Johnson Bagfoot
Member
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2017
- Messages
- 104
What I'm dealing with:
- A very high adrenaline / fight or flight baseline that will get triggered by all kinds of stimulus. For example: limited sleep, a loud environment, exercise, lots of different supplements/vitamins, etc. It is like a general hypersensitivity that makes me dump adrenaline / crash on almost any input. An example might be, I walk for 10 minutes, then suddenly feel a flash of adrenaline being dumped, and find it hard to walk any further, especially up hill. I will frequently wake up after only a few hours with a sudden spike of adrenaline, or extreme tightness in my chest, that feels painful and seems to begin while I'm physically asleep.
- Chronic fatigue. I never feel rested, on top of the constant fight or flight symptoms. I've been room/bedridden twice, soon after I tapered (very slowly) off SSRIs in both instances. First for 6 months in 2012. Secondly for another 6 months in 2016. Although I got out and started doing things again in life, I feel like I'm barely hanging on by the fingernails. I crash frequently for days to weeks at a time, where I'm almost nonfunctional. Only being a postgrad student with mid-term deadlines allows for this. There is no way in hell I could have a regular job. I've also had to do things like get taxis to go 200meters up a hill.
- No tolerance for any stimulants, including caffeine. No tolerance for alcohol. No tolerance for sugar, a smoothie will make me crash big time within a few hours.
- Limited tolerance for relaxants. For instance, valium might knock me out, but it will make me feel fragile, disorientated, and have very strong rebounds. I take it rarely, but it used to just have a simple relaxing effect.
- Lots of trouble concentrating, remembering, keeping track of my own life. I'll lose track of weeks. Or physically something will happen. For instance, it will be extremely hot one night, I won't sleep at all, that starts a spiral of anxiety and adrenaline, I won't sleep again... I spend the entire week in a state of disorientation and cycling anxiety/fatigue until by fluke I manage to sleep a little or knock myself out somehow.
- My pulse is pretty low. 60 resting, 42 average over night. 50 in the morning. Despite exercising almost nothing. I used to be an athlete when I was younger though. And anxiety is a pretty good workout.
-----------------------------------
What caused it?
-I was on SSRIs a total of 8/9 years. Starting at age 17. With several attempts to stop. Firstly, celexa for 6 years. Then 6 months house bound when I tapered off. Then it was reintroduced. Meanwhile, I was still gradually falling apart and the "poop out" of staying on the pills was barely better than the protracted withdrawals of being off them.
Secondly, I tapered off again a few years later. The exact same thing happened. The symptoms above.... I went back onto a different drug, sertraline. This was extremely stimulating and made everything even worse. I tapered off it slowly again, and I find myself exactly where I was just before I got bedridden the last few times. Having the symptoms above.
-------------------------------------
How I understand it:
-Some long term damage to the serotoninergic and related systems through long term usage, especially given that I started at 17.
-Habituated stress responses or some kind of adrenal fatigue caused by protracted withdrawals, and years and years spent in a "fight or flight" mode.
-The cause as being physiological at this point. I also did 5,000+ hours of meditation in the last few years to alleviate the suffering of my condition. I managed to silence my mind. I managed to come to a place of watch what is happening to me without reacting to it. Despite this, everything on a physiological level continued. Nothing changed.
----------------------
What I've tried:
- Meditation (5000+ hours), bioenergetics, rolfing, alexander technique, breathing exercises, the buteyko technique (I raised my CP from 5 to 30, but my symptoms are 90% the same or quickly rebound to a low CP upon discontinuation). Also, trauma release exercises, various shaking and breathing things.
- Ashwaganda, bacopa, phosphatidylserine, tagara herb (similar structure to benzos), CLO, bacopa, N-Acetyl-Glucosamine, R-ALA, various super high potency multi vits like "Life Extension Mix, probably more than I can count. Almost nothing was helpful, or had strong rebounds.
- Valium, zopiclone (when I really couldn't sleep). Quickly made things much worse and I discontinued.
- Keeping busy, pushing forward, acting normal. Quickly burned me out and I ended up far worse than simply being gentle with myself.
- Exercising lightly. I'm either too fatigued, or adrenaline dump within 5 minutes of starting light exercise.
- Cardiologists, neurologists, GPs. I fainted twice too, and several times had anxiety / fight or flight so extreme I ended up in A&E overnight. No-one helped me, although a cardiologist suggested looking into low cortisol.
Also, about 100 other things that my mind isn't working too well to remember.
-----------------------
Blood tests have revealed almost nothing, except high-ish Triglycerides, a low-ish prediabetic hba1c. The only thing I haven't test is 24 hour Cortisol, although I'm not entirely sure if this will be useful?
What I'm considering
I could really do with some way of re-regulating the damage SSRIs did.
And secondly, to bring myself down and out of the constant fight or flight cycle I've been stuck inside for years. There seems to be no "rest and digest" response for me, I'm stuck inside a tumble dryer from hell.
- Mirtazapine, I have some in my drawer now but have not tried. Something I specifically requested to try after researching the anti-andrenaline/cortisol effects. I considered either starting it or using it once in a while when a crash cycle starts. I'm concerned about more withdrawals though.
- Cyproheptadine, have seen good words spoken about it here.
Otherwise, I'm really open to hearing anything that might help, or recommendations for more tests to do. Right now, I'm living 1% of the life I'd like to be living. I'd give any amount of money, or even both legs, to resolve these problems. They've continued such a long time, and I'm so...so worn out by it all. I'm only 25 but I feel incredibly old.
