Posts by Mark Fox96

How can I help myself?
I feel absolutely terrible. Like I’m not even really here. Just sitting here, staring off into space, lost in my own head. Honestly, I'm just done with fighting myself constantly. Part of me just wants to crawl back under the covers and cry, but then there's this mountain of stuff I actually need to get done.
Yesterday, I finished off the rest of my Prozac, and man, it was rough. I managed maybe two hours of solid sleep, and everything else after that was just these pathetic thirty-minute naps where I'd wake up every single hour.
I'm exhausted. My brain won't shut up—just running a million different scenarios on loop, overanalyzing every little thing from a million different angles.
How did things get this bad?
Why am I doing this to myself?

Thanks, everyone. I'm just going to stick to the plan today and take half a pill like my doctor prescribed, then we'll see how things shake out. Honestly, I've been feeling absolutely terrible lately.

Brandon Lopez6 said:Fevarin is an antidepressant, meant to stabilize things for you in the long run. I don't know what you're dealing with—anxiety, depression, OCD, whatever—but the goal is to get you back to baseline.
What you’re describing sounds like side effects, and yeah, they can stick around for a while. It might even feel worse at first, and sometimes the initial issue—like the anxiety or depression—can actually flare up.
Look, if the Fevarin ends up being right for you, the benefits should eventually outweigh the side effects, and the bad stuff usually tapers off over time. But if these side effects drag on past a month or two without any real progress, your doctor will probably switch you to a different antidepressant.

The Xanax was likely prescribed as "rescue" medication, which is super common when you're first starting an antidepressant. As the side effects die down, the usage of Xanax should decrease too, until you either stop it entirely or just keep it around as a safety net.
My advice? Try to push through without the Xanax as much as you can. It’s easy to get hooked—not just on the pill itself, but on that sense of security it gives you when you take it.

Thanks,
I'm not planning on leaning on the Xanax; it's really just there in case I completely lose it at work or somewhere where I can't exactly just sit down and have a meltdown. But I'm hoping I won't need it. Like you said, just knowing it's in my bag gives me a sense of security. I fought against seeing a doctor or taking meds for a long time, but ever since the holidays started, I've just been crying constantly. Coming home to an empty apartment is the absolute worst part.

Michael Hill2 said:Here, I’ll drop a link to my own post where I laid out all the side effects I dealt with and how things eventually improved. Maybe it'll give you a little boost.🙂

Just take it slow and be patient. 😉

Thanks for getting back to me.
I’m dealing with anxiety—just that constant, heavy tension—but honestly? I’m starting to think maybe I shouldn't even bother taking the meds. Might be better if I just skip it.
I’m honestly terrified that these side effects are going to sideline me completely. I finally bit the bullet and went back to school after all these years, you know? And now, just when things are getting real—with the semester winding down and finals staring me right in the face in a few weeks—this happens. I’m spiraling a bit. I’m scared I won't be able to pull through this.

So, I was prescribed some Xanax 0.25, but only as needed, plus half a tablet of Fevarin before bed.
How exactly is this Fevarin supposed to work?
Because honestly, I feel like it’s making everything worse, and I’ve never even taken medication before this. I only managed about four hours of sleep last night. I took it for the first time yesterday, and now my mouth is bone dry all day long. I can't eat a thing—just sipping on tea and calling it a day. The instructions say you shouldn't really be drinking coffee or tea while on Fevarin, either. Anyway, I woke up at 3:30 AM feeling like my heart was going to jump right out of my chest, and I just started sobbing. But it wasn't even normal crying; it was those heavy, painful tears... that feeling where you're literally struggling to pull air into your lungs.

There aren't really any private specialists worth my time, and trying to land an appointment with a therapist is basically mission impossible right now. So, I guess I'm just stuck waiting for my slot at the ERF in Washington, D.C., while I scramble to see if anything else turns up in the meantime.

Honestly, I don't have much of a choice...

Karen Barrett said:We should probably apply for another ERF observation once those ventilation tubes are finally installed...

Seriously, just get that ERF application in ASAP. The wait times are brutal—we’re looking at an 11-month delay if we don't move fast.

Does anyone actually know who moderates the health subforum? It feels like this thread belongs over in the parenting section instead. Might be a better spot to actually get some useful advice from people who've been through this.

Thanks

So, I finally went to see the psychologist today. Her take? She thinks my kid is just being stubborn and really pushing his own agenda with these washing machine phases he's going through. She’s suggesting we just stick it out with preschool for now instead of sending him anywhere else specialized, thinking that might smooth things over. Honestly, I’m not buying it. From talking to so many other moms, it feels like our doctors and specialists love to brush off developmental delays because they're spread too thin and don't want to deal with "minor" issues right away.
Basically, this professor is the only psychologist serving the entire Orange County area...

