Hi, I'm new to these forums.
I'm newly diagnosed with depression and anxiety. I've been on one medication for a couple of months now. Was hospitalised for a week in September after having a bit of a breakdown at work, then was released into my mother's care. I had to either do that or go to the long term care facility. I also had my medication increased to the maximum dose while I was in hospital. After three weeks under her care, I was back at home and back at work, but only three days a week. I am terribly anxious and close to panic all day when I'm at work and generally terribly depressed when I'm at home - all alone again. So now to the point - I went back to my gp and said I wasn't getting better and he prescribed a new med, in addition to the original one. It has side effects of drowsiness and weight gain, to name a few, and he said he doesn't normally prescribe it for this reason. Weight gain is not an issue for me because the dietician in hospital wanted me to put on 15kg anyway (I'd lost weight because I wasn't eating). However, after several days of research and consideration, I tried the new med for the first time last night. It made me feel wasted! So sleepy I was falling asleep during my favourite tv show, and crawled to bed and crashed at 8pm. Got woken by the phone at 10am. Still drowsy at 12pm. Obviously I can't drive in this is a condition, which is a problem, as I live in a rural area. I don't think I could work in this condition either. Can it get better? Can the side effects reduce over time? I don't know whether to continue with it.
