I HAVE RECOVERED! And I want to share my story because I went searching for answers all over the internet when these problems were happening to me, and not many people had comments about being better. I'm sure many of them just moved on with their lives as I almost did. But I came back to these forums to post so that whoever is hurting might know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Keep hope alive. I did not have much hope at that time, but now I am absolutely fine :)
It all began when I went on birth control as suggested by my gyno because my periods were not happening every month like clockwork and this concerned her. But after awhile, I started getting bad headaches, so I quit them cold turkey after 3 months. Well, I was fine for awhile until a few weeks passed. Then my world changed forever.
One day I randomly started feeling extreme anxiety, a problem I have never experienced in my life. I could not eat or sleep no matter how long it had been since I had eaten and no matter how tired I knew I was. My body went haywire and it scared me to death. I was terrified, questioned my faith and my salvation, and did not want to be alone in case I died (irrational thoughts).
I went to a psychologist, tried herbs, everything... My regular doctor and gyno wanted me to either get on a drug for anxiety/depression, or get back on birth control. But my mom reasoned that I was fine before birth control and learned from researching online that birth control was probably the cause of these problems in the first place. We decided to stay away from more drugs and wait it out.
My episode of terror lasted a week the first time and I lost 13 pounds. I did not want to do anything, even get in the shower or change. I felt frozen in place, paralyzed by fear, but was still miserable sitting still. I seriously felt like I was going crazy. My heart seemed heavy and sometimes a muscle in my neck hurt too. Any little symptom scared me because I was in an irrational state. I thought I might just drop dead or pass out. Well, instead I dropped out of my last semester of college and moved home.
I thought maybe I was out of the woods when my week-long episode ended, but exactly a month after the first week-long episode, I had another one, this time at home. I was also having some sort of light bleeding every 2 weeks, which was abnormal for me. The feelings of anxiety and fear returned and I went another week without eating or sleeping much at all. Now I really began to worry that I was ruined for life. The world looked so scary and I did not want to live because I was scared of what I would have to deal with - I felt incapable of handling it. I did not want to die either because I was scared of that too. I hated birth control and was mad that I could not talk myself out of these crazy/racing thoughts going on in my mind. I prayed and prayed and felt sort of abandoned to be honest. Why couldn't I feel like my old self? Would this condition last for years? And why couldn't I handle this better?
I was really tempted to go on Paxil or birth control that time, but decided I would wait it out one more time. It felt like hell during these episodes but as long as I ate when I could, laid down at night, and just kept breathing in and out nothing serious was really happening even though I believed it was. I did dry heave a couple times but that was from panicky thoughts and was the least of my worries. Anyway, I was still having weird bleeding every couple of weeks and my acne was really bad, so I knew it was indeed hormone related and most likely the birth control that started all this.
SUMMARY: I quit birth control July 16, 2012 and had the 2 week-long episodes of extreme anxiety/depression. However after that I only had a couple more episodes! This time 3 days long and not as severe. November 10, 2012 was the last time I felt that abnormal/irrational anxiety feeling. Today it is January 7, 2013 and I feel completely fine. The weird, light bleeding is no longer 2 weeks apart. Instead I have relatively normal periods like I used to be before all this happened that are a month or more apart.
I feel like the same person I was before experiencing this except I have some questions about my faith. It humbled me for sure. But I am searching for answers, and I know God is faithful. This terrible ordeal will only make me stronger in the future. I believe it is getting better and better with time and that all this was caused by synthetic hormones which caused an imbalance in my body. This seriously altered the messages my brain was receiving. Hormones are more important than I knew before.
I suggest not going on drugs unless you have to and to wait it out. Doctors can help, sure, but also be your own advocate. Search online and consult the ones who care about you the most. If you do not have a history of anything like this, it is probably not really your mind but your body that is sick. But I am not a health professional. Just don't be too hard on yourself like I was. You are not the only one who has gone through this. Surround yourself with patient people who love you during your anxiety or other symptomatic episodes and if you don't have those people, pray to God and just breathe. Time will go a long way to heal you because it did for me. Hang in there and eat when you can, sleep when you can. Don't worry about the rest.
