Should I take the anti-anxiety medicine? - Anxiety Message Board

prostator · 07-05-2003, 02:00 PM

Hello there all, I'm a newbie to this board, would appreciate any advice. Ever since I came down with chronic prostatitis last year, I have had a horrible phobia of chronic disease. I imagine how I would react in different scenarios - what if I got cancer, what if I got MS, what if I were paralyzed? - and in each scenario I see myself being unable to bear the burden. I also have a terrible fear of having a problem in which the doctors see nothing wrong, cannot treat it, and I will be stuck with the symptoms forever. So anyway, after my chronic prostatitis improved enough, I moved back to school to acclimate myself to the enviornment before classes start in the fall. Five days later, I developed a throat problem. I gave it a day or two, and it did not improve. Then I started to get scared. Nothing - cough drops, sore throat spray, antacids - relieved the condition. Now it has lasted for a month and it is 100% chronic I feel it all the time. My doctor thinks there is nothing really wrong with my throat. He thinks my anxiety about being back at school is causing it. He wants me to go on a combination of alprazolam, gabitril, and Paxil. I, however, am not entirely convinced there is not a physical cause to my throat problem. I mean, I feel this thing the VERY INSTANT I wake up, when I am half-conscious, so how could it be caused by anxiety? I am in the process of seeing various doctors to try to nail the problem down, but it will take some time. In the meantime, however, I have become a nervous wreck, worrying that this throat thing will never go away. Also, I now have some kind of problem with my eyes that keeps me from sleeping well. Just to avoid going off the deep end, I have begun to take the alprazolam and the gabitril, but I am reluctant to start the paxil. In my eyes, my throat problem is causing my anxiety, not the other way around. I don't want to commit myself to a bunch of psycho-active medications; just a month ago, my sprits were good as my chronic prostatitis was under control, and I was only on two medications, both for prostatitis, and I was looking forward to getting off of them soon. I was feeling goo and then, out of the blue, this throat business. Now, in a month's time, everything has gone to hell. What should I do?

14allall41 · 07-06-2003, 01:29 AM

Thyroid problem could cause both the throat and anxiety attacks. Blood tests will show this. My wife had a problem for quite sometime where she thought she could not swallow. It was anxiety. She takes paxil. Be aware that alprazolam (xanax) is a short term panic attack medication that is very addictive. If you have to be on something like that, ask about switching to Klonopin, it is perfered for longer periods of time and it lasts hours longer then 5-7 hours as alprazolam does. Best to find out your test results as soon as possible before you commit to long term use of mental drugs. Make sure there is no cause other then anxiety. Good luck

Jennita · 07-06-2003, 12:33 PM

Full physical is in order of course, and a throat specialist. Tonsils can act up in adulthood.

Throat symptoms can also be caused by withdrawal syndromes from such meds as antidepressants, CNS depressants like benzos and neurontin if you have taken any of those in the past. Withdrawal symptoms, although the drug is out of the system by a month, can last several months.

Sounds like you are going to check everything out thoughly. No way it's anxiety if you are feeling pain as you wake up! You can't be anxious and be sleeping at the same time....anxious states prevent sleep. God, these days, anything they can't explain is chalked up to anxiety! Easy diagnoisis, since there is alot of stress in today's world, but come on! It's not always the case.

Lots of people get mis-diagnoised with anxiety when they really have a physical problem, or some drug reaction/withdrawals/etc. Doctors sometimes get lazy I guess, or maybe drug companies push them to give the anxiety drugs, I don't know.