Have you even been prescribed a medication only to find later that people were dying from the drug or having potentially life threatening reactions? They spend billions of dollars researching and developing new pharmaceuticals, but I never feel safe taking a new drug until it's been on the market for a few years. The newer medications make me feel somewhat the guinea pig. I'd rather not play that role.
A few years ago I was taking a particular class c medication while pregnant. With class c drugs, they don't know what to tell you when you inquire as to the medications potential threat to a fetus. The canned response when you ask a doctor whether a class c medication is safe when pregnant is... "do you think the benefit outweighs the risk?"... problem was, no one (at that time) could tell me what the risk might be. I'll never know either. We miscarried that pregnancy, like so many others before and after. I was only on that anxiety reducing medication for about a year, so the medication wouldn't have made a difference in any of the miscarriages. A few years later I learned that the medication I'd been on had been blamed for birth defects. How sad.
Anyway... I won't be looking for an attorney for Unsafe Drugs at this time. It's scary today to read about all the babies born with birth defects by moms who took certain medications while pregnant. I hurt for those moms and their little ones.The anxiety medication I was on isn't the same one I take today. I'm currently taking a med that has been on the market for nearly 12 years and I feel much better about it than the other medication. For one thing, I've never heard of any birth defects or law suits against it's manufacturer. Hopefully I never will!
Treating anxiety while pregnant shouldn't be frowned upon... we just need to be careful. Some of us (myself included) have chemical irregularities in our brains that make it impossible to reduce anxiety to a reasonable level on our own. Even with exercise and a healthy diet, some of us simply don't function well without medical intervention. I've found biofeedback helpful, but hard to practice when at work... or while sleeping... which by the way, without medication I don't sleep!
Do you ever worry about the prescription medications your doctor prescribes to you or your children? Does the length of time on the market play into your consideration of whether or not to fill the prescription? Do you research the drug online before distributing?
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1 comment:
I worry plenty about medications. Like you, I sometimes need medicine to get through certain things - my brain just is wired differently. Medications can certainly help when needed but I do think they prescribe too many and too fast, before they fully know what can happen.
I also think they do it too often. My boy is 3 and already we've had people trying to talk us into ADD/ADHD medication, because his father has ADD and his uncle ADHD. Our son shows no sign whatsoever of either disorder. In the same breath the health pros compliment his attention span and how well he can sit still and focus, they mention meds "just in case".
It's a dangerous game.
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