Zanaflex + Bud Light = ? ? ? ?

Okay, so for the last three days my lower back has been bugging the shit out of me. Not when I stand, primarily when I sit, or if I bend at the waist. I have been swimming a little more than usual, but nothing over the top. Well I guess my wife got tired of me going 'ooh ooh' everytime I stood up so she says, "Why dont you take one of my muscle relaxers to get your back to quit hurting?"

"Which one, I dont want something to make me all loopy"

"Grab the zanaflex just take one"

So I did, I was watching beerfest and really jonesing for a beer, so now I am sitting here naked, in a bean bag, with a bag of doritos....na just kidding. I am having a hard time keeping my eyes straight, I think I am going to go to bed.

 

Mixing drugs is cool!

 

Here is a quote from William Hyde's diary -

"I highly recommend mixing prescription drugs with alcohol. This is know to be a safe and effect way to increase the effects of medicines. As a matter of fact, nearly every drug label states that drinking alcohol with prescription muscle relaxers assures that the drug will work exactly as prescribed, and that respiratory failure, liver failure and death will surely be avoided thanks to the powerful prophylactic effects of alcohol."

http://tallahassee.com/legacy/special/blogs/2007/01/drugs-alcohol-blamed-in-ucf.html

 

Translated -

"I LOVE being a crash test dummy."

 

Eww... I used to mix drugs, but I got over it. I made the mistake of mixing Klonopin with Vicodin a couple of weeks or so ago and I felt terrible. I take K everyday (to get through a day, not to party), but I don't fair well on Vicodin. Percocet doesn't make me feel as nasty, but Vicodin always makes me feel like shit... but I had a killer headache and was desperate.

Phenergan with codeine is a nice alternative to V. I tend to get very nauseated on V and Phenergan treats nausea.

 

Do you have epilepsy or suffer from seizures or something? Why do you need to take it every day?

 

I have terrible anxiety. Klonopin doesn't really kick it and I don't have an RX for it but I do for Xanax (which I have grown to dislike) If I have to go somewhere... like the grocery store, I have to take Klonopin with Xanax and I still get dizzy and freaked out. Going to work is a nightmare each day. I didn't make it to work Friday because I had a panic attack and my pulse was close to 180... two beta blockers and 2 hours later, I got my pulse at 67.

It's either anxiety or I am dying. I feel like shit right now. I took some Meclizine for the dizziness, but I think it is making me feel worse. Sometimes I wish I really would die just so I wouldn't feel like this again.

Sorry for all the info. I'm not ashamed of it. It just sucks!

 

Do you consume a lot of caffeine or do you smoke cigarettes? I know those sound like a stupid questions but I used to regularly think I was going to die.

I've rushed myself to the ER plenty of times, just to have them tell me to relax and try to give me Ativan or something.

I even went to see a shrink once just to get a 'professional' opinion on why I was such a miserable, freaked-out mess. She immediately started rattling off different drugs I should take and I remember one of them was that Klonopin. I remember looking it up and seeing it was an anti-convulsive medication.

I never took any of the Ativan or anything that the shrink tried to suggest but I did start keeping track of exactly what I ate and drank every day along with how much and what type of exercise I got. How much water I drank. How much soda or diet soda I drank. If I took a vitamin or not.

Then I started keeping track of of who I spent time with and then I started to track problems I had (money, work, etc.) and how much weight they had for that day.

Every day I'd enter the information for the day before. Eveything had a score of 1 to 10.

At the end there was an overall score from 1 to 10 on how I felt that day and if I thought I was going to wig out or die. The goal, obviously, was to tweak all the other things that I know I had control over and try to get that last column as high as I could.

I kept all of this in an Excel workbook, so I could make charts and graphs and over time I could begin to see patterns.

I'm a big proponent of cause and effect. The biggest problem is identifying the cause, or the combination of causes that are making you so anxious.

Maybe you'll discover that each time you have a panic attack, you've just consumed a diet coke. Or that you had a diet coke approximately 72 hours prior to each one and all that is wrong is that you're a Phenylketoneuric (someone who can't process a certain amino acid that there's tons of in Aspartame) What I'm saying is, maybe it's that simple. You just have to figure it out is all.

Worst case scenario, you add obsessive compulsive disorder to your anxiety/depression. Beats being bored though.

 

I consume a good bit of caffeine on a daily basis, I dont smoke however, and I am in a pretty hectic work environment, 150+ users and being the only IT person is a bit of an overload. I just dont have the issue with stress. I mean there is a lot of shit going on, and most of it is non-stop. But when I cross the street and head home, that's it that shit stays at work.

