Hi, I"m new here so hopefully I'll be able to get a little help/relief. I'm a 29 year old mom of 2, and have dealt with anxiety my whole life. I've seemed to manage it for the most part over the years--I was on lexapro for about a year when I was 24 or so, and haven't been on anything since. Well as of a couple weeks ago, it's like my brain just snapped. I started getting these constant headaches just about every day and I immediately thought I had a brain tumor. I got so worked up about it, I went to the doc, etc, and she's having me try a migraine medicine for the headaches, but ever since then, it's like it triggered something in my brain. My anxiety is now worse than it's ever been and very hard to control. I have Lorazepam for my panic attacks, but it seems to just make me sleepy. I've gone to the ER a couple days ago b/c I woke up with my heartbeat racing out of control and I couldn't get it to come down. They just monitored me at the hospital and I took a Lorazepam when I got home.

The scariest part of my anxiety right now is my thought behavior. It's like nothing I've experienced before. All of a sudden I have a bunch of OCD symptoms and get worked up about certain things. Like if something is lost, I could work myself into a panic attack because I think I won't be able to find it. Or I am constantly thinking about this person I met randomly at a bar a few months back who I thought was cool, but I never got his name, etc, so the fact that I can never find him or will ever see him again makes my anxiety out of control. And that's something that never would have bothered me in the past. Another example is my son, who is 3, was saying silly things tonight that didn't make sense at all, but for some reason tonight it scared me that I couldn't understand what he meant or was saying and I started getting irritated with him. Finally, I keep feeling like I don't know who I am (I mean I know who I am, but kind of feel out of it I guess) and I get really scared thinking about my life.

We do have a few things going on in our life--we're in the military and will be moving again in a year, and my husband and my relationship isn't the best right now. But up until a couple weeks ago, I've been able to handle all of this and haven't had any strange or major anxiety.

My doc prescribed Effexor XR for me to try, and the first day I tried it was the day I went to the ER. I feel like I need to be more 'grouned' before I try it. I know it would help me get a little more control of my anxiety, but it's like I want to have a handle on all the extra parts of the anxiety (OCD, strange thoughts) before I'm on the medicine. I do plan on contacting a psychiatrist next week to talk about all of this, but that scares me too. Why am I all of a sudden at this point? Why do I feel so out of control? Thanks for any help in advance. :)