Progress thread for ne

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

Lis, you're right that I went back up. I'm taking 225 mg now. The prompt made me realize that there is a correlation between the two, because it wasn't the baclofen!
Sam, the reason I went back up didn't really have anything to do with booze. It was because I was so incredibly anxious and (now) depressed. I really, really wish I hadn't gone down so far and for so long. (By the way, I only went down about 10 mg/MONTH so it was not a matter of a too fast titration. I suspect that baclofen works for me. But that remains to be seen, I guess.)

Stuck, I know you're right. I find it almost impossible to make myself do any real exercise. Even though I KNOW it is absolutely the key to getting and staying well. It's so fucking frustrating. But the pilates class should help. And now that I'm settled into class, I can add to it at the gym. (I'm absolutely going to pay someone. I think it's the only thing that will get me to do anything.) And when I was in my 20s, I was very lucky, very stupid, and lived off of Reeses and coffee. And booze. Not that much has changed. ha! (Except booze.)

All that said, today was a really good day. My class is on the third floor, and I swear I walked those steps no less than ten times. Campus is huge and I walked all over in order to do the things I was supposed to do before class started. (ID, book, etc...) Plus, it was fun. The same exact class that completely freaked me out two months ago, and today it was...fun. I'm eager. It's refreshing. Yay!

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

And thanks.

[Cassander]

Progress thread for ne

Ne/Neva Eva;1700730 wrote: ... I suspect that baclofen works for me...

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

[skullbabyland]

Progress thread for ne

EDIT- I apologize if I'm speaking in the wrong time/place about this- maybe this has been discussed already or whatever- I'm still catching up on my MWO reading after days away. I'll catch up more on this thread later today)

Hey Ne- thought I'd post in regards to a small portion of what you wrote about, anxiety wise- at least, in regards to poo-eating dogs. I am writing because I too was sooooo grossed out and frustrated by my dog doing this. I learned some interesting facts about this behavior that helped me not care as much and thought I'd share.

One thing is that, while of course dogs have a much better sense of smell than ours, they actually do not sense foul odors in the same way. Their noses have evolved to block out the bad nasty smells and just recieve the "good" or beneficial information- so dogs don't know they're being nasty when they do this because their noses/brains literally don't experience the nasty smell.

The other thing is that, their interest in poo actually has reasons based in science- they're often interested in it for a number of reasons, which could be (gross as this sounds to us)-- replenishing healthy gut bacteria, supplementing nutritional deficiencies, supporting pack structure dominance/submissiveness (which is partially based on strong scent, diet), stuff like that.

Super gross to us, but they don't experience it like that. Also, they're not the only animals to do that- poo is actually one stage in the circle of life that many animals, plants, diversity etc. thrive on, even many other mammals. Gross and weird, I know... but finding this stuff out made me less frustrated with my own puppy. I still shoo him away from poop but I care less now- I just accept that dog butts, pee, poop, all that nasty stuff, is all just primary source of information to dogs.

Anyway hope that's useful, maybe you knew all that already though, but just thought I'd chime in.

[skullbabyland]

Progress thread for ne

In catching up on this thread, I'm seeing that the poo/dog thing was maybe not the point. Well anyway maybe my post was still useful, though if not, please disregard.

[skullbabyland]

Progress thread for ne

One last addition... I too experience most of my anxiety in the morning right when I'm waking up out of sleep, laying in bed. For the 20-ish minutes I lay in bed, my head often does lots of worrying and obsessing. It gets better once I'm up and I take my once-daily baclofen dose, have coffee and nicotine lozenge.

I've wondered if this morning anxiety is possibly, the beginnings of my mind going into slight bac withdrawal, since it's been 24 hours since the last dose. It almost always goes away quickly after I take my bac dose-- but if I forget my dose (only happened a couple times in the last year), it gets worse throughout the day. So for me it does seem related to the bac.

Though I'm sure there are many factors at play- healthy habits in exercise, diet, meditation, or lack thereof, I'm sure are very big contributors. Plus, sometimes life is just stressful as shit, and I just need to really guard my anxiety-soothing activities and make sure I'm nourishing myself as best I can.

Hope things are going well for you Ne and that the anxiety becomes more manageable soon

[Samandkatharine]

Progress thread for ne

skullbabyland;1701208 wrote: One last addition... I too experience most of my anxiety in the morning right when I'm waking up out of sleep, laying in bed. For the 20-ish minutes I lay in bed, my head often does lots of worrying and obsessing. It gets better once I'm up and I take my once-daily baclofen dose, have coffee and nicotine lozenge.

