i’m actually feeling a bit better. I saw her 5 weeks ago and since then I have stopped eating gluten which has made a huge impact on my anxiety and I have stopped falling asleep mid afternoon. Quite frankly, the intensity of side effects people are reporting, and these are things the leaflet says are common (1 in 10) SE, I wonder if I am foolish to try it. I am really surprised she didn’t mention the possibility of such intense side effects, and I do not want to be struggling at work or at home when actually at the moment I am starting to feel a bit better. she prescribed the sertraline over a phone appointment yesterday.

i really don’t know what to do now 🤷‍♀️

OP and everyone really - can I ask how bad you had to feel to get them? I don’t know what I should be putting up with as normal
and what’s the threshold to get medication. I have good days as well as bad days.
Thank you

I have taken Sertraline on and off for a few years. Side effects were tiredness and mild nausea. They pass after a couple of weeks, and like any SSRI they take around four weeks to start working on lifting your mood. Once you’ve started taking them it’s important not to stop abruptly because you’ll get withdrawal symptoms. If you think you aren’t suited to them make an appointment with your GP but don’t stop taking them in the meantime, until you’ve had advice. They worked really well for me and l know others have taken them with no problem.

@Cymbalsimbai think for me it was less about how acutely bad I felt, but more that I am totally done with constantly feeling like I have to fight ‘it’ or do xyz to manage it. It’s exhausting. It’s the constant low level doom that just tinges everything I do. I went to the gp to say I have all these symptoms, including anxiety, and I’m just so bloody sick and tired of feeling crap and anxious all the time.

When I say I think giving up gluten has helped me, it is exactly this that it has done, it’s hard to explain but the last 6 weeks I have been just less ‘doom’ and a bit more able to see past the worries, I can read something in the news or on here and not be obsessed and fixated and panicking about it, and I have not had that constant obsession with things (like a friend who has ghosted me and spread lies about me, I would obsess about this constantly and get very upset over the injustice of it, but now I’m a bit more 🤷‍♀️ about it). I think this is why I am very apprehensive about starting the meds in case I get that constant anxiety back, it’s so debilitating and utterly exhausting

I hesitated for ages before starting Sertraline as I was terrified of the side effects. When I did start taking them I halved the tablets, so started on 25mg (GP had prescribed 50). After about 3 weeks at 25 I moved up to 50 and have been taking that for almost a year now. I worked myself up into a real state about the side effects - in the end I had very few, and all manageable (feeling very tired, upset stomach, vivid dreams). They all went away within the first month or so. I take Sertraline for anxiety and OCD and it has been life changing for me. I know everyone is different, but people tend to post about negative experiences more than positive ones.

Life altering for me and life saving for my daughter. A few days of side effects and then blessed, blessed normal mental health. I've been on pretty much all the anti-depressants and sertraline was easily the best.

I’m a big fan of SSRIs (see my username) but I just wanted to check you have considered you might be perimenopausal and should consider HRT?

@SSRI I am already on HRT, have been for 2 years.

I think I’ve decided to start them on Friday. I don’t really want to, but I guess that’s symptomatic of the condition, and the last few days I haven’t felt as good, with a bit of gnawing anxiety and and just generally feeling low. So I think I am
going to try them, and hopefully if I do get any side effects I will have the weekend to determine if I am going to manage them or not.

Gluten is inflammatory if you have an intolerance. I also have recently cut out gluten and noticed a physiological change. There’s nothing to say it doesn’t affect you mentally