Ataques de Nervios

I remember growing up and always hearing that someone’s mother, one of my aunts or great aunts, usually just had un ataque de nervios. A nerve attack loosely translated, more like an anxiety/panic attack. Usually, this happened at a funeral. I went to way too many of them as a little girl. My relatives were passing away all over the place. Murder, alcoholism, disease, suicide were some of the causes.

Years later, therapists would see me talk about these issues in a nonchalant manner and not understand how I could be so desensitized. It happens after you see your fair share of mother’s trying to jump into six feet deep holes. Such is life in the ghetto. People struggle to survive, but find it difficult to make it to the next day. Poverty crimes—means to survival. But I digress.

In November of 2007, I became the victim of ataques de nervios. Before I had time to even try to figure out what was going on with me, I was suffering from 5-6 panic attacks a day. This was going on for a month before I had the ability to seek medical attention due to a lack of resources. In other words, I had no health care as was the case for many years. Oh, yes, I have the medical bills to prove it. That’s another thing that impoverished people struggle with – lack of health care. You have to choose between the doctor’s visit and the prescription to cure your ailment, food or medicine, rent or electricity, food or your cell phone bill, or in my case, books or rent. Hahah. I’m not the most practical of people. I’d rather read than eat.

In any case, I went to see an internal doctor at an office my sister was working at as a medical assistant. Within five minutes, the doctor went out of the room and came back with a starter pack of Effexor XR. In my desperation, after struggling to get myself out of bed in the morning to go outside, I swallowed the pill without doing any research on it. My panic attacks went away.

But, the side effects were never discussed with me. I lost all motivation to do anything with my life. I stopped going to work. I stopped writing/performing poetry and talking to my friends. I stopped going out. No more exercising, reading, planning, thinking, feeling, connecting. It’s true what they say about anti-depressants. They numb you – not just your panic attacks or whatever is ailing you. I lost focus of who I was.

One day, I started having these flashes of me cutting myself. Sure I’d suffered from depression before, but this was different. I had urges, impulses. Knowing that anti-depressants are proven to cause suicide amongst its takers, I contacted Mt. Carmel Guild, which is a behavioral health clinic for people without insurance or with a low income. I was put on a 4 month waiting list. FOUR MONTHS. I was feeling depressed and suicidal and I was on medication without supervision.

I called a ton of clinics in desperation trying to get a sooner appointment including the Beth Israel Hospital Behavioral Health Clinic in Newark, NJ, and the director told me to go complain to my councilman and hung up on my face. Thank god, I was cognizant enough not to let these urges get to me.

I waited the four months and finally went to my appointment at Mt. Carmel Guild. I had a counselor, who had never taken a course in psychology and told me she couldn’t teach me how to deal with panic attacks and scheduled me for an appointment to see a psychiatrist 3 months later. Yes. THREE MONTHS later. Around April, I saw the counselor and in early July, I finally saw the psychiatrist. Five minutes into his office and he told me to stay on the medication.

Convinced that the medication was doing my body, mind, and soul harm, I began to lower my own dosage in the three month waiting period. Dangerous, yes. I did a lot of research on Effexor XR and read a ton of horror stories. I was terrified of lowering the dosage, but even more terrified of losing my wits and killing myself.

At a brief conversation during the waiting period to see the psychiatrist, I asked him how one would go about lowering their dosage safely. He told me that for a week you would alternate between doses and lower it the next week to the next dosage. I did research on WebMD and other sites as well and this information was matched. Thus, I began to lower my dosage from 150 mg to 75 mg. For one week, I alternated between 150 mg and 75 mg every other day (i.e. Monday 150 mg, Tuesday 75 mg, Wednesday 150 mg, Thursday 75 mg, etc). The next week, I only took 75 mg. The first 3 days, all I wanted to do was sleep. I had zero energy. Headaches, brain zaps, anxiety, shallow breathing, restlessness, irritability were just some of the side effects of the lowered dosage. Oh, yes. Let me not forget the emotional rollercoaster. I got depressed again. I just wanted to lie in bed and hug my pillow for about a week. But, almost immediately, I felt more alert.

While I was taking 150 mg, I had to use my fingers to add 3 and 5. I couldn’t be articulate. I would forget what I was saying in the middle of a sentence. My cognitive abilities suffered greatly. I was unable to do a lot of basic math and grammar functions that were second nature to me. This was another reason why I was desperate to get off of the medication. I felt stupid all of the time. On occasion, I’d try to make an argument in a conversation and I’d get lost in circular logic without the ability to intellectually express myself. It was the most frustrating of things.

I stayed on the 75 mg dosage for about 2 months because I was traveling throughout much of the summer and was afraid to lower the dosage again during a time of instability. Last week (beginning Sept 11, 2008), I began to lower the dosage again. Today is my third day of taking the next lower dosage of 37.5 mg. The transition to the 37.5 mg has been easier on my body. Though, yesterday, my blood sugar dropped at Barnes & Nobles, and I thought I was going to pass out.

It’s only been three days, but my mind is there in a way it hasn’t been since December 2007 when I got on these pills. The feeling of disassociation I struggled with is almost completely gone, and I don’t need my finger and toes anymore to do basic arithmetic. Yay!