How to deal with Generalized Anxiety?

I was wondering if anyone had any insight into this..
I've had GAD for several years now, concurrent with severe depression. For many years I was on an antidepressant (whichever kind was working at the time, I've been on several) and ativan. The ativan worked wonders for my anxiety. I never abused it, sold it or gave it away. I used it as prescribed. Then a few years ago the dr I was seeing decided I shouldn't be on it long term and took me off of that and the prozac I was taking at the time. She put me on Effexor, which eventually made me manic and then I crashed hard and wound up suicidal and needed a hospital stay. Ever since then, no one will allow me to take it (I can sort of see why, though I've not been suicidal since then) citing that antidepressants are best for GAD. The thing is, nothing has ever completely helped, not the antidepressants, talk therapy or even abilify I took for over a year. So, how do I manage it?

I was diagnosed with GAD, last November and they recommended antidepressants.

I have taken many of them already and they did not help either; in fact they had some pretty bad side effects. Also some "antipsychotics", such as Seroquel, which also had side effects that were bad.

I am taking Klonopin as needed and trying not to be too dependent on it. I am learning coping skills such as visualization, relaxation, self-hypnosis tapes, and other self-help things. it's a process that takes time, patience, discipline, and persistance.

just my thoughts.

Carol

It was recommended to me to keep on the anti-depressants for the depression only.

For the anxiety, only while it was really severe causing me to not sleep at all etc. take the lowest dose of valium.
I had tried serequel but it knocked me out for 1.5 days.

It was explained to me that to avoid being addicted to anti-anxiety meds that I must use them only when necessary. I do this: walking, yoga, meditation (extremely hard to do by yourself), journal, do whatever I need to do to get good sleep (this took forever).

I agree with Moshi, it takes patience and persistence, lots of trail and error finding what works best for you personally. We are not created equal in this dis-ease of ours, one size does not fit all. It took me a very long time to discover I do not have the constitution for group activities like yoga, tai chi, and sitting meditation. On the other hand these tries led me to hiking in nature, long dog walks, and these are actually a different version of meditation (think walking meditation) journaling, crochet, and even leaf raking....the really good thing is once something doesn't work for you, you get to pick something new to try, and the self-loving message that you did try and that is enough, and it was part of wholesome effort.

Good luck to you
wishing you well
JA