I've wondered if this morning anxiety is possibly, the beginnings of my mind going into slight bac withdrawal, since it's been 24 hours since the last dose. It almost always goes away quickly after I take my bac dose-- but if I forget my dose (only happened a couple times in the last year), it gets worse throughout the day. So for me it does seem related to the bac.

Though I'm sure there are many factors at play- healthy habits in exercise, diet, meditation, or lack thereof, I'm sure are very big contributors. Plus, sometimes life is just stressful as shit, and I just need to really guard my anxiety-soothing activities and make sure I'm nourishing myself as best I can.

Hope things are going well for you Ne and that the anxiety becomes more manageable soon

Mornings are tough for me too. From reading about GABA I believe the anxiety is from Bac depletion. I can tell if I've missed a dose by the way I feel in the morning. That's why an extra 10-20mg in the early AM can squelch that feeling ASAP.

As for dog poop eating, it's called coprophagia. Golden retrievers are notorious for this. Mine used to do this, as well as roll in dead whale carcasses. Mommy dogs as well as most mammal species also lick the bottoms of baby mammals to stimulate defecation. I'm a wealth of info :H

Sam

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

Thanks, Skull. It's actually helpful to have that information. And explains a lot. She was sick when we first got her and that's when she was eating poop. Of course, it was particularly disturbing because she was sick and she was eating her poop which was putting the damn parasites back into her body. Anyway, it seems to have resolved, but I feel better about it should it happen again. (Though, ugh.) Now if I could get her to stop biting...

Sam, I've taken to getting up for an hour or so in the middle of the night and for the last couple of nights I've taken a baclofen. Thanks for the suggestion. No way to tell if it's working, because I am feeling much less depressed and I have a terrible cold. Now when I wake up I'm ranking the morning based on whether or not I can breath through my nose and how deeply I can breath without coughing. This morning it was one nostril open and a semi-deep breath. Progress!

I feel like I should clarify the emoticons Cassander and I exchanged. He is very aware of the fact that baclofen works for me. (It was tongue-in-cheek that I wrote that.) And I know that he knows it's been nothing short of miraculous.

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

Also, Sam, we are going to get another dog and I was leaning toward a golden, but now I'm not so sure. Is that really something with goldens?

[missyabby1]

Progress thread for ne

Hiya. Just had to jump in here guys. Don't know if this has been mentioned, prob has but here goes. I call them the "morning horrors". OMG did I suffer from them. I know there is a reason, which I wish I could recall......low blood sugar , nah not probably. However my sisters suffered from such and since we have all been on a low dose of Lexapro.....no more morning horrors. Our family, so I have found out recently have all suffered from undiagnosed anxiety disorders. Maybe I was just lucky to find something that actually worked for me??
Anyhoo fabulously sober, loving life (after getting rid of the sociopath in my life) and comfortably alone . Woo Hoo.
Still check in every now and then but had to chime in on this one.
It is quite common and worth doing some research on!
Missy xxx

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

MISSY! I'm so glad to hear you're doing well. I suspect you're right. Unfortunately, I don't think I can take baclofen and lexapro together. But that doesn't mean I'm not still looking for a solution.
Really, really great to hear from you. Thanks.

[missyabby1]

Progress thread for ne

Still carry you in my heart Ne, as I am sure many of us old posters do! Best to you!
Missy xxx

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Progress thread for ne

Thanks, Missy. :l

[StuckinLA]

Progress thread for ne

Still thinking about you as well, Ne. No advice, or suggestions, or any idea whatsoever of what might be going on with your morning feelings. I generally feel pretty OK in the morning, more or less, which in itself is weird considering I've never thought myself a morning person, and spent most of my life hungover in the morning.

I get the panic and loopy-headed almost dizziness at night. God, like things have come to such a state that I don't realize what "tired" feels like, or maybe it's more than that. But it sucks, a lot. I am AF about 8 days in a row now, and while the anxiety isn't gone it's certainly getting less frequent, and sleep is starting to come back. Real sleep. Like waking up with deep creases on my back from having slept on a wrinkle in the sheets all night without moving once.

Drinking isn't your issue, so I simply don't know. But don't give up tinkering with bac or with anything else until you find a more comfortable place. Hugs, hugs, hugs.