Posted by Elizabeth on June 12, 2001, at 22:46:14
In reply to Re: more about Xanax and depression, posted by gilbert on June 12, 2001, at 17:22:56
> Wow 8-12mg per day that is like a walking coma.
Not really. You adjust to the sedation. The big problem is, if you decide to stop taking it, it's *hard*. (Getting off Xanax is hard even if you only take a low daily dose. People who have experience with both often say that heroin withdrawal is not as bad as Xanax withdrawal.)
BTW: I don't take Xanax regularly, but when I do, I need 1.5-2 mg *at a time*. So 10 mg/day or so doesn't seem like that much to me. I haven't experienced any increased depression when I take it, but no antidepressant effect either.
> The best I ever felt was on klonolpin but that darned limp biscuit set in and I thought what a bummer I had fianlly found my drug my ED was worse than on an ssri but it crept up on me like sex was fine for a week than all of suddden my capacity began to deteriorate day by day.
Ouch! I think Klonopin has some unusual characteristics compared with the other benzos, possibly including serotonergic effects.
> My depression on xanax the past 1.5 years comes and goes and nothing too serious just a little apathy and low energy.
Was that an effect when you first took it, or after you'd been on it a while? Sedative/anxiolytic drugs often have that effect on men (consider alcohol, barbiturates, etc.) but not necessarily on women.
> I know my doc won't crank it up to the necessary dose to get anti panic and anti depressive what about st johns wort and xanax together?
Lots of people take a benzo in combination with a standard AD (SSRI, MAOI, tricyclic, etc.). The benzo can reduce the dose of antidepressant that is needed and alleviate the jitteriness that antidepressants tend to cause for people with anxiety disorders (especially panic).
SJW might be a problem, though, due to enzyme induction: it has the potential to increase the metabolism of the Xanax, so that you would need to take a higher dose of Xanax.
The amount of Xanax that you take is actually pretty close to what a lot of people take for panic disorder. The recommended doses in the PDR may actually be higher that what's really needed. I know that a lot of people with PD take around 2-4 mg/day.
-elizabeth
poster:Elizabeth
thread:65795
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010612/msgs/66270.html