Anxiety disorder and nausea

Hi.  I was recently diagnosed with GAD.  I also am a clinical depressive and have been since the age of 9.  I am 51 now.  I went through a period, mid 90's, when I was having panic attacks but then they stopped after I was put on and stabilized with SSRI's.  Now I am on 150 mg of Zoloft as well as .5 mg of Klonipin (klonopin) ( 3 x per day).  I am noticing some nausea which seems to settle down after I take my anxiety med.  Is there a connection?  I have some Phenergan that I was given at one time which seems to help but would like feedback from others.  Thanks.

[TerraC]

Common anxiety connections to food include loss of appetite, nausea, nausea when thinking about food, etc.  I'd say it's definitely possible that they are connected for you.  They are often caused by anxiety medications themselves, but are also caused by the anxiety too. I have random nausea with my anxiety and often have a loss of appetite, both of which are neither helped nor worsened by my medication. It's also possible that you could have a hint of acid reflux (commonly paired with anxiety) and that is causing some nausea. Sometimes acid reflex helps cause anxiety while anxiety causes acid reflux.

Good luck and hang in there!

[Sue357]

Hi.  Thanks.  As a matter of fact I do have Acid Reflux.  I take Prevacid, 30mg, daily for it.  I also experience loss of appetite.  Boy, what a vicious circle:  acid reflux can cause anxiety which can cause acid reflux. Thanks again for responding....

[TerraC]

No problem. :)

I found a lot of this out by searching the web vigorously after I starting having burning in my chest when I started taking Paxil.  Apparently because your stomach/esophagus are close in location to your heart, something like heartburn up your esophagus can jump start anxious feelings if you are the type that's prone to them.  In the same respect, the anxious feelings cause your body to go into slight overdrive (including your stomach) and you start to get more acid.

The biggest thing for me was realizing that the burning in my chest wasn't killing me (haha, there's that anxiety!).  It was a sensation all across my chest, different from the typical heartburn feelings I have grown to know - but included the burning above my stomach too and nausea.  At first, these feelings made me panic which made the burning worse.  I had a good laugh when I realized that it was just acid and now I do my best to try and burp as much as possible after I eat or drink (especially water, for some reason water can hurt me pretty badly).

Another thing that helped me with the acid as well as the nausea was actually sipping root beer.  It tends to make you burp very easily and actually made my stomach feel wonderful after I drank a bit of it.  Though I'm sure this doesn't work for everyone, it may be worth a try if you like root beer.  Most of the brands are caffeine free, too, if you are avoiding caffeine to keep your pulse lowered (Barq's is the only major brand that has some caffeine).  Overall, making sure I didn't hold the gasses in did wonders for the nausea I had from anxiety.

[Sue357]

Thanks.  I have been drinking ginger ale.  I spoke with my shrink yesterday who prescribed some Phenergan to help with the nausea.  He also upped my Zoloft to 200 mg ( max dose).  I am not real happy with that as years ago I was on Zoloft and topped out, over some years, and eventually was switched to Celexa.  Now, it has been a year and I am back at the max dose.  I go see him in 2 weeks and we are going to discuss other options....