Kava or Xanax, What should I take?

[Jcinny777]

I tool Kava a few times and it seems to work but have not taken the Xanax yet? I am still worry about the potential side effect on liver for Kava but also the side effect on Xanax? Will both Kava and Xanax help to ease my dizziness and headache casue by anxiety and which one works better on those? Any suggestion is helpful. Thank you.

[Paxiled]

We all react differently.  The best thing for headaches is probably a combination of meditation and exercise and sleep.  Drugs can cause headaches.  But how do you know for sure they're caused by anxiety?  Could be your diet.  Could be a lot of things.  Basically, headaches due to stress are either vascular or something like a muscle cramp.  But it's also allergy season, a lot of people have headaches right now.  But if it is stress, as I say, the best thing I've found is if you can get regular exercise, meditate, and sleep.

[Jcinny777]

One more question Paxiled since you seem to be knowledgable in this area.   What medication/herbal supplement works the best for headache and dizziness due to anxiety?

[Jcinny777]

I have seen  a therarist once and will go back to see her again in a couple weeks.  The first session is kinda just me talking and she's listening. Dont seem to help much.  For the time being, my GP has prescribed me Xanax as needed but I have not tried yet. Bought a bottle of Kava capsule from a health store but not sure if it is pure root extracted.  Still have constant headache and dizziness so I have to decide to take either the Kava or Xanax for them. Thank you for your post.

[Paxiled]

Xanax is much stronger.  It's also addictive and very hard to stop if you take it on a regular basis.  Kava isn't addictive and is easy to stop taking.  Xanax has a lot more reported side effects than kava.  As to which will work better, again, drugs are a lot stronger than plants.  Aspirin is derived from white willow bark.  Aspirin will work much better for a headache for most people.  It's also deadly because of being so strong -- it can tear apart the stomach lining and cause internal bleeding.  White willow bark would have to be taken in buckets to do that because it's got a lot less of the active ingredient they isolated to make aspirin.  It's just not that simple to give you an answer, as I explained I think to an earlier post.  And neither kava alone nor Xanax alone will solve your anxiety problem.  My own advice is to always start with a non-medication approach because if it works you avoid the problems of medication.  If it doesn't, the medication will always be there.  And I believe I also mentioned that kava isn't the only relaxant herb out there if you're that afraid of the liver problem, which I'm personally not afraid of at all because of its wide use and so few reported problems.  I also told you only standardized kava has the reported liver problem and you don't have to take it in that form.  I would say skip both of them because of your anxiety about them and get into therapy and learn other relaxation techniques -- maybe you can actually solve the problem.  Maybe not.  But you should give it a try.