8 weeks in

Yesterday was my 57th day on citalopram and I have to say to anyone struggling: it gets better. I started out with some gnarly side effects. I don’t know if they were 100% the meds or the meds combined with coming off a high stress period that included a panic attack, but I was ready to quit after two weeks… but decided to stick it out.

What I’ve actually found most helpful was firing up a ChatGPT instance that I use for journaling and documenting my toolbox of interventions when I feel anxiety spikes or find myself falling into rumination loops. Talking to a person would probably also work, but AI is always there and I don’t feel like I’m actually being a burden just constantly dumping my thoughts out on them. I don’t ask the AI for their take on things, I just mostly use it as a way to journal what I’m going through and will read or skim responses to see if any significant patterns are emerging.

At 8 weeks in I do still find myself waking up earlier than I used to and that’s annoying, but could also be a function of the sun rising at like 3 am here. I’m no longer spending my whole morning feeling like I just want to sleep to check out. There is still underlying anxiety and stress, but it’s feeling a bit more manageable. I‘ve got a big meeting g in a couple weeks I’m running at work, but I am still able to do the prep for it and it hasn’t put me in a place where I freeze up and stop functioning.

Monday I am going to talk with my doctor to see about adding propranolol as well since I still find my sympathetic nervous system being really touchy and activating a lot. I have the “tense and release” tool available to me if I end up there, but that takes some time to engage. I’d like to see if I can just take a bit of the edge off it. Anyone who has tried this would love to hear experience. I used to have Ativan for that kind of response, but they don’t prescribe that here due to risk of addiction (which I sort of get, but I still miss it).