Hi Alica,

I'm so sorry you've been struggling with this for so long. I think I posted in your other thread too, I hope you don't mind. Since I have some experience taking medication for anxiety purposes I figured I could share more details. I mentioned Lexapro before. It made me a bit tired and at first, I was pretty jittery, but once it kicked in I had a kind of brain fog-like feeling where I was calm but at the same time I felt like my head was in the clouds and I was on cruise control. I'm not sure if that makes any sense so sorry if it's a horrible description! It wasn't necessarily bad, because my anxiety level definitely lowered, and I slept through the nights, but as a result, I felt a bit too numb during the day for my personal liking so I decided to go off of it. Though, if I ever got desperate in the future I would consider going back on it. I also gave Effexor a try, but I had an unpleasant experience with that one from start to finish and it did not relieve my symptoms, so I wouldn't recommend that one personally. But as I said in my other post, people don't always share the same experience with these medications so what is terrible for one person might be a lifesaver for another. At the end of the day, I think if you want to try medication it is worth giving it a shot! Anything that can potentially improve your quality of life is worth a chance in my eyes.

Recently I have tried meditation too. I had tried them in the past but I guess I never really fully committed or believed they could be truly useful. These days I use an app called Insight Timer. I randomly stumbled upon it one day. They have a bunch of meditations, calming sounds, and music that you can listen to for free. I'm not very good at meditating, but I play one meditation each night to help myself fall asleep and they have helped me improve my sleep so much. I usually fall asleep before the meditation even finishes. I try to do as much of it as I can until I drift off. I also do a shorter one in the morning to help me start my day off on a calm note. I think it has helped me even if only a little. I hope you can find some relief soon and that others will have some more helpful advice for you to help you in your next steps.