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It took me 70 treatments to feel better, and I continue to improve after stopping.
I certainly would not start a medication right after finishing TMS. It’s bad science, you’re throwing in a new variable before seeing the evidence from your current treatment on its own.
I was in a very similar position, every medication other than Remeron threw me into a terrible place. We tapered me off the medication during my TMS treatment.
If you’re not comfortable being on a medication, don’t take it. Yes, you might need maintenance, but hopefully it’s something you need a few times a year. If you need to pay out of pocket for that and can stay off meds, it sounds like a trade off you’re willing to make.
Do you know how many pulses you’re getting per treatment/how much of a percentage of motor threshold they’re giving you? After two weeks my doctor did 5,000 pulses a day at full power which may have accelerated things a bit.
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This reply was modified 9 years, 8 months ago by
GraffinLA.
Like you said, I do remember some slight sleep disturbances the first week, which went away.
Honestly, my instinct is to think it’s just a symptom of your depression. It’s pretty common to have early waking. The two things I’d recommend is some deep yogic breathing before bed to get your nervous system to settle down a bit, and also Uvex Goggles. Search for them on Amazon, they cost $8 and work wonders for insomnia, though I’m not sure they can cure the early waking. I’m sure things will improve as you get deeper into treatment 🙂
I’d recommend staying away from stimulants while doing TMS so you can assess when it starts working. Ideally, the TMS gets you to a point where you don’t need a stimulant, or at least you can see where you’re at when treatment ends and make the decision then.
I’m assuming you’ve tried medications, probably many. They usually take six weeks to work and at a certain point it’s throwing darts and hoping for the best.
You’re in the middle of a treatment with no serious side effects and pretty remarkable effectiveness. Hang in there. Many of us were where you are now. I started treatment last July and only started to really feel better in November. Still have some symptoms eight months later but doing much better. This is a long process.
My mood has been consistently good, motivation, sleep, appetite. My family tells me they notice a huge difference in me. When I started treatment it was hard to walk around the block with my dog, I’m now back to running long distances and hitting the gym regularly.
I was the one who mentioned the tiredness and fog still being there, I’ve been told this can take some months to resolve. But everyone is different and I was essentially not functional before I started treatment.
I’m not back to 100%, but I’m in a tolerable place where I’m able to do the things that make life worthwhile for me, and I’m not in emotional pain. Hopefully the rest will come later.
Keep in mind that your brain is still doing good stuff on the rest days. Now that I’m on boosters, it takes me a week after a treatment for everything to settle down. But yeah, I hated weekends too 🙂
Don’t discount the little things, they’re a sign it’s starting to work. On Week 3 of my treatments I was driving through a sketchy area and loving every minute of it for some reason. The feeling passed an hour later, but I held onto that when I went back down for a while. If you have those blips of feeling better, that’s a great sign it will stick in the long run.
Once you get used to the treatment, talk to your doctor about going up in power. After two weeks I asked them to crank it up as much as possible. It becomes very tolerable.
Granted, your mileage mary vary, but i wanted to get the most out of each treatment.
Before I started treatment, I was on a medication that worked for about a month, then I felt so much worse when it pooped out.
My doctor kept me on the medication for the first few months of treatment, and once I started responding we tapered off.
Thanks for the thorough response 🙂 The challenge for me is that I lived depression free for my whole life and was extremely functional and successful professionally. I went from that to being too foggy/tired to drive for a good chunk of last year, so it’s a tough transition.
The good news is I’m on the upswing thanks to TMS and getting back to intense exercise. But I’m not going to settle for being less than what I was before this episode.
So it’s a difficult place to be. I envisioned finishing treatment and feeling good as new, clearly that’s not how it works for some of us. Where I’m at right now isn’t acceptable long term, so I’m hoping to get some support from the community here that things do continue improving after you’ve finished treatment.
Also, expect lots of fluctuations. It can be frustrating, but know that the ups and downs are a signal that your brain is taking to it.
I’m a broken record here, but I required 70 treatments to get better. If you have any inklings of feeling better, even if it’s for an hour here and there, that’s a sign than TMS will work for you. Keep going until you get there.
Greg: For what it’s worth, once I ended my treatment course, I’ve noticed some morning anxiety for a few days after a booster. Hopefully you have a similar pattern and it settles down once you finish.
Don’t hesitate to get more treatments if you feel you need them.
Colleen: I’d love to hear more about your nine month process. I’m in a spot where my treatment course is more or less over, and I’m better but not “back to normal”. I’ve heard about progress continuing when treatment is over for most patients and it’s hard to wrap my head around (not being all the way better at the end of treatment, but putting faith in the idea that you’ll get there with time/letting your brain do the rest on its own).
This was my first experience with depression, so i had a very clear idea of what it’s like to live without it. That makes lingering symptoms more frustrating.
I had a few hours of wellness here and there starting Week 2, and a big dip in Week 5. We kept going past 70 treatments until the results started to stick.
Sure 🙂 I made a post about this elswhere: my mood is generally well, but I’m still struggling with fatigue and fog. I’ve been told by other patients that this can be a lingering symptom that goes away with time, which I’m curious to hear feedback on.
I noticed a pattern where I have a bit of a dip for a few days following a treatment, then come back up the further I get away from it. So I decided to stop, and that’s when the biggest improvements came. Last treatment had been before Christmas and January was pretty good. I’ve had two boosters since then with the usual dip, come back up in a few weeks pattern.
Still trying to figure out where my stability is, hopefully getting there. Back to the original point, I’m very grateful my doctor knew to keep going (and that my insurance covered so much of it).
I feel like 20 treatments is far too few to judge how well TMS will work for you. It took me over 70 to finally feel well enough to taper off. I’m lucky that my doctor only stops if he hasn’t seen any improvement by 45 treatments. I had some glimmers of wellness, so we kept going until it stuck.
Hi,
One piece of advice I’d have is that if TMS has worked for you in the past, it should work for you again. It could be that you need more treatments to pull you out of the current hole. I would do more before getting back on the medication merry-go-round. But also easy for me to say, as my treatments were covered by insurance.
It seems that most patients need maintenance, so if it made you well for a few months and you needed more, that sounds about right.
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This reply was modified 9 years, 8 months ago by