I am so sorry if any of you are going through this. I hope it ends soon. But if you are, know that it is most likely temporary. Don't try to fight it and question everything about your universe - just keep breathing. A better day is ahead.
I just wanted to say thank you for that post. 100 % what im going through and your story is helping me become more optimistic! Its very stressful and makes you feel like you cant control your own thoughts, emotions and life. But what ive learnt, is that anxiety is just a terrible feeling, it will not kill you and its as strong as you make it
I want to thank you too! I am dealing with this right now as well, and just like you said, it can make everything in your life come into question. That is a very scary place to be, so your story really encouraged me! I have been praying and reading my Bible and searching for peace in all of this, which has been hard when anxiety seems so overwhelming. Thank you for sharing!
Thank you so much for this, I've been feeling exactly like you were for a week now. And the feeling of hopelessness is finally fading away, since i don't feel like I'm the only one and I finally don't feel like I'm going crazy. I've just decided that getting off the pill was the best thing. So I'm extremely excited to get better in the weeks to come. In moments like this I feel like we realize how much we need God,and family. Im so happy that you are ok again, and I hope whoever is going through this will get better. I would never wish that feeling on anyone. So thank you again, its nice to see a good result instead of just speculation.
I also wanted to share my story. I have literally spent hours a day reading other womens experiences in coming off birth control and while it is nice to know you are not alone it would doubly be more helpful if they came back and said that they got better. When you are at the worst place in your life that you have ever been in and feel hopeless that it will ever get better it is helpful to know that other women did. I started taking birth control in January 2013 (don't remember the brand) and was doing okay except when taking the 2 or 3rd placebo I would be hit with awful headaches that wouldn't respond to painkillers (over the counter ones). My ob/gyn said to just short the placebo day length or just skip them altogether. This lasted for about 6 months until I started having visual problems and nausea. Also starting having strange symptoms when driving where I felt like I was floating above myself. I had to pinch myself until I left marks on my legs so that I could stay on the road. I sort of just wanted to drift away even though my kids were in the car! I later learned that this was dissociation and the beginning of my panic disorder. I was a week into the active pills of my birth control and the headaches never went away. I decided then to stop them at the beginning of July. Had a withdrawal bleed not long after. I had an headache every day that month. Also an episode of anxiety which at first I wasn't even aware that was what it was because I had never had anxiety. Sitting in traffic on the way to go camping I was overcome with feelings of fainting (which I have experienced after receiving a steroid shot). I had to have my mother quickly change seats and drive because I was about to pass out). I would also have episodes of my heart just start racing for not reason although it didn't last long. Maybe a few seconds. Then on August 11 I started my period. My husband and I were just laying in bed watching TV when my heart started fluttering. Then it was racing like a freight train. I was terrified and though I was having a heart attack. It lasted from 10:00 pm at night until 7:00 am in the morning until my body just gave out. All those hours all I could do is just pace. I got maybe four hours sleep and I woke up to the same thing. It would feel like a fist had hit me in the chest and then the adrenaline would rush through me my heart would race and my limbs felt like they were on fire. I had my husband take my to the urgent care where they did a workup and said they couldn't find anything wrong. This lasted an entire week. A panic attack, surge or adrenaline non stop racing heart every one to two minutes. I was in the urgent care three times and took an ambulance ride to the emergency room in one week. Had adivan in the ER and it had the opposite effect (made me feel high and the next day I was suicidal). Eventually the attacks happened every 5 minutes and slowly tapered off. Have had numerous tests because my psycholigist didn't believe it was just mental panic attacks don't last that long she said (suspected pheochromocytoma) and the only thing that has come back abnormal is elevated cortisol. Now three and a half weeks after my first panic attack I can feel the attacks beginning to get worse. I can usually fight them off by deep breathing but it is getting harder because I suspect my next period is coming. I am taking Seroquel at night so I can get some sleep because for some reason the attacks get worse in the evening. This has been the worst experience of my life. I had to send away my kids for two weeks because I was unable to care for them and I didn't want they to see mommy losing her mind. My poor husband has missed work shuttling my back in forth to the ER and doctors visits not to mention his mental state is shot having to deal with it. I lost ten pounds in a week and could only be forced to drinking Ensure to keep me alive. My 62 year old father can now outwalk me. I literally walk like I am in my 80's. We have insurance thank god but this is costing alot of money. Not to mention the guilt I feel for not being a mother to my children during all this and feeling the worst physically than I have felt in my life. Not one doctor has agreed with me that this is the result of coming off birth control. I only hope that I can make it through this and eventually get my life back. I will keep updating if I see any improvement because I think it will be helpful to those of us who are currently feeling without hope that it will ever get better.
