[Guest]

Dr.,

I wanted to confirm some information I received from my therapist. Since I have been on my Celexa (at least since I got to 20mg), I have definitely noticed significant improvement in the following areas:

- Sleep
- No full pannic attacks while on the meds
- energy
- overall functioning

As I mentioned previously, I increased the dose to 30 after 7 weeks because although all of the above have improved significantly, I still have an unsatisfactory improvement in the following areas:

- general somatic anxiety
- anxiety in response to facing situations or places that have caused anxiety or attacks in the past

The therapist says that the 6-8 weeks for SSRIs is really only measured against the reduction of the attacks themselves, the rest is anticipatory anxiety which responds much more slowly (maybe by week 12, sometimes longer. As a result, he thinks I was too agressive in asking my Dr. to increase the dose before I gave more time for the anticipatory anxiety to respond to the medication and therapy.

My question is:
Is it true that the anticipatory anxiety responds more slowly? You had mentioned in the past that after about 8 weeks on the meds, "what you see is what you get", does that include the anticipatory anxiety or just the attacks themselves? Thanks as always.

[Guest]

Actually, your therapist is on the money. The SSRI's do effect panic, mood and anxiety. Their is a residual anticipatory anxiety that takes a while to fade.
[quote] Dr. ,

I wanted to confirm some information I received from my therapist... [/quote]