I’ve talked a bit about various mental health related things in my random “update” posts (again my messy mind) but I wanted to make this more concise so some of this you may have already read.

I left off in my Mental Health Update #2 speaking about my doctor wanting to change my anti-depressant and focus on my physical health.  As you may have noticed by my other blogs I’m going to be getting gastric bypass surgery (hooray!). My doctor agrees that this is the best choice for me right now.  He also switched me to Effexor, he was reluctant at first because I didn’t take the weaning of Paxil very well and Effexor is much worse, but in the end the benefits outweighed the negatives so I started that in May.  I started at the lowest dose of 75mg and remained on that for almost a month before doubling to 150mg.  Let me tell you what a clusterfuck it was to move up to 150mg.  I went 4 days without medication due to errors at the pharmacy and because my picky ass insurance only covered capsules and not tablets. (Seriously… don’t they know a girl is crazy???) It was probably the most confusing 4 days ever and I’ve decided I will probably never come off of Effexor unless they hospitalize me.

I’m going to therapy bi-weekly now instead of weekly but it still seems like a lot because between therapy, weight loss appointments (which I’ve lost 12lbs), and surgery appointments it seems as if I have something to do all the time.

Now back to Effexor, does it work? Initially I thought it was as good as the Paxil, now I’m not as sure.  I seem to have a lot of depressive moments that shine through BUT I am also at a significantly more stressful place in my life.  So I don’t know, it takes away most of my depression and some of my anxiety.  It’s definitely not as effective as the Paxil was but what can you do? I’m extremely reluctant to go up in dosage as while this hasn’t caused me any weight gain I’ve noticed it makes me lazy. Like come home and get straight in bed lazy. Or is that the depression?? Hmmm…  A girl can’t win huh? There haven’t been any other significant changes to my mental health so I’m going to leave it here.

Until next time. Blessed be.