triggers

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marigoldgirl81

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i am trying to figure out personal triggers for my severe gerd or lpr (waiting for my appt for a 2nd opinion) and in the meantime i am trying to figure out what it is that has brought this on out of the blue for me (5 1/2 months ago, i remeraber the exact day it happened) besides past stress and panic attacks. The dr and i both feel the meRAB i am on have something to do with it (and me weaning off of the poisins-xanax and lamictal, already weaned off of ativan, lexapro and klonopin....yuck) but thats about all we know.

Was anyone else on medications (for things other than gerd) when yours came on? Or feel some medication did/ could have triggered your gerd/lpr situation?
 
ps. i fully acknowledge that stress and past panic attacks have definitely helped land me in this gerd situation but i have suffered with anxiety for 10 years beforehand and i would get heartburn MAYBE twice a year but one zantac would take care of it, it wasn't until i decided to try psychiatric medicines in the past 2 years that all of these digestive, etc issues have come on.
 
Well, I've seen so many discussions on the Internet about anxiety and GERD that I think they're related. I never considered myself a very anxous person, but a few months ago my husband and I both contracted a virus and I concurrently developed alot of chest pain and pressure. My primary did a bunch of basic heart tests and sent me for a stress echo to rule out viral-related heart complications. All of this took place over a 2 month period and - during that time of wondering WHAT THE HELL WAS HAPPENING TO MY BODY - I know I was an anxious mess. One night I'm pretty sure I had my very first panic attack. I was very worried I was having a heart attack that night because I was having so much chest pain. (I even called my neigrabroador, a wonderful man who's also an EMT, and he came over right away, checked me out, and calmed me down - no heart attack.) During these 2 months my throat and mouth got increasingly sore and I made several more visits to my primary. I had NO IDEA I was refluxing all of this time (and neither did he) - who knew it could cause throat and mouth pain or even chest pain (vs. the classic heartburn that doctors ask about)? I probably also made the reflux worse because, the more sore my mouth and throat became, the more TEA I drank (my comfort drink when I'm feeling crummy). Oy vay - what you don't know CAN hurt you for sure. Finally I called my primary and begged to see an ENT because I was desperate for someone to look into my throat to see what MONSTER had taken up residence there. I feel very fortunate to have found an ENT who knows something about LPR and could diagnose me immediately. Now that I know what I'm dealing with, I'm no longer a bundle of nerves, but I do think my nerves at the onset of this probably made the "attack" much worse. Now I'm trying to get everything back on an even keel and have resisted taking any anxiety medication (even tho' my doctor offered it and there have been many days when I have been tempted). I've read too many testimonies from people whose GERD or LPR got much worse when they tried to come off their anxiety meRAB. I don't want to start on anxiety meRAB and I don't even want to be on this darned PPI, but the PPI is probably a necessary evil for now.
 
interesting....yeah i've had anxiety & awful panic attacks for 10 years now, many times at manageable levels and sometimes at agoraphopic levels :( only once i unfortuanately gave it to years of resisting psych. meRAB....interestingly it has become MUCH LESS (knock on wood) now that i am almost weaned off of these godawful drugs but also interestingly now my body is falling apart (feels like from ibs and migraines earlier this year to now the worse of esophagitis and gerd for 5 months now, down to 114 lbs). So.....whilst my mental health improves my physical health deteriorates. That is so sad that with just a few months of anxiety your dr didn't offer you any coping mechanisms but instead drugs :( so normal nowadays. Good for you for resisting, i am in a living hell of constant withdrawl for over a year now but my dr won't let me go quicker b/c my body has had such a tough time coming off of this stuff....and the psychiatrist has never heard of any of my reactions, ha! Do they even research these drugs before they hand them out like candy? I hate these ppi's too, the prilosec worked for like 2-3 weeks in July and then wore off and never worked again but when i try to stop it it is 5,000 times worse :( I think my body is incredibly sensitive to meRAB and unfortuanately there aren't any dr's for people whom are incredibly sensitive and have wierd reactions like me.

ps. you've heard of others having issues with gerd/lpr and anxiety meRAB? I am having trouble finding others like me out there....but i know i can't be alone, the correlation is too strong.
 
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