[Aliceisalive]

Difficult times...
Before the end of 2008 I was taking Clonazepam, (1mg three times a day)
Effexor XR (75 mgs 3 of them every morning) Trileptal (cannot remember dosage, but i took two in the morning and three in the evening) Seroquel (200mg once at night) and my birth control yasmin. This combination of medicine worked EXCELLENTLY after almost 10 years of testing out medications and was able to function MUCH better than ever in my lifetime.
Mainly the addition of seroquel and trileptal.
At the end of 2008 I got off my father's insurance (turned 25)

At that point I had no insurance for any of my meds. The bill for buying this medication outright without insurance was well over $1,500 a month if not over $2,000. I still had a little effexor and trileptal left over so i decided to use it very sparingly only taking one of each a day, still the withdrawals were HORRIBLE. Alas all my meds ran out and i was suffering withdrawal from 5 medications at once. I tried to find insurance for myself... but since my meds were such a high price nobody wanted to insure me. I did find one company which did, but only took about ten percent off of the original price of my meds. Still WAY too much for me to pay. I spent the next three weeks calling insurance companies... and feeling sicker than I had ever felt in my entire life.
Lying on the couch, dizzy and nausious and my entire body tingling and my eyes unable to focus on anything.

And then I finally got my appt with my doc. He switched my effexor to Pristiq, Trileptal to the generic Tegretol, and wanted to switch my Seroquel to a generic but the price was still going to be over $200 so i couldn't afford that one. Thankfully my insurance covered ONE of my meds (clonazepam) for $20. *Still dont have my birth control

I've been taking my new meds Pristiq and Tegretol for about a week now.
I've noticed, that i can focus a bit better now and can drive (on a good day) now, but that's the only good thing i can say.

I've been very short-tempered, angry and critical of me and others. Losing control of my anger and breaking things. Very restless and burst into tears over nothing. It rather sucks when you're so annoyed at everything that you even annoy yourself. I'm scared with suicidal thoughts when i MAKE myself sit down and be calm. It crawls inside of me and makes me want to rip myself apart. I don't want to hurt myself... or others... I'm a very non violent person in most cases. I recently slashed open my leg just to get this anger out of me. This isn't me. My boyfriend is caught in the middle of this and tries his best to help me in any way he can. I did get out of the house this week which was extremely difficult... I held it together for my boyfriends b-day and went shopping but by the time i got home i couldn't pretend anymore and anxiety swallowed me whole. I had such shortness of breath i thought he was going to have to take me to the hospital.

Is this the new medication? Is this still the withdrawal from my last medication? Is this a hormonal imbalance from not taking birth control pills?

I WISH i could stay on the meds i was on... but it seems that it's just not going to be affordable as no insurance wants me.

Please! ANY input is greatly appreciated!

[Robert_325]

I'm concerned for you. I don't like it at all when someone describes self-harming as "getting the anger out of me." There is more to this than that. What do you mean by "slashing" your leg? How severely did you cut yourself? I think you should talk to a psychiatrist about this and you need to be honest when you share. I don't care if you have insurance or not. If you go to the hospital ER and show them what you've done they will treat you. They have to, it's the law. I'm not trying to be judgemental of you over the cutting thing, I'm sincerely concerned for you.

It would be overstepping my boundaries with this being a drug forum to attempt to diagnose anything under these circumstances. Yes part of your problem is probably from the change in medications but quite honestly it sounds like you COULD have been over-medicated to begin with. Of course I'm not looking at your medical chart so I am very hesitant to even comment much more than I have. You were taking numerous mind-altering substances to have them abruptly stopped without warning. I surely wish you would find a way to talk to a specialist in this area even if it requires going to the ER.

Please keep posting. Let us know what's happening. Please get on here and talk to us BEFORE you decide to hurt yourself again. I surely hope you don't find it necessary to repeat that. Wish you would get yourself to a dr tomorrow. Stay in touch and take care of yourself. I will add you to my prayers. God bless.

