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Anti-depressants and sex drive

carlisleorama's picture
Mon, 04/06/2009 - 23:52
Submitted by carlisleorama

 

So I hear a lot of people saying anti-depressants will depress your sex drive as well as your depression. You know what? I get a little sick of hearing it all the time. Not because I don’t think there’s a lot of truth to the statement; it’s just that I don’t hear the opposite side of the story so often. Maybe that’s because it doesn’t happen so often, but I’m here to tell the story of some one who takes anti-depressants and has a ridiculous sex drive.

I don’t actually have depression, and many anti-depressants are prescribed for things such as anxiety. I take Paxil for a general anxiety disorder and obsessive/ compulsive disorder that I was diagnosed with by a very good doctor at the age of 13. At first I was reluctant to go on meds at such a young age, as were my parents. But my life was crippled by the disorders I was trying to deal with and I was ready to try anything. I got incredibly lucky and it worked. It worked so well, in fact, that I would consider myself 95% recovered from both disorders. 15 years later I live (mostly) anxiety free and I no longer have any obsessive thoughts for which I need to act rituals to feel ok. I live a far more normal life than I ever would have dreamed possible for myself, and I owe it all to my parents willingness to get me help, a great doctor who was able to help me stop feeling guilt for mental problems, and yes, Paxil.

Occasionally when I forget to take a dose I will suddenly be over come with an anxiety attack and not know what happened until I realized that I forgot to take a pill the other night. For this reason I feel that it is important for me to stay on Paxil, perhaps for the rest of my life. And I’m ok with that.

As for my sex life, I was horny before the Paxil (well heck, I was 13) and if anything I was even hornier after. I have never felt it have a perceptible impact on my sex drive, which is still going quite strong at 28. Strangely, I do experience what I think is a sexual side effect that I read about somewhere, I think maybe about 1% of people who take Paxil have this: sometimes when I pee, sneeze or yawn I will have an orgasm. It doesn’t happen often, but it’s always a pleasant little surprise when it does!

Perhaps this medication was actually able to supply the chemical balance my brain so desperately needed, and so my sex drive is- if anything- enhanced. That’s my theory at least. There may be other “natural” ways for me to achieve this balance, but since I have found this and it actually works, I’m think I’m gonna stick with it.

I just feel that it is so important to let people out there who are suffering from life debilitating mental illness that sometimes medication really does work. There’s so many dissenting voices out there, about how you’re going to lose your libido or your passion for life or that you’ll stop experiencing emotion all together. I don’t think these things happen to people who really do have a chemical imbalance and need something to get everything back in place. Medication is not the right answer for all people, maybe not even for most. But I hope people who are suffering like I was will at least give it chance.

Oh man, I just realized this sounds like it was written by some shill for a pharmaceutical company. I promise I’m not! Just want to help anyone who’s considering medication feel a little less alone.

‹ Philosophical question Ugh..... Hot guy.... bad sexual experience. ›

Thanks for the posts! I do

Tue, 06/02/2009 - 02:34
The_Status_Is_N...

Thanks for the posts! I do need to hear the positive side of medication--I have debilitating anxiety, and a lot of bad med experiences. On the psychiatric side, I went on Lexapro once and had a three-day reaction where I cycled over and over through the desire to commit major mutilation, which I never had or have since had other than that one time. I also had all kinds of other awful sensations, insomnia, etc.

I feel most betrayed and bitter because the prescribing psychiatrist told me it was totally safe, even safe to discontinue on my own, etc. Very, very wrong.

I don't really have a sex drive anyway, so I'm not worried about that, but if I do try meds again, I'm going to need the help of a good therapist and a good GP, and, luckily, I seem to have them lined up.

That said, I lovelovelove CBT and other non-medical interventions. And I also think that the victim can have a lot more potential for recovery than anyone gives them credit, and that medicalizing normal human emotions just because someone experiences them a little more often is a good way to put people into a negative feedback loop where they feel basically flawed and can't get better (though the feelings of being basically flawed would probably exist anyway if the person's depressed and there's certainly plenty of other cultural/social/familial sources for that judgment).

