Comment Re:Depression is not all serotonin (Score 1) 674
RE zombie- I had a recent experience with prozac that corroborates neatly with what you mentioned.
When one of my typical worries sprung up I would torture myself with endless rumination on the hopelessness of the situation. This mental process is soon accompanied by a visceral feeling somewhere near the bowels that would move up to the chest and 'flow' like a circulating jet stream. The areas it affected and the manner in which it spread was similar to an adrenaline rush, but the sensation is something else entirely that I can only describe as a stressful tightening. (Probably identical to the physical sink you feel in your chest.)
To treat a recent surge of depression I started prozac earlier this month. The prescribed regiment is to begin at a low dose that will be titrated upwards from 5 to 20mg. When I begun at the low doses the effects of the drug was dampened but still apparent, so I got to experience a kind of midway between debilitating physically-felt depression and the alleviating affects of the SSRI drugs. One night while on a low dose my thoughts started dwelling on an anxious/depressing thought and I could feel the beginnings of the visceral tightening that it triggers -- but it was halted; I could literally feel the sensation ceasing somewhere in my chest where normally it would continue in that circulating jet stream until my whole chest was strained with tension.
The depressive ruminating was still going on in my head, the medication did nothing to stop it, instead it was the associated physical strain that was treated.
To treat a recent surge of depression I started prozac earlier this month. The prescribed regiment is to begin at a low dose that will be titrated upwards from 5 to 20mg. When I begun at the low doses the effects of the drug was dampened but still apparent, so I got to experience a kind of midway between debilitating physically-felt depression and the alleviating affects of the SSRI drugs. One night while on a low dose my thoughts started dwelling on an anxious/depressing thought and I could feel the beginnings of the visceral tightening that it triggers -- but it was halted; I could literally feel the sensation ceasing somewhere in my chest where normally it would continue in that circulating jet stream until my whole chest was strained with tension.
The depressive ruminating was still going on in my head, the medication did nothing to stop it, instead it was the associated physical strain that was treated.
