Need help...Celexa

LoneStar14

New Member
Does anyone have experience with Celexa? difficult child was just prescribed Celexa.

He was diagnosis with depression. What are the pros and cons of Celexa?
 

susiestar

Roll With It
Celexa is a SSRI antidepressant. It can be very effective for treating depression.

All SSRI's carry a warning concerning suicidal ideation, suicidal thoughts and parents should monitor any child/teen while taking this.

NOT all teens or kids, or adults, get thoughts of suicide while on these medications. MY son is suicidal without one of these medications. Many people are helped by them. It is very important to watch for behavior changes, and to discuss how the patient is feeling while taking this medication.

I woudl advise you to google celexa withdrawal BEFORE you have your child start this medication. I have taken quite a few of the medications that are similar to this one, and have taken this one. Some of these medications have side effects for some people. Stopping this medication can be hard because the withdrawal symptoms. ALL SSRI/SNRI medications have withdrawal issues. The medication should be stopped using very slow weaning. The dose should be cut down in small steps over a period of weeks or months.

I can't remember if this medication gave me trouble when stopping it. I probably switched to another SSRI, so it would not have the same withdrawal problems.

My son is on a different SSRI, but he will be on one for the rest of his life, most likely. He just seems to need it for help with his Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and the depression and suicidalness (is that a word?).

I hope this medication works wonders for your child.

IF bipolar is thought to be the problem, please ask the doctor about starting a mood stabilizer instead of celexa. Antidepressants can cause mania in people with bipolar (and in some with-o it, esp children). Many people with bipolar cannot take stimulants or antidepressants because it starts the cycling of moods.

It is good to ask LOTS of questions before you start a medication.
 

LoneStar14

New Member
Thanks Susie Star. He was just prescribed this today after meeting with a psychiatrist. This was his first consultation with this particular doctor but had been interviewed by others at this facility. I think they expected us to run out and get it filled and start giving it to him tomorrow. Their rationale was that they have a short amount of time to see how he reacts to this medicine/dosage. I had some time to do some research and really had some concerns about it, including the withdrawal affect.

Here's our dilemna. We acknowledge he was depressed. We also acknowledge he had begun to self injure. We also know that he and two other friends were going through the same feelings/self injury. Together, they would commisserate (sp?) about how bad they had it. We started to notice a slight change in him when he started hanging around them. Everything came to a clash when we decided to meet with the other parents and things came out in the open. He had successfully painted a terrible picture about us, which was disproved once they met us.

To make a long story short, all communication has been stopped between the 3 of them and each family is seeking help for their child. Since then, we've seen a big change (positive) in him, at least at home. I asked him today if he was still depressed (he's been really happy at home). He said yes because he couldn't see is his friends. I asked him when was the last time he had suicidal thoughts and its been over 3 weeks. I'm wondering if he's confusing sadness with depression. We want to work through the reasons why he was depressed and give him coping strategies for when he gets sad and angry.

The reason he's been depressed is because he gets grounded for disobeying the rules, not doing his school work, taking things, etc. Then he gets upset he can't do things or he can't keep friends. He's behind in social skills. We admit it's not all his fault. Somewhere along the line, we got into a catch-22 situation. We want to get him help. We don't want to deny him medication he needs. But, we also don't want to get him started on something he doesn't need and the 'fix' will be worse than the problem.

We didn't get to meet with the psychiatrist to express our concerns. However, we will get to meet with a therapist in family conseling, which the doctor recommended we do right away. We're scheduling tomorrow, hopefully for tomorrow.

I appreciate any insight. I'm going to go and do some more research. Thanks.
 

SRL

Active Member
All medications that get mentioned here will bring out parents whose kids have had good success along with those whose kids who haven't. Like other medications, Celexa is effective when it's a good match.

difficult child didn't get along well with this medication. It nipped the anxiety (which is what it was to target) but made him hyperactive, unable to cry, and increasingly angry. Side effects increased gradually over a 9 month period at which point we pulled him off.
 

susiestar

Roll With It
I am so very GLAD you are taking time to research the medications. Every person reacts differently to medications, but I think we need to be as educated as possible about medications.

What do they think the diagnosis is? A troubled kid? Or are they talking about bipolar, adhd, aspergers, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), or something else?

If they are even wondering about bipolar, PLEASE get a different medication. So very many of us just jumped right in iwth the medications with-o researching them. Then we learn better. People with bipolar often cannot tolerate antidepressants or stimulants. It makes the moods cycle. Often the cycling continues LONG after the A/D or stimulant is stopped. Some have had problems for a year or longer!!!

IF they are going to take him off an A/D, there IS a trick that can help. Most of the newer SSRIs only stay in the body a short time. Effexor, for one example, is in the body about a day. If you are just an HOUR or so late for your next dose you will start to have withdrawal symptoms.

Prozac is in the body much longer. Several weeks, in fact. So a single 20mg dose of prozac can help manage withdrawal symptoms when you are stopping an SSRI. I found this out when dealing iwth my own effexor withdrawal. It made sense (when looking at the amt of time the medications are in the system) and I ended up taking 3 doses of prozac, each 2 weeks apart. It really made life much better.