Boo hoo... Many thanks for reading !
- Johnson
- A very high adrenaline / fight or flight baseline that will get triggered by all kinds of stimulus. For example: limited sleep, a loud environment, exercise, lots of different supplements/vitamins, etc. It is like a general hypersensitivity that makes me dump adrenaline / crash on almost any input. An example might be, I walk for 10 minutes, then suddenly feel a flash of adrenaline being dumped, and find it hard to walk any further, especially up hill. I will frequently wake up after only a few hours with a sudden spike of adrenaline, or extreme tightness in my chest, that feels painful and seems to begin while I'm physically asleep.
- Chronic fatigue. I never feel rested, on top of the constant fight or flight symptoms. I've been room/bedridden twice, soon after I tapered (very slowly) off SSRIs in both instances. First for 6 months in 2012. Secondly for another 6 months in 2016. Although I got out and started doing things again in life, I feel like I'm barely hanging on by the fingernails. I crash frequently for days to weeks at a time, where I'm almost nonfunctional. Only being a postgrad student with mid-term deadlines allows for this. There is no way in hell I could have a regular job. I've also had to do things like get taxis to go 200meters up a hill.
- No tolerance for any stimulants, including caffeine. No tolerance for alcohol. No tolerance for sugar, a smoothie will make me crash big time within a few hours.
- Limited tolerance for relaxants. For instance, valium might knock me out, but it will make me feel fragile, disorientated, and have very strong rebounds. I take it rarely, but it used to just have a simple relaxing effect.
- Lots of trouble concentrating, remembering, keeping track of my own life. I'll lose track of weeks. Or physically something will happen. For instance, it will be extremely hot one night, I won't sleep at all, that starts a spiral of anxiety and adrenaline, I won't sleep again... I spend the entire week in a state of disorientation and cycling anxiety/fatigue until by fluke I manage to sleep a little or knock myself out somehow.
- My pulse is pretty low. 60 resting, 42 average over night. 50 in the morning. Despite exercising almost nothing. I used to be an athlete when I was younger though. And anxiety is a pretty good workout.
-----------------------------------
What caused it?
-I was on SSRIs a total of 8/9 years. Starting at age 17. With several attempts to stop. Firstly, celexa for 6 years. Then 6 months house bound when I tapered off. Then it was reintroduced. Meanwhile, I was still gradually falling apart and the "poop out" of staying on the pills was barely better than the protracted withdrawals of being off them.
Secondly, I tapered off again a few years later. The exact same thing happened. The symptoms above.... I went back onto a different drug, sertraline. This was extremely stimulating and made everything even worse. I tapered off it slowly again, and I find myself exactly where I was just before I got bedridden the last few times. Having the symptoms above.
-------------------------------------
How I understand it:
-Some long term damage to the serotoninergic and related systems through long term usage, especially given that I started at 17.
-Habituated stress responses or some kind of adrenal fatigue caused by protracted withdrawals, and years and years spent in a "fight or flight" mode.
-The cause as being physiological at this point. I also did 5,000+ hours of meditation in the last few years to alleviate the suffering of my condition. I managed to silence my mind. I managed to come to a place of watch what is happening to me without reacting to it. Despite this, everything on a physiological level continued. Nothing changed.
----------------------
What I've tried:
- Meditation (5000+ hours), bioenergetics, rolfing, alexander technique, breathing exercises, the buteyko technique (I raised my CP from 5 to 30, but my symptoms are 90% the same or quickly rebound to a low CP upon discontinuation). Also, trauma release exercises, various shaking and breathing things.
- Ashwaganda, bacopa, phosphatidylserine, tagara herb (similar structure to benzos), CLO, bacopa, N-Acetyl-Glucosamine, R-ALA, various super high potency multi vits like "Life Extension Mix, probably more than I can count. Almost nothing was helpful, or had strong rebounds.
- Valium, zopiclone (when I really couldn't sleep). Quickly made things much worse and I discontinued.
- Keeping busy, pushing forward, acting normal. Quickly burned me out and I ended up far worse than simply being gentle with myself.
- Exercising lightly. I'm either too fatigued, or adrenaline dump within 5 minutes of starting light exercise.
- Cardiologists, neurologists, GPs. I fainted twice too, and several times had anxiety / fight or flight so extreme I ended up in A&E overnight. No-one helped me, although a cardiologist suggested looking into low cortisol.
Also, about 100 other things that my mind isn't working too well to remember.
-----------------------
Blood tests have revealed almost nothing, except high-ish Triglycerides, a low-ish prediabetic hba1c. The only thing I haven't test is 24 hour Cortisol, although I'm not entirely sure if this will be useful?
What I'm considering
I could really do with some way of re-regulating the damage SSRIs did.
And secondly, to bring myself down and out of the constant fight or flight cycle I've been stuck inside for years. There seems to be no "rest and digest" response for me, I'm stuck inside a tumble dryer from hell.
- Mirtazapine, I have some in my drawer now but have not tried. Something I specifically requested to try after researching the anti-andrenaline/cortisol effects. I considered either starting it or using it once in a while when a crash cycle starts. I'm concerned about more withdrawals though.
- Cyproheptadine, have seen good words spoken about it here.
Otherwise, I'm really open to hearing anything that might help, or recommendations for more tests to do. Right now, I'm living 1% of the life I'd like to be living. I'd give any amount of money, or even both legs, to resolve these problems. They've continued such a long time, and I'm so...so worn out by it all. I'm only 25 but I feel incredibly old.
Boo hoo... Many thanks for reading !
- Johnson
Last edited: