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As Needed Anti-Anxiety Treatments?

Messages
7
Hi there,

After living with intense symptoms for years, I've decided that I want to try some sort of anti-anxiety treatment to help me through particularly bad days. I've had medical marijuana and Xanax recommended to me before, but I've never actually tried taking them. Does anyone have any experience with this, what works well, or how different medications or supplements might interact with ME or fibromyalgia?

Thanks :)
 

belize44

Senior Member
Messages
1,662
I have been using Xanax on and off for nearly ten years. I find that it really helps me relax for sleep, but I don't use it in the daytime hours because a very small amount makes me incredibly drowsy. Of course there are dangers in that one can become dependent upon tranquilizers, so maybe medical marijuana would be a better choice?
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
Hi there,

After living with intense symptoms for years, I've decided that I want to try some sort of anti-anxiety treatment to help me through particularly bad days. I've had medical marijuana and Xanax recommended to me before, but I've never actually tried taking them. Does anyone have any experience with this, what works well, or how different medications or supplements might interact with ME or fibromyalgia?

Thanks :)
About 75% of pharmaceutical drugs damage mitichondria, especially psychiatric drugs.

Your symptoms are real, and you are wise to take action, but there are other choices...

As background, an immediate family member went to 22 doctors, was on 9 psychiatric medications and was suicidal before we learned about alternatives to drugs. She became well and needs no drugs after 4 serious psychiatric diagnoses.

Having a healthy gut, where most neurotransmitters are made, is important. Gluten sensitivity and food allergies, especially milk products can cause symptoms - gluten and dairy can act as excitotoxins in the brain.

Deficiencies of B vitamins, particularly folate (MTHF or folinic acid), B6, and B12 can cause symptoms.

GABA, suntheanine, and glycine are amino relatives you could try. And there are herbal, like ashwaganda, that might help.

A good functional medicine doctor may be able to help you find answers here. Drugs may be a short term bandaid, but they are not a long term answer.
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
Where may I ask did you read that?
I didn't read it. It was presented by the researchers who'd tested the drugs at last year's United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation Conference in Seattle.

Following which, Robert Naviaux, who'd given his Cell Danger Response talk just before that talk, got up and gave an impassioned speech to the 350 doctors in the audience to be cognizant of the risks to their delicate patients as they prescribed drugs.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
I didn't read it. It was presented by the researchers who'd tested the drugs at last year's United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation Conference in Seattle.

I very much doubt those researchers, because gathering evidence that even one drug might cause mitochondria damage takes a lot of effort and published studies, let alone making statements about the many thousands pharmaceutical drugs in existence.

Even in the very short list of drugs with suspected mitochondria toxicity given in this post, there is only about 5 drugs in that list which have good evidence of such toxicity; the others are just suspected of causing toxicity.
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
I very much doubt those researchers, because gathering evidence that even one drug might cause mitochondria damage takes a lot of effort and published studies, let alone making statements about the many thousands pharmaceutical drugs in existence.

Even in the very short list of drugs with suspected mitochondria toxicity given in this post, there is only about 5 drugs in that list which have good evidence of such toxicity; the others are just suspected of causing toxicity.
@Hip Over time you've mentioned taking a lot of drugs, including psychiatric ones, and therefore have a vested interest in turning blind eye to the truth here.

This wasn't some random group of wackos, it was a very serious set of researchers who went to great pains to describe the processes they'd used over several years to test each drug individually in order to build a database of mitochondrial toxins. I can't remember the name of it at the moment...but it was very real.

And, I was one of the only people in the room without a doctorate degree. It was a serious exchange of information among serious professionals.

Whether you choose to believe it or not is your business, but making light of this and recommending potentially harmful drugs to others here could do someone serious harm.

Anything we put into our bodies has risks. We need to weigh the risks and potential rewards responsibly and with the best info possible before ingesting anything.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
and therefore have a vested interest in turning blind eye to the truth here.

