Kickas.org Forums Ankylosing Spondylitis General Discussion #1 AS Web Support Group waves of anger every coupla months

God i am crippled with this right now......

it appears to come on me every 2/3 months,i can feel it comming on,and it stays for weeks

if the long suffering wife says the wrong thing or looks at me the wrong way i will rage at her and take to my bed for days

it's depression.only once before in my life have i sought help for my mental state and the doc then prescribed CITALOPRAM for "pain related depression."they helped but i did not care for the trade off(lethargy)
when taking these tabs i could not find any motivation for my exercises

the negative energy i am using in my rage against the world would float a boat,it's everyones fault but mine

does this ring any bells with anyone?
do you have meds for it?
what are they like and what are the trade offs?

i am hurting the one person dearest to me and i really can't help myself.all will be well soon until 2 or 3 months down the road.....

John

John, yes this rings bells not just for me but many AS'ers. Personally I have finally disclosed all this to my docs, started therapy and have been on Lexapro for 4 months. The Lexapro is the only one that works for me and doesn't leave me sleepy. I take it at night before bed. The 2 or 3 months has, unfortunately, moved to non stop for me and is now an on going process. Now I look forward to a week here and there that things ease up but for the most part, it is a new transition for me after 40 years of this.
I do hope you find relief for this. It's an awful feeling when you know you are pushing away those you love in the process. Please talk to you doc, maybe give Lexapro a try and seek a councelor who specialises in chronic pain.
Cindy

thanks Cindy.if i could just find something that would keep me stable and leave my daytime energy intact,well that would be great.i will google lexapro

Yes John I get like this too its not surprising with what we go through. I'm on Citalopram I was on 20 mgs for years but have recently managed to reduce it to 10 mgs. I don't think there is an answer. Come here and vent and try not to bottle it up.

Hi John - I take citalopram and have done for many years. Like Kevin, I'm now on a maintenance dose of 10 mg. When my depression was at its worst, it took 60 mg per day to get it under control and that took several months (I was very ill). The lethargy bothered me so much I tried to come off it but the depression was too serious. I had an excellent psychiatrist at the time (I believe psychiatrists are much more knowledgeable about these meds that regular GPs) and she recommended that I reduce the dose of citalopram and add in buproprion which acts on different neurotransmitters and helps to balance out the effect of lethargy from the citalopram while adding further antidepressant capacity.

It worked wonders - I continue to take a blend of the two drugs. The buproprion gave me back the energy and drive that the citalopram had removed.

I now take 100 mg of buproprion daily and 10 mg of citalopram.

How's your sleep? My ability to manage my anger is decreased when I'm sleep deprived. I'm on a high dose of Prozac. It doesn't seem to bother me now, however when I first began it at 10mg it made me slightly nauseated and tired, but that went away.

I've heard really good things from people about buproprion; it might be good to check with your doctor and try a combo like Wendy.

Yes BIG bells and YES they have meds for it. Tell your Doc if one isn't working and try another, I am on 3 different depression meds.

There is no reason to hurt the ones you love when you can get help. Sorry your having a rough go of it.

Hugs,

Lisa

I had depression and anxiety before I knew I had AS and I am on a trifecta of meds for it....not ashamed to say it either keeps me sane and my loved ones alive, most days (house full of boys)
I take 20mg of prozac, 300mg of buproprion and 5 of valium for anxiety and muscle pain.

We have it hard enough with out pushing our loved ones away and they have it hard enough watching us in pain....especially when there is help and meds...hell most of us take a million meds for what we have a few more to make us calmer more gentler spouses can't be bad to at least give it a try.

Btw I love my combo, the valium makes me sleepy but the other 2 nope actually gives me energy.
hang in there

John, I love your honesty.

I just started Celexa and I believe it is helping already.

Good luck to you. :-)

John,

Have been on that circuit many times! It's not a rollercoaster ride that's good for many trips...

As a result of the rollercoaster, I was then on and off anti-depressants for many years... they evened out the highs and lows, but every single one I tried left me just not caring about *anything*... I felt like I was looking on from the sidelines with no interest in joining in - like a big docile cow just standing there chewing on my cud....

It made for an easier life for those closest to me, but I am and have always been a passionate and intense person, and I have a huge need to be able to be creative, just to feel ALIVE! I realised that all anti-depressants left me feeling DEAD INSIDE. I had no creative urge and just drifted along from day to day. That was not the ME I wanted to be!

I also have a partner who is afraid of emotion and illness and any sort of thing that rocks HIS boat, so I had to find something that worked for me, as he is not emotionally or physically supportive or I suspect even *interested* in my welfare.

I knew I had to find a way to be internally happy as well as dealing with all the crap in the world. As an empath I take on others' pain as well as my own. For me drugs *alone* were clearly not the answer.

So I have spent quite a bit of time and $$$ over the past few years seeing a psychologist doing Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. (CBT). I would thoroughly recommend getting inside your own head for a guided tour - you will learn a lot about yourself, what makes you tick and what makes you ticked off and what to do about it!

I am now in a more accepting place and have regained the inner peace that my exploration of Buddhism in my 20s gave me. I do think that all the trials of life over the past 30 years has killed some of my inner spirit, but what can I do? No point raging over the loss - I just accept it.

(Most days - I *am* human after all... ) I now no longer care that my husband is not interested in me, my activities or my welfare, that my son is not working as hard at school as he could be or that my boss is not doing the ordering of the consumable stock *before* it runs out. I don't have ownership of these issues...

Whilst I do miss the old intensity of caring sometimes, I don't miss the fallout! I can walk away from most little things and it is easier to deal with those that do bug me. I can look whistfully at the loss of my happy marriage,(it's my 21st anniversary in a few days...) but no longer blame either myself or my husband for its demise. It just is as it is.

I would highly recommend some CBT to help you learn some inner peace. It doesn't fix everything but gives you some more tools in your toolbox for coping with the big and small cr@p that is our lives.

The best thing is that my inner artistic muse is back and when I am feeling down, being creative helps to lift my spirit and give me the strength to carry on.

All my best to you,