HI all. I am on 35mg of Citalopram & have been since July, does anyone wake up with a start early in the morning, cant get back to sleep

[Gretch]

& then the fear & anxiety starts in the stomach area & lasts all day every day although sometimes it is less than others. Or is it just ME! Any help would be much appreciated.

Good health to all

[sueron]

hi gretch, these are the exact symptons i always experince at the beginning.I have found,that after a few months into medication,it subsides,and sleep patterns return again. good luck,it will happen for you,when you are ready.

[Gretch in reply to sueron]

Hi Sueron,thanks for that.

Cheers for now

[Hidden]

Hi. Gretch. sueron is right. If you are on medication it can do this. This is, also, a common symptom of the Anxiety State and is not something to be afraid of. (OK, now tell me that at 2am. when I wake up with a start and can't get back to sleep. I know.). Even at 2am. it is still a common symptom! I want you to try an experiment. Sit down and FEEL your symptoms and see if you can make them any worse. You will find that you cannot. THERE IS A LIMIT to how much Adrenaline that can be released at any one time and, without a doubt, you have felt the limit .Our INVOLUNTARY nervous system responds to our MOOD. It's function is to control our heart, stomach, breathing etc.and we (thank God) have no control over it. (Try holding you breathe). But if we re-act to the symptoms with FEAR then we create more anxiety more FEAR and so more Adrenaline. Our MOOD governs our response. Now suppose you were told you had won the Lottery. Would your hands not sweat, shake, legs go weak, have a tight stomach, headache, want to sit down or dash to the loo? But this would all be NORMAL IN THE CURCUMSTANCES but would be felt with JOY not FEAR. All those symptoms are what you are having now but you re-act with FEAR and not JOY. (Don't try the JOY bit at the moment!! You haven't won the Lottery).

I hope this makes some sort of sense to you. If not put it in your drawer marked ' for future reference'. I do really hope you feel better soon. Blessings. Love. jonathan.

[Gretch in reply to Hidden]

Hi Johnathan,thanks for your words of wisdom.You are right I am afraid of the fear,I can get up in the night to go to the loo with no stomach problems at all get back into bed & go right back to sleep,then maybe about 4.30 to 5.30 wake up & just wait for the symptoms to start & they always do. I will make sure I try your little experiment as it does make sense.But what crap affliction this anxiety is,I look forward to it fading away.

Cheers for now

[Hidden in reply to Gretch]

Hi. Gretch. 4am. to 5am. can be a bad time for anxiety sufferers. It is 'the wee small hours syndrome' and is very upsetting. We seem in limbo. Can't connect with our thoughts. This is probably the result of over stimulation from the previous day and the exhaustion that follows. Whatever the reason it is really hell. The key is in your remark 'I wait for the symptoms to start'. You are ANTICIPTING them and, like all good visitors, along they come. You have laid the fertile soil for them to thrive on! When they do come may I suggest; 'Well here you are again. Good luck. I am going to just ACCEPT you for what you are. Just thoughts, and thoughts cannot harm me. They are NORMAL thoughts in the CIRCUMSTANCES which, at 4am, come to a lot of people but my reactions are so exaggerated that I respond to them irrationally'. I FEAR them so they, feeding on FEAR, carry on regardless'. This illness is so difficult but if we could only understand that we do this to ourselves by the way we THINK.

Bless you. jonathan.

[Pennylayne]

Hi Gretch I do the waking with a jolt too and a big burst of adrenaline which is worse if I have had something in particular on my mind the day before and even worse before I go to sleep.

It's really worth trying to get off to sleep in as even a state of mind as possible and to do whatever you can to help this. It can be tricky to 'switch off' the thoughts, but listening to chill out music on an ipod or something like that before you sleep can help.

I know it sounds silly but I also tell myself that no matter how anxious I feel about something I know that in the very near future it will be resolved and as usual I will have been stressing for nothing.

Another thing which I like and which I learned from a meditation class I go to is to breath in positive energy for the count of say 5, hold it for the count of 3 and breath out the negative energy for the count of 5. I visualise the positive energy as like gold dust and the negative energy as like grey dust.

If you are feeling anxious each day even though you are on 35mg of Citalopram you should also mention it again to your doctor as it should be helping the anxiety by now.

[evo1210]

hi Gretch

i am currently taking 20mg citalopram .for panic and anxiety .i all so wake up an can't go bk sleep so that be side effects of them nothing worry about the other side effects i hav are

sweat dripping from my armpits.

really dry mouth. ...sweets or mints helps with this

going dizzy standing up to quickly.

ho if your taking these for the first time you will feel like shit... i did for about 2half weeks

stay with them i all so get that horrible empty feeling in the stomach.. i been on these now for a month hope that helps .. p.s don't ever take them on a empty stomach make sure you eat food first ...then take them ..i did this on empty stomach i felt like i was off my head and cause me to panic really badly...hope this helps evo1210