I have no vested interest in turning a blind eye to the truth. Rather, I am asking for details and evidence. So far you have not provided any: no names of researchers, no references to published studies, no links to this database of mitochondrial toxins that you mentioned. You expect me to believe, but you don't provide any information or evidence?

To make unsupported statements such as "75% of pharmaceutical drugs damage mitochondria" is irresponsible.
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
I gave the name of the conference and location. It was in June, 2016. I am satisfied with the facts as presented. You can look up who presented. You can look at the agenda for the last day of the conference, the one starting with Robert Naviaux of UCSD. Kendall Wallace of U Minn was the third presenter, if I recall correctly. You'd be looking for the second presenter, too. You can email them and ask for their slides.
 
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Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
This article supports my statements, and there are many others as well...

http://www.eurekaselect.com/140615

A side note... my CFS was triggered by carboplatin and paclitaxel, which work by damaging mitochondria in cancer cells... As I unfortunately learned, they also damage healthy cells. No one told me this, and as my treatment began with emergency abdominal surgery, I was not in a state to do my own research and trusted my doctor completely. Now, my mitochondria are unhappy. THAT is irresponsible...

Neither drug was on the list you provided. And, since you like links, here are but 2 articles... there are many more.

https://www.google.com/url?q=http:/...ggeMAM&usg=AFQjCNGzU4WG391xNhMScQxGUrbKKLCLOw

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12459501
 
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Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
The only thing I can find on the 2016 conference is this page of videos, and there nothing in the titles about mitochondrial damage or toxicity. I don't deny that some drugs may cause mitochondria damage, but to say 75% of drugs cause such damage is another story. You'd need provide peer reviewed published studies to properly back up a statement like that.

But this discussion is taking the thread well off topic. The topic is about recommendations for anti-anxiety treatments.
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
You took this thread off topic.:bang-head:

I had stated that there are many valid alternatives to psychiatric drugs and gave examples.

It makes no sense to take a drug that could be damaging mitochondria in the brain and adding to the illness. The brain uses a great amount of energy and reducing negative impacts to ATP production on mitochondria is critical to improved brain function and reducing symptoms.

If symptoms are so bad as to prevent functioning to be able to solve the underlying problem, one could take it as a short term bandaid.

But, diagnosing and treating food allergies, gut and microbiome abnormalities, toxicity, infections, and nutrient deficiencies is the way to solve psychiatric problems. No one has a Prozac, Neurontin, Ritalin, or Haldol deficiency... the brain and body are just asking for the proper ingredients to do the job properly.

This article provides more insight and background on the topic of mitochondrial impacts of drugs:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/mitochondrial-collateral-damage-thanks-to-big-pharma/5447650

The resources of pharmaceutical companies to push their products are far greater than those of researchers, governments, or the common man. It is right to question sources, but ample info is available if you choose to look. From what I've seen, and was emphasized at the OMF Symposium, mitochondria are compromised in ME/CFS and we would be wise to avoid negatively impacting them further.
 

Learner1

Senior Member
Messages
6,305
Location
Pacific Northwest
Hi there,

After living with intense symptoms for years, I've decided that I want to try some sort of anti-anxiety treatment to help me through particularly bad days. I've had medical marijuana and Xanax recommended to me before, but I've never actually tried taking them. Does anyone have any experience with this, what works well, or how different medications or supplements might interact with ME or fibromyalgia?

Thanks :)
Two resources that were tremendously helpful to my family in solving anxiety/depression issues are:

https://www.amazon.com/Optimum-Nutrition-Mind-Patrick-Holford/dp/1591202590

https://www.amazon.com/Primal-Body-Mind-Beyond-Health/dp/1594774137

Best wishes...
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
You took this thread off topic.:bang-head:

I had stated that there are many valid alternatives to psychiatric drugs and gave examples.

It makes no sense to take a drug that could be damaging mitochondria in the brain and adding to the illness.

