Intro post - My story of tiresome, lifelong anxiety issues (warning!! LONG!)

RaceAgainstMyself · Sep 05, 2011, 02:14 AM

Hey everyone,

I made a brief intro post in the new members forum, but I wanna make a more detailed one here because there is a lot of history behind my struggles, and I was hoping maybe I'd be able to get some feedback about any similar experiences.

I have panic disorder and emetophobia, the latter of which has caused me some issues throughout my life. I'm not sure exactly when the emet started, just that it was when I was pretty young, maybe about 4 years old. I just remember that I started to become increasingly fearful of throwing up, and that it was around that time that each vomit experience I had was increasingly worse in terms of my anxiety. At age 8, in 2nd grade, I saw a pediatric psychiatrist who said I had GAD and put me on a half of the adult starting dose of Zoloft, which I stayed on for the next few years til I decided I don't wanna be on it anymore. When I was 11 years old my sister who was 5 yrs old at the time, got some kinda stomach bug and was throwing up for a day or two. I freaked out to the point I didn't wanna be near her for about the next month after that, and would yell at her to get away from me. I was afraid if she breathed on me I'd catch whatever she had, and I also was pretty convinced I'd "catch" it either way anyway. Well about a month later, I was eating nearly nothing, came down with a cold and strep throat, which only made things worse because it made me even more paranoid that I'd vomit. And by then I was underweight and dehydrated (which isn't really a good thing when you're running a fever, either.) My pediatrician and my mom eventually said I'd have to be hospitalized for severe dehydration and being so underweight. So 4 days before Christmas I went to the ER. At that point I'd been on antibiotics for strep for two days, and my throat had already stopped hurting. But at the ER they made me go off all meds..oddly my strep was gone by then and never came back.. but anyway, I was put on IV and my family as well as my doc tried relentlessly to get me to start eating again, and to convince me that I don't have a stomach virus or something that'd make me sick. I couldn't get myself to eat a normal amt without going into panic mode, and since I was on an all-liquid "diet" (not that it was exactly anything with basic nutrients), I ended up with what I was convinced was diarrhea and therefore I MUST have some sort of stomach bug... on Xmas eve I was put on a feeding tube, I'd been diagnosed with anorexia and OCD (I spontaneously started performing these "rituals" like standing on certain tiles in the bathroom whilst washing my hands, and turning the faucets on and off, because I felt if I didn't do those things I'd vomit...) and a few days after that I was transferred to an eating disorder unit, where I stayed for 4 more weeks. Of course I couldnt really relate to the people there, other than the fact they kept me company and I felt less alone. But in a more internal sense, I guess, I felt even MORE alone because no one had the same issues I did.

I was put on some meds shortly before leaving the ER, including Zoloft, Zyprexa, and Periactin which they gave me after I said something like "I wish there was a medication that'd give me an appetite" (I had no idea there was such a thing, actually), and was also discharged on these meds. After the 4 weeks, I transferred to an ED day program for another two (insurance stuff kinda limited the time I could be hospitalized, as well as inpatient vs. day/outpatient treatment.) By this time I'd felt more comfortable in these environments than at home, and I got pretty depressed when I had to go home... to the point I'd thought many times about "starving" myself so I'd HAVE to go back. Anyway, after the day program, I continued seeing the psychiatrist I was assigned to there for about another 4 months. She switched my antidepressants a couple times, and would always be all "this isn't working so we're gonna raise the dose".. so this one day, I was in the subway with my mom, and I apparently went into some kind of stupor, in which I was basically unconscious but still mobile for the most part. To this day I can't remember any of what happened, but my mom told me that I was unresponsive to her talking to me, and also didn't talk at all, and that I was walking at some odd diagonal angle towards the edge of the platform as if I was headed right into the train tracks, and she had to pull me back. She couldn't get hold of my psychiatrist, and was all freaked out, and decided to change docs cuz she figured it musta been some kind of med overdose (at the time I was on a high dose of Clomipramine.) So for the next few years I ended up with a neurologist who ultimately had me on 75mg Effexor XR. When I was 14 and graduating from 8th grade, he had me ween off the Effexor, which took me from January of '04 til May of that same year. By July, the summer between 8th grade and the beginning of high school, I relapsed so bad that I nearly went to the ER again, for the same freakin issues... til my doc found me a psychiatrist in the neighbourhood who right away got me on Klonopin as well as back on Effexor, Periactin, and Zyprexa, which got me to manage staying outta the hospital. When I graduated high school I asked my psychiatrist (who is the one I'm still seeing currently) if I can take something for my anxiety, because I felt I was having worse issues with it.. the thought of college was freaking me out at first. So he gave me a Rx for Klonopin.