Of course all the weed I smoke in between makes it easier.... jk.

 

Well, I can rule out caffeine and cigarettes. I used to smoke, but quit and I completely avoid caffeine because it does tend to make me feel 10 times worse.

I dunno if it is possible, but when I was 19, I ate some really bad acid and totally freaked out. I had a panic attack and almost killed myself because I was convinced that I was going to die anyway. One of my ideas was to drink a bunch of shampoo (acid is such a retarded drug) and the other was to drown myself in the river (I lived right beside it... not in a van) Instead, I went to bed and let my life flash before my eyes until I finally passed out (probably from hyperventilation). When I woke up, I was thankful to be alive but I was so freaked out that I swore off all drugs for months but eventually went back to smoking pot. I have never touched acid again. Anyway, I wonder how badly it fucked me up? I've ALWAYS been paranoid and 11 years of smoking pot certainly didn't help. I quit that shit for good several months ago thinking that it was part of my problem, but I still feel the same.

I've taken myself to the ER as well and was diagnosed with costochondritis (inflammation of your chest wall) shortly after the 'bad trip'. I think it was from a car wreck that I was in and some of my anxiety subsided after I was diagnosed with something. I'm the type of person that has to have an answer for everything or I will die searching for it.

I've been to the shrink as well. Two different ones... one told me that I could be suffering from the beginning of schizophrenia (that was 7 years ago) and the last one told me that I had cyclothymia. Two totally different things, but I didn't go into the anxiety stuff the last time because I guess it wasn't much of an issue. I was just a pissed off bitch all of the time. My 'cyclothymia' symptoms went away when my shitty relationship ended.

Why didn't you want to take the meds that the DR was suggesting?

I've never thought about keeping track of everything and looking for a pattern. I tend to try to self diagnose myself with some ailment. I'm going to start doing what you did. It's definitely worth a shot. And if I get enough nerve to go back to the DR, I'll have everything charted.

I'm afraid that I am a head case though. I had OCD when I was a kid and I still suffer from it to an extent. When I was a kid, I had compulsions mainly and now mainly obsessions.

Yeah, never a dull day in my mind.

 

Quitting smoking weed is a long process for some people, especially ones with anxiety. I smoked a lot in High School and the year or two after and then just stopped but was paranoid like you wouldn't believe for years after that.

I worked as a landscaper one summer and after being up for a couple days and working out in the sun, I smoked a bowl with a friend of mine named Chuck. He laughed after we smoked it and told me it was Loveboat (weed laced with PCP). I don't think I've ever been the same after that day.

For a long time, I couldn't even go to the store because I was convinced that people I didn't even know could actually hear what I was thinking. People's faces used to change shape and stuff when I looked at them

I had this one asshole friend who dumped liquid acid in my drink too, and I was already paranoid and so for years I was scared to eat or drink anything that wasn't sealed.

I'd leave my car door unlocked when I went to the store and then realize it after I got back in and so I'd drive home and stare into the mirror for an hour, waiting for my pupils to start to dilate, all the while drinking water and forcing myself to vomit to try to purge the effects. I'd wash my hands fifty times because I was sure someone painted it on my steering wheel and it was soaking into my skin.

It was a mess. That guy that put acid in my drink is a heroin junkie now with Hepatitis-C so... sucks for him.

I think stuff like that goes way back for me though. I can remember lying on the couch when I was 7 or 8 years old, convinced that I had just consumed some kind of poison in whatever I had just eaten and was going to die.

I really do think that if you apply a little science to it though, and look at things logically, you can beat it.

You said you felt better after some shitty relationship ended. Don't underestimate the negative effects stress can have on you too..

Whatever you're good at, do more of it, and whatever you do that you know makes you feel bad, stop doing so much of it.

This is going to sound really bad but some times you just have to suck it up. Whenever you have one of these attacks, actually TRY to make it worse. Mentally, just try to make yourself feel as bad as possible because I'm sure you know it's really all in your head. If you can dare it to do its worst and then get through it, you will know you can handle it and then some.

It's just some imbalance of chemicals that are causing certain neurons to fire the wrong way and, as a result, all these perceived real life feelings are screwing you all up.

If you've been to the doctor and, physically, you're ok then it's just a mind game. You can do it. Depression and anxiety is fucking crippling. You just have to get mad at it and kick its ass.

 

Oh, and if I could recommend one thing above all else, it's physical fitness and proper nutrition. Your body is a just a chemical factory and your brain is just another part of it. If you feed yourself junk and don't exercise, you're asking for trouble.

Healthy body healthy mind, and all that.