No, you took it off topic by saying that 75% of drugs damage mitochondria, which is an unsubstantiated statement, not backed up by any peer reviewed studies that you can supply, and likely wrong. So you are likely misinforming people.

Now if you said that drugs like benzodiazepines can cause horrible withdrawal symptoms lasting for over 6 months in a subset of people, fine, that's good advice. Or if you mentioned that SSRI drugs can sometimes cause emotional flattening, that too is valid. But to argue that you should not take such anti-anxiety drugs on the basis of unsubstantiated claims about mitochondrial toxicity does not really help anyone.

I agree there is a question mark regarding possible (but unproven) negative mitochondrial effects on some of the psychiatric drugs, such at those listed in my post that I linked to earlier. But these are only of possible concern to people with classic mitochondrial diseases, and I don't think there's much evidence that ME/CFS is such a mitochondrial disease. And even then, it's more the drugs like minocycline and metformin that are the main concern.
 
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jpcv

Senior Member
Messages
386
Location
SE coast, Brazil
Treat your gut, it helps a lot by reducing inflamation, inflamation in the brain is related to anxiety, depression and even autism
You should see a doctor but I´ll give some brief explanations
-short term, you can use something lie Alprazolam or Clonazepam. They work very fast but they can lead to long term side effects
- When you have your anxiety controled, then you can take some antidepressive drug with anxiolitic properties, like escitalopram, Duloxetine.
-Do you have insomnia? It is important to know because there ere some antidepressive drugds that help your sleep like trazodone or Valdoxan
-psi therapy and something like yoga helps( I couldn´t tolerate yoga after I got ME but I used it before getting sick to treat my anxiety)

I did everything I told you abocve, and it worked for me, now my necessity of drugs is very low
Marijuana can have legal issues and i harmful too
 

CFS_for_19_years

Hoarder of biscuits
Messages
2,396
Location
USA
No, you took it off topic by saying that 75% of drugs damage mitochondria, which is an unsubstantiated statement, not backed up by any peer reviewed studies that you can supply, and likely wrong. So you are likely misinforming people.

Now if you said that drugs like benzodiazepines can cause horrible withdrawal symptoms lasting for over 6 months in a subset of people, fine, that's good advice. Or if you mentioned that SSRI drugs can sometimes cause emotional flattening, that too is valid. But to argue that you should not take such anti-anxiety drugs on the basis of unsubstantiated claims about mitochondrial toxicity does not really help anyone.

I agree there is a question mark regarding possible (but unproven) negative mitochondrial effects on some of the psychiatric drugs, such at those listed in my post that I linked to earlier. But these are only of possible concern to people with classic mitochondrial diseases, and I don't think there's much evidence that ME/CFS is such a mitochondrial disease. And even then, it's more the drugs like minocycline and metformin that are the main concern.
Medication-induced mitochondrial damage and disease
http://sci-hub.cc/10.1002/mnfr.200700075

Table 2.
Acquired conditions in which mitochondrial dysfunc-
tion has been implicated
Diabetes [3, 10, 11]
Huntington's disease [12]
Cancer [3], including hepatitis-C virus-associated hepatocarci-
nogenesis [13]
Alzheimer disease [12]
Parkinson's disease [12]
Bipolar disorder [14, 15]
Schizophrenia [15]
Aging and senescence [3, 16–19]
Anxiety disorders [20]
Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis [21]
Cardiovascular disease [10], including atherosclerosis [22]
Sarcopenia [23]
Exercise intolerance [24]
Fatigue, including chronic fatigue syndrome [25, 26], fibromyal-
gia [27, 28], and myofascial pain [28]

Medications documented to induce mitochondrial damage:
upload_2017-8-20_15-39-52.png
 

barbc56

Senior Member
Messages
3,657
Medication-induced mitochondrial damage and disease

John Neustadt and Steve R. Pieczenik

Montana Integrative Medicine, Bozeman, MT, USA

My bold.