In college I got all defiant and told my doc and my parents that I don't need the frickin meds anymore cuz I'm not even depressed. I'd go a few days without Effexor, after which my anxiety would go through the roof and I'd be like "this is cuz I haven't taken the meds" and would take them again. This went on until April of my freshman year, after three instances of throwing up several hours after taking a dose for the first time in a few days (yay for irony

) and my psych put me on Prozac weekly only a few days after the third instance, telling me that I would only have to remember my meds once a week. But that whole first week I actually felt it made me worse! MY anxiety seemed TWICE as bad, I couldn't stop crying, shaking, and having panic attacks... so after that first week I stopped taking that as well. I'm not sure if that first week was only sucky because of Effexor withdrawal, or if it really was the Prozac... so at that point I just had the benzos which I figured was okay... until fall of the following year when my roommate got ****faced and vomited at around 2am while passed out in bed, but slept through it (!). I went into a full-blown panic attack instantly, during which I laid in bed covering my ears with my hands for about an hour before taking a benzo and staying curled up on a chair in one of the common areas for the rest of the night. I couldn't fall asleep though because the anxiety kept me awake. I was still afraid to go back into my room the next morning, and every night I came back to the room thereafter for the rest of the quarter... over winter break I went back on Effexor and I'm now on 300mg/day of that. I started going to an anxiety clinic at my school a few months ago (oh, and I also transferred because the anxiety I got every time someone would get wasted was too much for me by then...) Apparently they've had two previous cases of emet, and they're the ones who dx'd me with panic disorder. They make all patients go off benzos, if they're on any, before they can proceed with treatment. So I've been benzo-free since May now, although I nearly lost it and was ready to take another one last Mon night because that was my first full-blown panic attack since I stopped taking them and I felt like it wouldn't go away unless I did something about it. Fortunately it was shorter than most of my attacks of that severity usually are (about a half hour-45mins as opposed to 2 to as much as 5 hours, even after taking benzos...), and Idk if that's coincidental or if the therapy is actually helping me, but either way, I'm slightly less worked up over the thought of that happening again. I think the relief when it was over overpowered the attack itself...

So that's where I'm at now. I'm doing exposure-based CBT for PD and emet (with a good amt of overlap between those two things), and I'm still doubtful that I'm getting anywhere, mainly because of the lack of fear response that I think is normal with exposure treatments. Normally if I'm not already in panic or "pre-panic" mode, or right next to someone barfing, lol, then I'm hard to perturb.... which kinda sucks but I think it's the Effexor that's doing that, because as you've seen in my story, the two times I went off it I went loopy

I still wish I could go off the damned things and be sane without them... they've been a life-saver for me as SSRIs seem to have done nothing, if not made everything worse, and I've had little to no side effects from Effexor (aside from the getting sick after taking a full dose after missing a few days thing, but I don't count that as a side effect, lmao...) but I just... ugh, well I guess it kinda makes sense that I don't wanna be on psych meds forever... :P I also want to leave emet and PD in the past, I wanna know what it feels like to vomit without freakin the hell out...

and I want to just not feel so trapped by my own mind to the point I want my amygdala removed LOL. And, I'm also tired of feeling emasculated because of the nature of anxiety disorders and.. I mean I'm sure emet is shameful enough for women, because I've heard how ashamed/embarassed emets can be, and how there are plenty of "closeted" emetophobes for this reason. But lemme tell you, I think the shame factor is worse for males -- especially since when I read people's emet stories online, it seems I'm like the only male who has it. It sucks! And I hope that doesn't come off as "my phobia is worse than yours" or anything, to women, cuz that's not at all what I mean... just the emasculation thing is... eh. It's getting old. lol....

So... if you've read this far, I applaud you

And so yeah, that's my crazy, effed up trip of a story. Hope you enjoyed the ride