Is it actually worth taking medication

I’ve been in erp for a couple years now and haven’t felt like I’ve achieved significant improvement. I know the reason for this is because I don’t follow through with not engaging in mental compulsions and I don’t tend to make good choices about doing things that are uncomfortable or resisting the urge to ruminate. In practice it’s so hard to do, and even if I understand these are the things I need to do to get better, in the moment I don’t feel like it’s possible for me to get better and I don’t feel like I deserve to. I have read that medication can help with depression and ocd symptoms and make it easier to actually do erp effectively. I desperately don’t want to take medication. I have a lot of trauma associated with medication in the past. My experiences in the past have involved being over medicated on adhd meds and not being allowed to stop taking them, not being able to stop on my own due to the withdrawal effects, no one believing me about how bad they were, my doctors wouldn’t listen to me, ultimately had to trick my family/doctor to let me try a different med which allowed me to be on a smaller dose and was able to slowly ween myself off until I was able to convince them to let me try non-stimulant meds which did absolutely nothing. I truly believe that getting to stop taking meds was one of the greatest blessings of my life and even though this is a different kind of medication, the idea of going to a doctor willingly to take meds willingly is absolutely the last thing I would want to do. Especially if those meds are gonna take months to even be able to see if they’re helping, or would take months to be able to stop taking. I don’t want to commit to being on something I can’t stop taking. Also read they generally dont consider weening you off ssris if you’ve been taking them for less than 2 years?? My dad has ocd and he used to be on medication. He tried many different meds over ten years or so and ultimately found them not to be helpful, and now does erp without them. I know I have his genetics and we are very similar. I recently went on a diet and lost over 20 lbs. it was really difficult. It’s not just that I am worried about gaining the weight back, I am worried about sacrificing one of the few areas where I have felt successful recently for something that may or may not work. Just really not convinced this will be helpful, worried it will make things worse because of the weight gain canceling out my recent hard work. I know it’s important to trust doctors and people who have worked hard to learn these topics, I definitely don’t know better about medicine than your average doctor is psychologist. But my experiences have been so bad and our medical system is so fucked. I have so little faith in our medical system. But this is clearly not working the way things are

Firefly girl

Date posted: 9h

I relate to the med trauma , except it was that my family was saying it was making me act different and I needed to get off it . They were convinced meds were the problem and contributing to my mental health issues. Although I felt a lot happier during the time I was on it whether that was situational or because of the meds I don’t know. I’m on 10 mg fluoxetine right now but wish I wasn’t on anything . Still feeling really depressed and struggling with a lot of compulsions and rumination . But I don’t really know what else to do . I’m tired of feeling this way. I also have little faith in the medical system it’s a pretty hopeless feeling . I wish there was a way to cure this more naturally

isaacco5

Date posted: 9h

I truly believe you can do the ERP work. I think meds can be worth a try, but truly, if you choose to believe you can do it, I think you can do it. Ask God for help in the process and he will help you.

lola_mento

Date posted: 8h

Trying ocd meds changed my life. I was also forced on adhd meds (stimulants) for about 9 years and I hated it. The thing is it could take some trial and error, to me the first one we tried worked perfectly. I was frustrated for not wanting to take meds before because I struggled for so long. But in my case I didn’t know I had ocd until right before they switched my meds. I saw no weight gain, but that also depends on you. It’s up to you, but if you don’t like the meds there is nothing tying you to them, you can just stop. You do have to be patient and wait a couple of months for them to work, but think about how much more patient you have to be for ERP to work.

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