I tried Prozac but it didn’t help a lot and I found my gf so I didn’t want the sexual side effects, then after a lot of anxiety tried Lyrica and it worked decently for a bit less than a year but I think that now it doesn’t help that much (either because my circumstances are more anxiety inducing in general or because of tolerance).
There aren’t that many CBT therapists in my country either let alone ERP specialists (most are talk therapists or psychoanalysts). I’m not sure how much it would help anyways because I mainly have mental obsessions which might are more difficult to prevent.
What did you do in a similar position? Did you manage to find some semblance of inner peace? Thanks for your time
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I’m autistic and have special interests.
I also “check” things regularly, though not as often as I used to.
I would definitely keep looking for some therapist, but consider also doing tele-therapy from far away or even with someone outside the country.
Have you considered channeling your obsessions in good ways?
Have you considered channeling your obsessions in good ways?
They mostly follow the “I am a bad person” / “I will harm someone” pattern, so I can’t really get something out of them. During uni I had a severe checking compulsion which helped me get high grades but I got burnt out halfway through, so they probably do more harm than good in general :/
The checking might be egging you on. I had to wean myself off of that after I believed that Hell could exist or something.
Don’t worry, I transition to not giving many fucks about academics/work heh. I only check when consuming media sometimes (staying to long in one line of dialogue by pausing or sth)
Oh, I see.
Yeah, I used to do that sometimes.
Gabapentinoids like Lyrica have been my only real saviors, but the tolerance climbs way too fast to be useful long term, and the withdrawal is the literal worst withdrawal I’ve ever been through. Avoid phenibut with a 100 foot pole for this exact reason. Some people report good long term success with benzos, but they don’t do shit for me so ymmv.
Hot take, I really like anti-psychotics. Most of them suck, but risperidone treats me fucking great emotion wise and helps me keep from focusing in on physical discomfort. Different strokes for different folks tho.
This also may be a hot take, but kinda fuck CBT. It’s cool for like a month, but then after that it just made me spiral even harder. I don’t need help recognizing the thoughts, I don’t need to pick my brain any harder than I already do. Therapy all depends on the therapist though, find a person that works for you. Therapy is good, but bad therapy can be worse than not going at all.
Gabapentinoids like Lyrica have been my only real saviors, but the tolerance climbs way too fast to be useful long term, and the withdrawal is the literal worst withdrawal I’ve ever been through
I haven’t looked into psychopharmacology relating to OCD but if gabapentinoids work then you might consider trying out memantine/amantadine. Obviously they work on different receptors however memantine/amantadine might hit a similar note that a gabapentinoid does. Both memantine and amantadine have pretty minimal side effect profiles in comparison to psychiatric meds like antidepressants.
I am interested in memantine, just worried about ever going through withdrawal again. NMDA action (cough syrup, ketamine, memantine ect.) have all treated me pretty well when I’ve done them. DXM as a short term SSRI actually works alright imo.
How does memantine make you feel?
I haven’t tried memantine before but it’s very similar to amantadine, which I do take.
I’ve heard one anecdotal report that memantine’s effect is stronger than amantadine but idk the truth of that.
Amantadine is an anticholinergic but it’s very mild in this respect compared to the anticholinergic effects that you get from antipsychotics.
I take amantadine to hit a few different birds with one stone: I have ADHD and I’m really sensitive to the side effects of norepinephrinergic meds (think Adderall, Vyvanse) and amantadine increases dopamine release and blocks reuptake so it works well as an adjunct ADHD med for me. I suffer from pretty crippling depression and the NMDA antagonist effect is definitely welcome. Last of all there’s the obvious anxiety that goes along with the depression and the sensitivity to norepinephrinergic meds and amantadine works well to mitigate these two related factors.
It’s a little bit hard to determine what memantine would feel like for a non-ADHDer but I would say that it’s anxiolytic effects would still be the major effect, so if it works it should feel reduce your anxiety noticeably.