Hi everyone I have a similar situation except for all of this starting happening to me while still on my birthcontrol (micrgestrin 1.5/30 Fe)I started taking this pill in march of 2013 on a continuos cycle meaning i take the active pills for 3 months then take a week off. I had some aches in the 3rd month and also noticed i was gaining weight but i thought that was do to another pill called singulair that I was on. So i stopped the singlair in july. During August I started having stange dreams and when I woke up in the morning I would drenched in sweat. I didnt think much of it until August 21st I woke up and had a cup of coffee and went to work. while at work I was standing in our everyday morning meeting when I started not to feel well dizzy and chest pain and just weird long story short i started to faint and then hyperventalate so the paramedicts were called i was given ativan at the er and told i had a panick attack. I was fine for a few days but then it happened again and this time it lasted for hours. and then it would come back every 2 hours like clock work for 3 days straight and was accompanied by stomch pain diareahh, sweating, shills, and alot of other random pain. I went back to the hospital because I could not take it there they focused on my stomach and said i may have an ulcer to follow up with my doctor. I was having these symptoms everyday for about 2 weeks going through blood test and everything was coming back normal. after doing some research i asked the doctor if it could be hormones and if i should stop my pill. He said he run some test and in the mean time it was up to me if i wanted to stop so i did. the first 2 nights of the pill were aweful I thought i might actually die but i have been off for 1 week and 2 days and i still get a lil anxiuos at times but now im more of a cry baby and im tired all the time. the night terrors and sweats have gone away during most of the night but seem to always return at 5 am. i still wake up during the night at other times but not sweating or racing thought and i usually go back to sleep. The doctor gave me ativan to take at night but i still seem to wake up so im just hoping that this was all cuased by this birthcontrol and that it is going to go away very soon and never come back. I am only 22 years old and I do not want to be put on medication for anxiety for the rest of my life becuase i never had this problem on any other birthcontrol pill or before them. I am still waiting on a stomach xray to make sure everything is ok in there and although no doctors will agree with me that it could have been the pills one nurse did and said that it takes 2 weeks for the pill to be completey out of you system and could take another month or 2 for hormones to regulte. Just wondering if anyone has had this happen while on their pill and it go away when taken off?:-)
I posted about two months ago and wanted to update my status. I am feeling much much better. I've had two periods since stopping birth control and will probably get my third judging by how I feel tomorrow morning. It seems that the week before and the week of my period is when I have most of my anxiety and panic. And again when I ovulate. The week after I ovulate I feel almost completely normal. This is an improvement from feeling the anxiety and panic all the time. I have found that taking a magnesium supplement helps and doing daily yoga. So far all of my tests have shown that I have elevated cortisol. Hopefully this will help someone who is feeling hopeless and cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel. I went from having a week long panic attack to attacks every few minutes to feeling anxiety everyday and some limited symptom attacks to having some anxiety for about two weeks and about a week of feeling normal. Don't give up hope!