[Aliceisalive]

Thanks for writing...
I needed somebody's.. anybody's input on my situation. As far as the possible overmedicating... I've been down a very VERY long hard road of therapies and medications. The medication rollercoaster possibly the hardest. I was (diagnosed) at the age of 16 though I've had severe social anxiety as long as i can remember. It's hereditary unfortunately. They started me out on the nice safe drugs like prozac and zoloft etc etc etc etc, much to no avail, hoping that I was not like my father who had also been down a long road of medications and had reached the end where he just takes xanax. It was when I was introduced to clonazepam (klonopin) that I actually felt any relief and decided instead of dropping out of highschool because the anxiety was too unbearable, to stick it out and try to graduate, which I did. Yes, i know klonopin is one of the *end of the road* meds. After I had tried pretty much everything in the prozac.. zoloft...paxil.. etc family I tried many other meds, too many to count. My file is literally at least 8 inches tall. It was when i was introduced to the antipsychotics... bipolar meds that I truly felt better. It may seem like a lot to you but it's definately not as if I was first prescribed these meds... Its been about 10 years since i first started taking meds.

About my trying to release anger...
I maybe should not have mentioned my cutting my leg.. but figured i wouldn't be totally honest if I didn't mention it because it deeply disturbs me. I haven't cut myself in years. I've been.. well.. as happy as i suppose i can be with the illnesses i face. When I was a teenager it was the only way to ease the pain.. a lot of people dont' understand it, and I don't expect them to. The best way to describe it is exchanging pain for pain. And no, it's not a bad cut, I'm fine. I used to discuss that sort of thing with my psychiatrists/psychologists but lately i haven't needed to.

I feel like i'm reverting back to when I had meds that weren't working... and that scares the living ******** out of me. I'm so INTENSELY angry... not at anything in particular. And I'm scared to be alone when my boyfriend is at work. Everybody around me seems to think that everything is okay.

and its not.....

[Robert_325]

It's okay that you mentioned the cutting. Trust me I've worked with many people who have dealt with this exact same situation. I was just concerned for you as I don't know your specific medical history, but you didn't freak me out or anything. I just want you to be safe.

I'm very familiar with all the meds you mentioned. I have no problem with people using psych meds who really need them. I've seen people basically try to shame patients out of taking meds they need to take. I've seen it cost a couple people their life when they stop meds they really need. So I only have your best interests at heart.

Please understand that I have to be very careful about what I tell people on a forum where serious medications and serious conditions are concerned. There can be potentially disasterous consequences if we tell some people the wrong thing. Again I just want you to be safe. Please keep me posted how you're doing. I will keep you in my prayers. God bless.

[MaisieC]

Hi Alice,

I think it's probably close to impossible to say exactly where your symptoms are coming from right now...your body is going through so much.

I am so sorry you are suffering all this! The lack of provisions for health care in this country is absolutely SINFUL. But while the president works on that, we need to help you.

First, I think Robert is absolutely right that you should go to the ER and get someone to take you seriously. They can't not treat you.

Because I think you're probably stressed enough, I did some research on the Web for you, about patient assistance programs. Basically, they'll send you a three-month supply of your meds for free. (When I lost my job and my insurance, I was able to get my Zoloft free from Pfizer this way.) You have to fill out forms and get your doctor to fill out forms and write a prescription for what you need. You also need to give them proof of income (or lack thereof). The companies that make your meds all seem to have similar programs. So here goes...

For your Effexor, the Wyeth site:

http://www.wyeth.com/contact?rid=/wy...nt_assist.html

For your Trileptal, the Novartis site:

http://www.pharma.us.novartis.com:80...73805851729154

And for your Seroquel, a company called AstraZenica:

http://www.astrazeneca-us.com/help-a...our-medicines/

I know you have substitutes for some of these, but it wouldn't be bad to get the real thing for free.

I don't think there's any way you can get birth control pills this way, though. (I also doubt very much that you have a hormonal imbalance from stopping the pills. I think it's everything else combined.) You know you need to be really, really careful right now not to get pregnant. Not only because you don't need that complication in your life right now, but also because some women become extra-fertile when they go off the pill. Not to scare you, but just be careful.

I don't know what your financial situation is, but from what you wrote it doesn't sound like you're working, right? That will be to your advantage in the short term, in applying for help through the patient assistance programs.

Long-term, given our lousy health-care system, the safest place for you is in a job with real insurance, as soon as you start feeling able to look for work. It's not easy, I know. But I've been in a similar position of needing multiple expensive drugs, so I'm not just blowing off steam here. If you can get and keep a job like that, it will be one of the best things you can do for yourself. Of course I have no idea what your circumstances are or what you're planning to do career-wise. You just gotta be safe, you know?

Please keep posting and let us know how you are, OK? Take good care.