While docs often tell you the withdrawal isn't a problem, they are mistaken. A look at the info on the internet about the withdrawal gives a much different story. My regular doctor is now doing the prozac to help with this, but until I spoke with her about it she didn't know anything about it.

IF I had to start this rollercoaster over we woudl start with lithium, depakote, abilify or one of the other mood stabilizers LONG before we did an A/D. But that is us.

You must figure out what is right for you. The website www.loveandlogic.com has been very helpful to us. It is a program my husband could "get", and it let us be n the same page.

You might want to talk with the therapist, and/or get some idea of the diagnosis before you start the medications.

Hugs, this is a tough time.

Susie
 

klmno

Active Member
Hi! I will offer only one thing- that I wish psychiatrist or someone would have told me. We had every reason to believe my son was suffering from unipolar depression, not bipolar, and he was on an AD for a year, then dosage was increased. The one thing I wish people had told me- the signs to watch out for that meant he was going into mania. So, even though you feel sure that this is only depression, just to be on the safe side, I would advise to read the signs that CAN possibly indicate mania, so you can intervene at the earliest possible time. It probably won't happen but again, just wanted to let you know what I wish I had known.
 

smallworld

Moderator
I just want to clarify some misconceptions you might have about depression. Depression can be situational, but very often it is caused by chemical changes in the brain that the adolescent has very little control over. While it's extremely important to work on coping skills with a qualified therapist, it is generally very difficult to pinpoint the reasons behind why a teen is depressed. It is often wise to go the therapy route first before trialing medications, but if the adolescent's life is significantly impacted (as in suicidal thinking or self-harming), medications can be a very important component of the treatment plan.

Even when a teen is not suicidal, he can still be depressed, and it can be exhibited in his disobeying the rules, not completing schoolwork and stealing. My own son displays his depression as irritability and emotional shut down.

If your difficult child is lagging in social skills, has an Autistic Spectrum Disorder been ruled out?
 

LoneStar14

New Member
I don't know what has been ruled out. All they've told is that he's been diagnosed as being depressed. We didn't get to talk to the doctor before the prescription was written. When they ask him how often he feels angry and depressed, he says just about all the time. He may or may not.

I just wish we would have known that some of his behaviors (homework, disobeying, stealing) were signs of depression. We would have acted earlier instead of focusing on the behavior.

He's been made to feel he was weird by classmates because of the ADHD since he was little. That's were alot of his anger (kept in) started, I believe. He also alluded to that earlier today. I wish I would have dealt with situations differently. I backed him, but would pull out of an activity because I didn't want people to treat him bad. I should given them a piece of my mind and kept him in. I just feel so sad.

But, since God won't turn back the hands of time, we need to go from this point forward. What to do now?

:sad-very:
 

smallworld

Moderator
Would you mind filling in your profile a bit more so we know how old your difficult child is and what he has been diagnosed with?

So he has been diagnosed with ADHD? Is he taking medications for it? What do you mean classmates made him feel weird because of his ADHD?
 

smallworld

Moderator
Just so you know, Concerta can cause depression over time. Have you given him a medication break at any point recently to get a baseline read on his mood? Has he ever had neuropsychological testing to make sure he doesn't have another disorder in addition to or instead of ADHD?
 

AmyH

New Member
I have personally been on Celexa for 2 years and it works great for me. My difficult child could not tolerate it though, medications are different for everyone.

As far as the ADHD and been treated different, My difficult child is going throught the same thing. And honestly our therapist now is saying these kids were often misdiagnosed years back and ADHD may not (or may) be the only issue. Depression runs along with so many other mental/psychological illnesses. And it seems like real strides have been made in the last few years to identify these things earlier.

My difficult child has a 5yo 1/2 brother who is diagnosis Aspergers and they see the same therapist because they are ALOT alike. Therapist seems to think difficult child is an undiagnosed Aspie. Mostly because we lived in a small tourist town and ADHD was all the rage back then.
 

LoneStar14

New Member
We've decided to hold off on giving him the Celexa. In our view, there is a small chance this can be bipolar and from all indications, this would be the WORSE type of medication to give him.

He's been pretty happy until tonight. He was okay until he saw one of his friends. Without going into details (basically, its a they said, he said scenario) as to what caused him to start getting angry, we were able to use one of the techniques we learned and called for a time-out. We walked away from each other and he was able to calm down and get back to a normal state. Its been calm since then.

We'll be bringing up the situation to the counselors tomorrow. I'm tired. I'm glad he didn't escalate like before. I pray its because he's learning coping skills.
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
I first tried it for my anxiety/depression for about a year. But it really didn't do enough for me, so now I'm on a tricyclic which seems to work better for my particular symptoms (more anxiety than anything else). I did have dry mouth and profuse sweating, but that happened on the tricyclic too, and finally settled down after I'd been on it a few years (!)

It's so much trial and error because what works for one may not work for someone else.
 
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