seadragonsovereign
Well-known member
Hi everyone,I am in the early stages of what I hope is only BFS (see my posts elsewhere), but I went to see my home doctor yesterday (meet again with my neuro for 2+ weeks for 1st emg and anxiety levels are off the chart, along with the non-stop twitching) to come up with an anxiety management plan. He had some very strong opinions on the meds available (based on his experience) and I thought I would pass them on for whatever its worth. Buspar is probably among the weakest of the anti-anxiety meds. He does not recommend it alone as it usually is just not that effective, in his opinion. Among the SSRI's, he ranks them thusly: Lexapro, zoloft/prozac, celexa, paxil. He said he does not prescribe paxil anymore and ranks it last because of the extreme withdrawl problems people have trying to get off it (to which I can attest as he had me on it about 4 years ago when I went through a similar period of anxiety - not due to twitching, but "phantom" heart problems and general stress). He said that Lexapro has, in his experience, the fewest side effects and doesn't have the withdrawl problems that others do. However, Lexapro does not have (as yet) a generic version and many health plans won't cover it fully.Any of these take time to get going, so you have to add in the short term fixes. These would of course be your vallium and xanax types. My mom uses xanax and it seems to work well for her. Primarily because of this, I think, he prescribed that to me (since your anxiety problems are probably inherited, the meds that help your family should help you too!) for the "short term" although he said that addiction/withdrawl is typically only seen in those who take it "for the high" and/or in several dose per day every day for a long time. He said not to worry about using it long term if one is only using 1 or 2 per day or less as needed. Back to the Buspar. He did say that Buspar AND one of the SSRI's generally increases the control of anxiety. In fact, if say Lexapro wasn't working really great he would add in Buspar (it is cheap, too) before changing to something else. They are not a problem together.So right now I am going on a Xanax plus Lexapro regimen. Hopefully, it will work. But I wanted to pass this info on here. It is just one Dr's opinion, but every bit of info we have I think should be shared.As an aside: you might have guessed that my appointment with him lasted longer than usual. It did. I was in his office for almost an hour talking about the meds as well as what's going on with me neurologically. I think it was the last appointment of the day, but it was nice that he spent some time with me on it. Very good "bed side" manner - as opposed to the polar opposite that is my nuerologist. If anyone lives in the Columbus, OH area and want the name of my GP, send me a private message and I would be happy to give you his name.
) I am from Northwest Ohio (Lima) originally, but I always fly into Columbus when I go home. I miss it dearly, so I always love it when someone mentions it 