I went in for an MRI last Wednesday at the ordinary hospital. The people weren't even THAT cold, just more interested in getting me through than making sure I'm comfortable or know what's going on, and my reaction was so bad they said I'd have to have more sedation than the valium I could deliver. On Friday I went to the Children's Hospital instead where they worked to reassure me and let me where scrubs instead of a horrible hospital gown, and I got through the whole thing with no sedative and no problems.

I was fine this weekend when I had plenty of non-school-related, clear-cut things to do with my father visiting to help schedule/plan/accomplish things (I was moving) and I was utterly fine. Cue today with uncertainty about what I'm supposed to do, and the one thing I got accomplished required me to march through tears of anxiety. I might be losing my summer job through inaction today.

I agree about over medicating...

carlisleorama's picture
Wed, 04/08/2009 - 00:02
carlisleorama

This is why I catch a lot of flack for my opinions on medication, this society really does over medicate. I actually completely agree with that, but at the same time I worry that people who really need help won't get it because everyone's always talking about what a problem it is. Unfortunately, frequent masturbation was not the cure for all my problems. Believe me, I was trying it because I was 13, after all! I was born with anxiety that hindered my pursuit of life, liberty and happiness, so to me it wasn't a delightful little quirk that just made me different from others. It made very uncomfortable, sad and fearful. After 13 years of that (I had memories of feeling that way from the age of 3) I had enough and I asked my parents to commit me to a mental institution and I was completely serious. Luckily, they just found me a good psychiatrist instead.

It is important for me to distinguish the difference between myself and a kid who just had trouble paying attention in class, and sometimes that's hard because people who has never experienced true mental illness don't fully understand what it's like. Would you ask someone with schizophrenia to stop taking their medication if it was helping them even just a little? I accept that severe anxiety and OCD are not anywhere need as serious as schizophrenia, but it is severe. Believe me, I was there.

I agree  with the

Petunia's picture
Wed, 04/08/2009 - 00:53
Petunia

I agree  with the sentiment that we over-medicate people in this country, though I completely sympathize with what carlisleorama just wrote. I'm a good example of someone who needed medication but refused to get help because of all the negativity surrounding the topic. I refused to go on medication for 9 years because I was convinced there was a natural way to cure my problems. When I was 14 I was locked away in the eating-disorder unit of a mental hospital and was deathly afraid of being like the zombies around me, pumped with enough Thorazine to not feel anything. It was terrifying, and a great example of how doctors often don't try to get to the root of mental illness, they just prescribe enough medication so the patient is no longer a "problem." No doubt that behavior is what has given psychotropic drugs such a bad rep. After a long time it became apparent that my problems weren't going away, they were just getting worse. Finally at 23 I went to a doctor and requested to be put on medication because I was a complete mess, and it was probably one of the best decisions I've ever made. I don't think medication should ever be the first attempt at helping someone, but sometimes its the only thing that can really help.

Anti-depressants are sexy

Petunia's picture
Tue, 04/07/2009 - 12:29
Petunia

I'm on antidepressants and my sex drive is out of control. I take Wellbutrin XL which can actually enhance sensations, I've heard this from a few people, so I'm not the only one. However, Wellbutrin is known to make anxiety worse because its a stimulant, so if you've got anxiety problems it might not be for you. My libodo was always a little over the top, but I think it's definitely increased since I've been in meds- though, that could really just be because I'm not depressed anymore.

Shalom. Let me first say

Tue, 04/07/2009 - 18:30
Jeffrey65802

Shalom. Let me first say that as a religious Jew, some might call militant, I worry when I agree with Tom Cruise and/or scientology, but I happen to agree with him/them on the whole matter of psychiatry and medications. I think we overproscribe, overdiagnose, and push for some baseline of normalcy in our society. For some I'm sure psychiatric medicines help improve life, but for the majority I think they're just different and that it's purely an American thing that makes them think being different requires medication. Think about it, all the figures in history we read and learn about stood out in some way so as to have become important. If they lived today and did whatever they're famous for having done, wouldn't we be saying they need therapy and to be medicated? It's "Brave New World" with an official government seal of approval. Try accepting whatever makes you different instead of rushing in for some headmed.

Better still, try a couple masturbation sessions every day. As a single 37 year old man I'm a big advocate of masturbation therapy. Now if only I could get a federal grant to continue my work...;)

I'd much rather be happy than right any day.