The full extent of my very dark period is laid out in the post "New to the Boards and trying to avert a crisis" in the Introduce Yourself section. To summarize, I was intensely melancholy, had insomnia, intensely isolated, no motivation, extremely irritable, quick to anger, lacked patience, took no joy in anything since 2010, and crying nearly every day.
June: I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder. First, I started on Wellbutrin 150mg and increased to 300mg after a week, with Xanax PRN (as needed). This took care of the crying and some of the irritability. I still couldn't sleep more than an hour or two at a time because my mind was still obsessing over EVERYTHING. The anger could be kept in check with Xanax, but I wasn't trying to pick up a benzo habit, so it was definitely used sparingly.
July: We continued with Wellbutrin daily and Xanax PRN, but the psych was concerned over my lack of sleep. He started Ambien nightly. Being able to totally shut off and just sleep without thinking about EVERY SINGLE THING that could ever go wrong in your life made quite a difference in my outlook. I still had no patience or motivation and could get angry pretty easily.
August: The lack of patience and motivation and quickness to anger was troublesome, so he started 20mg of Prozac in addition to my other meds.
September: I was feeling better but still was having patience/motivation problems. He wanted to bring me up to 40mg of Prozac but I was concerned about SSRI side effects (Zoloft was terrible for me. Lots of weight gain, no sexual response, tired all the time, and was completely emotionless) so I wanted to give the 20mg some more time. I declined a refill on the Xanax because I hadn't really been using it.
November (yesterday): I hadn't gotten much more improvement in my problem areas (plus there's been a return of my stress related stomach issues) since September, so we decided to bump Prozac up to 40mg. I'm flying for the first time next week and I don't know how I'm going to react, so I asked for a few Xanax just in case I'm terrified. I'm so close to being completely better I can taste it.
I'm a million light years away from the way I felt in June. I'm content with my life, I've picked up some freelance work to keep me occupied and keep a gaping hole from my resume, and I've lost 30 lbs since July. I'm having an easier time taking things in stride, and although I'm having my stomach problems again, I'm not discouraged. Hopefully this will be the last adjustment and I can stop going to the doctor all the time after my next appointment. A girl can hope, right?
