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Originally Posted by peter12
I strongly disagree with this post. Today's drugs have to undergo rigourous testing and scrutiny before being approved for medical use. An SSRI, like Lexapro, or an SNRI, like Cymbalta, can give you that extra safeguard to prevent stress or stop an anxiety attack in its tracks. All they do is increase the amounts of chemicals, like seritonin, which are depleted through anxiety attacks.
Side effects can be a bit nasty for the first week or so, insomnia, dry mouth, increased sweating etc..., but they should go and you should be feeling better after 1-2 weeks. If the meds don't work, switch to another type. Everyone's body chemistry is different and the same meds won't work for everyone.
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So if the same meds work differently on different people than how does their rigorous testing ensure they are safe? Lets face it, doctors are allowed to prescribe drugs that really mess you up in other ways. Atypical anti-psychotics now have been acknowledged to cause massive weight gain and increase the risk of diabetes. Is that safe?
Changing the way your brain takes in seratonin or blocks it can have a lifelong impact on the way your brain works. Decades of use can lead to massive change.
All I'm saying is be VERY wary. Mental illness is not like typical body illness issues. They do not understand how many of these diseases or conditions really work. The rigorous testing of these drugs is not as comprehensive as you might think.
Sounds like you are find with experimenting with drug cocktails on yourself. I personally wouldn't be and have seen firsthand from my half-brother who was diagnosed (now they are saying mis-diagnosed) as bi-polar and has been taking lithium and anti-psychotics for years. Now they're saying he was just alcoholic, meanwhile these drugs he's been on have permanently changed his attitude, the way he acts, etc while masking the fact that his alcoholism may have been the sole issue the whole time.
Different psychiatrists can also can different diagnoses, if you don't see that as a troubling issue I'm not sure what to say. Different psychiatrists will also prescribe different drug cocktails. My current roommate said his psychiatrist now switched him off the cocktail that his former doctor prescribed because it was a very dangerous mix of drugs.
New studies come out that highlight "side-effects" of certain drugs that weren't known before. That should be worrying too.
A certain drug in America was marketed to all ages as a great miracle drug then later found to cause serious issues for children and older people. They were successfully sued and they settled out of court for almost a billion dollars I think, which is chump change to big pharmaceutical companies. That should be worrying.
Read some books. I'd recommend Mad in America, that has some pretty worrying stuff in it.