(I’ve only ever had temazepam during serious mental health crises so I can’t really compare the effect to benzodiazepines anecdotally, unfortunately.)
Gabapentinoids like Lyrica have been my only real saviors, but the tolerance climbs way too fast to be useful long term, and the withdrawal is the literal worst withdrawal I’ve ever been through
I tried to lower my Lyrica dosage from 2 x 50mg to 2 x 25mg but my sleep was worse for a month with no signs for improving, so I started it again, I dread what would happen if I completely stopped taking it.
This also may be a hot take, but kinda fuck CBT I don’t need to pick my brain any harder than I already do
Yeah, I also do that and its the compulsion that has tormented me the most. The depression stuff like forcing positive thoughts didn’t work either for me, I don’t know if I did it wrong or CBT was conceived for the NT brain or sth
Oof, your doctor is being kinda irresponsible with Lyrica if they recommended that drop. 25mg is the most you should drop at a time, but that’s still harsher than I’d recommend. You’re right at the line (100mg a day) where the withdrawal should still be manageable, but you’re also at the point where you have to do tiny long term drops in order to make it bearable. If you want off, you essentially have to do a slow taper to zero or you will literally be dealing with the withdrawal for years. I didn’t want to deal with the full taper so I did a fast one to get off, and it is literally the biggest regret I’ve had my entire life because of how bad the withdrawal fried me afterwards. The nerve damage and PAWS depression from it make my time quitting benzos and fentanyl at the same time feel like fucking child’s play. Medical professionals usually don’t understand how bad the withdrawal is or that there even is a withdrawal, so unless your psych is particularly smart, they will give bad advice on this subject.
They didn’t recommend it. Sometimes I feel that while my doctor is much better than the psychiatrist horror stories I have heard, they wait too long to react to certain side effects I am having, or they aren’t very good at extracting that information out of me. I tried to reduce it because it made me extra sluggish this summer (every summer I become depressed and fatigued for whatever reason), and I couldn’t take it anymore so I reduced it on my own. They didn’t object to the decrease though, so that’s on them
I don’t suffer from OCD but I would consider trying out NAC to treat it. NAC has a very minimal side-effect profile and it’s often sold as a supplement, which makes it cheap and readily available. (In countries where it’s regulated, you might consider grey market importing - in the extremely unlikely event that it gets caught in customs you could just play dumb and say that it was sold as a supplement and you didn’t realise that it was a regulated product in your country.)
Here’s a couple of meta-analyses that consider the efficacy of NAC in treating OCD and related disorders:
https://sci-hub.se/10.9758/cpn.2015.13.1.12
https://sci-hub.se/10.1503/jpn.100057
Disclaimer: IANAD
I had actually considered trying NAC before any medication, but got spooked because of some papers about it protecting cancer cells (iirc in mice, so they probably administered huge doses, but still)
Just going to reiterate that I’m no doctor, and I’m sure as heck not an oncologist either, but the effects of NAC on cancer are mixed and it appears to, at least in part, prevent the formation and proliferation of cancer cells.
What you’re looking at with taking NAC and its potential effects in promoting cancer growth is probably similar to that of the less-significant lifestyle factors (e.g. not the extreme ones like smoking or sunbathing) such as diet, body weight, and level of chronic stress; if NAC reduces your level of chronic stress then it’s probably going to even out in rough terms. It’s also worth considering your quality of life in this regard too - while NAC may increase your risk of cancer in some respects, if it causes a major positive impact on your quality of life then it might be worth it.
If you find that NAC is effective and you’re considering taking it long term, one preventative measure that you could take is to cycle on and off the dose on a regular basis. I’m unsure how long NAC is effective in the body for so taking your whole dose first thing in the morning may not provide enough of a window but you might try something like 3 days on/1 off or 5 days on/2 off.
Obviously this matter is well above my pay grade but in the short term it’s very unlikely to cause any significant risks and if you find that it’s effective then this question is something that I’d email a researcher about or I’d follow cancer experts and wait for an opportunity when one of them does an AMA or a podcast appearance to ask about this.