On the flip side, she’s pushing us toward speech therapy because he hasn't quite mastered his Ls and Rs yet. Personally, I didn't think it was a huge deal since he's only four. My husband's cousin didn't even start speech therapy until she was five, and she speaks way better now than he does at his age.

She also mentioned she’s noticing some slow development in his fine motor skills, but her magic solution for everything is just "preschool will fix it." I actually asked if she had any specific advice on exercises we could do at home to help him improve—I mean, we’re just parents, we don't necessarily know the best clinical ways to support him. But no. To her, preschool is the cure-all. She basically ushered me out the door leaving me with a million questions swirling in my head.

I am counting down the days until we can take these findings to our neurodevelopmental specialist at the Mayo Clinic. I have a feeling she'll be much more helpful; she actually seems to love what she does and always takes the time to focus on the child's actual well-being.

And just so we're clear, I am definitely not satisfied with any of this. Back at the beginning of the year, I put him on the waiting list for the early intervention program at Harvard University, but I was told we wouldn't even be seen until October or November. So now, we're just stuck waiting and following whatever instructions we get from the local doctors and professors here in the US...

Anyway, I'd really appreciate it if you guys could jump into this thread. Please, if you have any advice or have dealt with something similar, let me know...

Thanks so much

Ryan Carter52 said:Look, this is all totally normal, trust me.
When I was a kid, I used to freak out over the sound of chainsaws or wearing those creepy masks—you know, the ones people wear on Halloween? Especially if they looked particularly unsettling.
Every kid has their weird little fears. It’s just a phase, and it’ll pass...

P.S. Like I said before, don't sweat it too much. Just enjoy your son while he's still little... and maybe focus on giving him a little brother 🙂(if you guys can swing it) or if that's even on the cards right now....

Best,

Thanks for the kind words, really. But honestly, I am worried. Even some professionals have started flagging things, which definitely spooked me a bit. We actually have an appointment at a psychologist this Tuesday—it's part of our regular check-ups—so I'm hoping we get some actual answers there. Hopefully, daycare will help too.

As for a second kid... yeah, that's just not happening right now. We're living with my husband's parents and his brother, plus his grandparents are in the mix, so there are eight of us under one roof. We're building a house and hoping to move in within a year or two, so once we finally have our own space, then we might start thinking about a baby.

I’ve been trying to convince myself for a long time now—just praying that everything turns out fine in the end—that autism isn't some kind of disease in itself. It’s not. But it does point toward certain elements, you know, those pervasive spectrum disorders. I was just listing a few things I've noticed that feel... off. Weird. For instance, there’s this intense fear of tiny babies, mostly because they don't talk or walk yet. And then there's this obsession with buttons. You wouldn't believe it; he can't even handle someone wearing a button-down shirt around the house without losing it. If anyone accidentally touches him while they're wearing one, he just starts screaming. It's constant.

I'm a mom to a little boy who just turned four, and honestly, a few months back, I started getting these nagging suspicions that he might be showing signs of autism...

Back when I was 32 weeks pregnant, I ended up stuck in the hospital on bed rest because of some complications. They had me on sedatives to keep me calm, and then I just started catching one infection after another. He ended up being born three weeks early via C-section, and he actually picked up an infection from me during the process. Once we finally got home, he seemed to hit his milestones just like any other kid, but then we started noticing these motor issues. At 11 months, he couldn't even sit up on his own. He clearly wanted to walk, but his lower back was so weak he just couldn't stay upright. We were sent to do physical therapy... eventually, he learned to crawl, pull himself up, and finally walked at 15 months, which is when we stopped the exercises. He started talking at 12 months, and man, does he have an incredible eye for detail. Around 18 months, we noticed he could memorize logos of all sorts of companies—you know, grocery stores, appliance brands, car manufacturers... stuff like that.

Between reading articles about autism and talking to parents whose kids have been diagnosed, it’s just clicked for me that something isn't quite right.
He is absolutely obsessed with washing machines; he just stares at the spinning cycle for hours. He can spend the whole day watching the laundry spin while flapping his hands around. Sometimes he’ll take his toy cars, flip them upside down, and just spin the wheels, doing that hand-flapping thing again. The weird part is, he seems totally checked out from the world when he does it. I can call his name and he won't even blink. Then there's the weirdness with noise—he’s terrified of regular household things like the blender or the vacuum, yet he’s fascinated by huge, loud machinery... those are just a few things, though, my brain is a bit scrambled trying to remember everything else.

Since he hasn't been in daycare yet and shows zero interest in drawing, singing, or anything typical for his age, we decided to enroll him starting June 1st. But I'm freaking out about how people will react. How is he going to handle it? We don't have an official diagnosis yet—we've just started the testing process—so I can't exactly warn the teachers, and I'm terrified that if I say anything now, they might not even want to take him.

If anyone has any advice or has gone through something similar, please, I'm desperate for any kind of help. Thank you so much..