Hi guys, i thought id give you a brief overview of my situation and hopefully deter as many people as possible from using Omeprazole as I can safely say it’s ruined 4 months of my life. FYI I am a fit and healthy 28 yr old M with no past depression history.
It all started early last year when I started getting heartburn. After trying Gaviscon and Nexium, I decided to go to the doctors where I was prescribed Omeprazole and silly me I assumed it was safe and did no background research. If I had there would be no way I would have tried it!!
In September I took my first dose, initially 1 every AM. Despite working on the heartburn I became incredibly anxious around the same time. I have suffered with mild anxiety throughout my life but this was a whole new level.
I experienced my first anxiety attack in a work meeting, god I’ll never forget it - it was HORRIBLE! Immediately this triggered a bad response in me and I became worried about further meetings etc.
Symptoms continued until November, when I revisited the GP, this time I was still experiencing mild heartburn issues but also incredible anxiety. Sadly for me, the GP prescribed me Beta Blockers for the anxiety to cope in meetings and advised I doubled my Omeprazole dose to 40mg from 20… OUCH!
From November to date, never putting 2 and 2 together and trying everything under the sun, my symptoms have included shortness of breath, dizziness, depressed days where I felt emotionally numb even though my life and work is great, incredible brain fog & confusion (feel like life wasnt real and I was walking round in a dream), fear of impending doom, blacking out and panic attacks. It’s been awful to say the least.
After praying to god and trying to piece together why I felt this way the Omeprazole sprung to mind & after Googling wow!!! I feel immense sadness that I have been taking such a harmful drug that has caused so many bad side effects daily, but also HUGE relief that I believe I have gotten to the bottom of the problem.
Has anyone else suffered similar side effects? I have binned every packet - I would rather have the crippling heart burn any day of the week!!
Any advice would be much appreciated.
I was fine on this for years until earlier last year when that wasn’t available any more they suggested lansoprazole (which I was told may have same effect as omeprazole) but to try and then stop if I got any issues. However I didn’t have any to start with so felt OK. I first started taking them in July this year, and started feeling anxious and having issues about September - an exact copy of before. So I have stopped them, I took last one on December 6th. I’ve read alot about them and I’ve read anything from 3-6 months to feel better. I know from last time it was about 6-9 months, I’m just over 3 months now and have a week or 2 of feeling pretty OK, and then 2-3 weeks of feeling anxious, upset, intrusive thoughts, having palpitations etc. I’m concentrating on the fact I know it’ll eventually go but it’s just horrendous! I’m meditating every day to try and help, but I think its a case of just riding it out 