Yeah that makes complete sense and my fears are a bit irrational. The chatter about Gabapentinoid-induced cognitive decline didn’t faze me that much, so why should this. It is a bit expensive and not covered by the national health system, but if I run out of options I will try it
In my own limited experience, there is no shortcut and I simply have to force myself to do exposure exercises. I also have internal obsessions & compulsions - what I do when I’m having a flare up is write the obsession out as if all my worst fears are true and read it over and over for 5-15 minutes per session without reacting with any kind of internal compulsion (checking, reassurance seeking, etc). While it is deeply unpleasant, in my experience it also has resulted in pretty rapid improvements. I’m not sure if this is the “correct” way to do exposure-and-response prevention but its a method that has worked wonders for me.
Damn, that could work
Ya I mean obviously it’s better to do this under the guidance of a therapist trained in this type of treatment and I’m no substitute for that. But if you can’t find one where you live it would probably be helpful to research the kinds of exercises that other internal OCD sufferers have undertaken that they’ve found helpful to get a sense of what’s available to you. My method is ofc not gonna be one size fits all and I could see it being a bit too much at once for some.
Best of luck, I know how debilitating and awful this disorder can be (it ate up a lot of my early 20s before I figured out what it was and took steps against it). But in my experience it also responds really well to the psychological treatments available so definitely doesn’t have to define your life.
I actually sort of tried it, it really is pretty anxiety inducing but I will keep at it. Glad you are better now
Which country are you in?
Also, welcome to Hexbear!
Greece, thanks!
Nice. I’m Turk.
Anyway, if you can speak English, consider tele-therapy with someone outside the country.
This is what I was going to suggest. I’m no professional but I wouldn’t think that OCD is something that can be treated through medication, CBT as much as I dislike it might be the most effective
True enough, yeah.
CBT can be useful depending on who administers it.
This person should find a neurodivergent therapist like I did.
I had a therapist who was neurodivergent as well and they were who helped me recognize that I was also, it really is so helpful to have people with lived experience, sucks that it’s so rare to find
Thanks!
Wow that’s really cool, thanks for sharing it!
This person should find a neurodivergent therapist like I did
Lucky, last therapist I had used some really old terminology which categorized me (probably autistic) as “psychotic” and we had some conflicts about that. She did help me on understanding some things about how other humans act though, which I am grateful to her for.
I wouldn’t think that OCD is something that can be treated through medication
I have more or less reached the same conclusion, it is pretty interesting because the meds lessen the actual body anxiety, but the rumination / mental reassurance never goes away completely. They do help with allowing me to distract myself from the thoughts by doing something else, but I will still get overwhelmed if left alone with them
Anyway, if you can speak English, consider tele-therapy with someone outside the country. This is what I was going to suggest
I did those during the lockdowns with yet another therapist but they didn’t go that well, but I could try it again bc I found an ERP therapist in Greece who does them
That’s awesome that the meds can help with the anxiety; the feedback loop between the obsessive thoughts and the central nervous system is something important to address, I think. But I would imagine that being able to dissect the obsessions may help to relieve them with someone trained in talk therapy/CBT. At least for me, I feel like sometimes when I am able to figure out the root issue of a particular behavior, it can kinda resolve itself. Not always, of course, but being able to let go of the tiniest bad habit or stressor makes such a difference. I hope you can find the support you need!
Perhaps there could be a resource to help you? Like this?
It would definitely be worth your while doing talk therapy or psychoanalysis if that’s available to you. It’s fine to try and numb your OCD with psychiatric drugs, i take antidepressants myself, but psychologically speaking things happen for a reason, that is to say your OCD has a purpose and is probably some kind of reaction or defensive mechanism to an emotional problem, although it’s not possible for me to speculate on what that would be. Ultimately you will have to challenge the thoughts and compulsions via exposure type treatment (as in, exposing yourself to triggers and conditioning yourself to ignore them), but it’s easier to do that if you have some understanding of why they are occurring.
