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[Mindfulmoomins]

Hi everyone,

Last Wed I saw my GP as I was still struggling with anxiety and depression.

She has referred me urgently to a specialist menopause clinic (Northwick Park appointment in early March).

She has also referred me to the community mental health team as she said that's the way to access one to one support.

We also talked about trying a different anti depressant. I have been on fluoxetine 40 mgs for over 10 years and it worked well and along with meditation, exercise, eating well, lovely friends and my husband things were good.

Two years ago I started mild peri symptoms including brain fog, crashing fatigue, low mood, anxiety, itchy skin, bad PMT. They went away but last year they increased and started HRT. I reacted to the norehistine in Evorel Sequi after a few months and have been trying Estrogel 3 pumps for 3 and a half weeks.

So I started 15 mg mirtazapine a week ago and it seemed to make a huge difference. My sleep, anxiety and mood all improved greatly. I tapered the fluoxetine down to 20 mg and took the last one on Sunday morning.

I am feeling anxious after a restless night and anxiety last night. I am worried about feeling worse or going backwards and just wondered if anyone else had changed antidepressants and could share their (positive!) experience?

I am seeing the GP later and I realise I need to give it a few more weeks. It's so scary all this trial and error with HRT and other things!

I am also having a break from ultragestan this month after talking to a private specialist. I felt so awful coming off it after 10 days and we agreed to let the oestrogen build up in my body a bit more for a month.

I also started counselling yesterday and that may have brought up stuff although it felt helpful at the time.

Like so many have already said. I just want my life back.

Thanks for reading.

Xx

[aspie65]

My first thought was why are you changing your AD?  I have watched my son and mother go through this and it is not fun.  I needed to up my AD dosage and add pregabalin to the mix with HRT to cope with the extra strain the perimenopause put on my mental health. Changing my AD during a fraught time would not be something I'd like to do.  Also your mirtazapine dose is low and may not be enough now that you have reduced your fluoextine.

[Mindfulmoomins]

Thanks Aspie, we decided to change as Mirtazapine has an anti anxiety component and it didn't feel like the fluoxetine was doing much as I was so low and anxious.

Obviously it is a difficult time to change things but I was feeling quite desperate and had resisted changing ad's until then.

Your post has not encouraged me much!

[Abba Fan]

It sounds like you've tapered way too quick off the fluoxetine, you were on this for over 10 years, you should have tapered slower over months.

[aspie65]

So sorry mindfulmoomins, didn't mean to be so negative.  I just wanted to say it is hard and as Abbafan says maybe tailoring off more slowly would be better.  I did go through something very similar to you.  I was on cipralex 10mg for years and I was doing fine, when my perimenopuase got going it just wasn't enough.  I doubled the dose and added in HRT but unless life was very calm my anxiety spiralled out of control.  This was when I was was prescribed pregabalin which really worked for me.  Could you consider taking fluoextine and mirtazipine (my son takes this combination) for a while?

[Mindfulmoomins]

Thanks Aspie and sorry I am quite sensitive at the moment.

Yes I could absolutely consider taking a combination and think that's a great idea. Didn't realise that was an option and it seems more sensible. I could then come off the fluoxetine slowly over a few months as ABBA Fan says if that was appropriate.

Thank you xxx

[aspie65]