Being physically fit does wonders for all kinds of things. Self esteem and confidence just being the tip of the iceberg.

And I'm no doctor or any kind of expert. I just think I can relate is all.

I'd really like to hear what Barry thinks of this.

 

Any bad trip on drugs especially the potent types can leave you with permanent psychosis. I've had a bad trip on amphetamines and ended up staying up for 48 hours, towards the end of which I was hallucinating whole armies of invisible men spying on me and even hallucinating smells (yes, all your senses can pick up fake signals not just vision)

I really hope you get better anyway Nauseous, Like I said to you before though, have you even just stopped taking the meds for a little bit and cleared your system? I've noticed the more drugs people take, for anything, the more other problems persist. Your body has to process all of these chemicals, even if they are illegal, or prescribed and it can get overloaded.

 

You have associated yourself with some fucked up people, but I have done the same... I ended up smoking SnowCap several times (marijuana is capped with cocaine on top) after telling all of these cokeheads that I wouldn't touch the shit. Cocaine is a terrible drug. I did it once and felt like I was going to kill someone and had to take Valium to try to calm down. I don't get the facination with it. That feeling is the same feeling I have when I am totally pissed off. Why anyone would want to pay to feel pissed off is beyond me. There are so many free ways of getting mad.

But your past experiences really make sense as to why you were so paranoid. You had some seriously bad shit happen to you. It's one thing to knowingly take a drug but it's something totally different to have injested it w/o any intent. I'm really sorry that shit happened to you.

Well, I can remember a day when I was about 5 or 6 years old and I ate some old jelly beans while I was playing up in the attic and my mom told me that you can't eat stuff you find laying around because it could have botulism in it and I was so convinced that I was going to die, that I got all of my favorite toys together and made a "death bed" on the couch and prepared to die. I did make one request of my mother and that was to give my older sister some of the jellybeans so I wouldn't have to die alone. So, it goes way back for me too. I also remember (around the same time) not wanting to use the bathroom at my grandma's house because I thought that the guy next door (they were apartments) had placed an invisible camera at the bottom of the toilet so he could look at my butt. I used to go in the bathroom and make faces and give the middle finger to the toilet bowl just to show him! I mean, it's funny shit now, but these experiences really shape the type of person that you are to become. I did weird OCD shit too because if I didn't do it, something 'bad' would happen. I actually stuck an electrical adapter that was plugged into the wall in my mouth because if I didn't something "bad' was going to happen (bittersweet, I got fucking shocked).

I think the only thing I am good at is worst case scenarios and ironicaly it is the thing that makes me feel really bad.

I did try to freak myself out even more while having a panic attack. I dared it to kill me and then I started getting the strange feeling that I was starting to die that I snapped out of it and started getting legitimately scared. I have also tried to do really physical shit to make my hard beat even harder, hoping that the fucking thing would explode, but all I did was almost pass out. Beta Blockers are a godsend for heart palps. I can say that. I wish I was given them years ago.

My DR doesn't really try to look for physical causes, he just treats me for anxiety and I think he may try to refer me to a shrink. I think DRs do this too much when there really could be an underlying condition. But the act of going to the DR's office and waiting (I have zero patience) sends my heart into a panic and my head starts spinning and I imagine myself falling on that germ infested floor and having a seizure. I always feel like I am going to have a seizure. I get this weird feeling of pressure on both the front and back of my head that makes me feel like my head is about to roll off my body and I have to take my hands and hold the back of my head to keep it from doing so. I went to an ENT and was supposed to have an ENG http://www.webmd.com/brain/Electronystagmogram-ENG but I am too afraid to go because I cannot take any xanax or anything before going. It's not like it works well, I still have issues which leads me to believe 1) I'm legitimately sick or 2) my mind is stronger than any benzodiazepine known to man

 

I would have to wean myself from it and I don't know if the effects of that are worth it.

I do think physical exercise would probably be a good thing. But I am convinced that I have exercise-induced asthma. I can walk forever, but if I go out in the woods and try hiking up some hills, I get bull blown asthma symptoms. I guess I need to pace myself or something because we walked hiked a couple of miles and I honestly thought I was going to check out.

 

Okay, you're right.

 

I get the impression you are one of those really deep thinkers that generally avoids interaction on the forum because it's is so consuming to address an issue with all angles addressed. Just putting it all together with this thread especially considering someone would go to that great of detail with the excel sheet and all.

That being said I think you are likely dead on with the idea. A lot of issues could be brought to the surface as to cause an effect if people kept some sort of diary, journal or excel sheet to reflect upon.