That's probably not a good definition of what I'm thinking about, but it's sort of like depression/anxiety. I know they go hand in hand, and overlap, but it just feels logical that what would help one would exacerbate the other.

But anyway, what I was specifically thinking of was my frustrating situation of being both tired/fatigued AND jittery. If I take meds or do caffeine to keep alert, it increases the shakiness and jittery feeling. If I take something to ease the anxiety, I'm sluggish and foggy-brained. Grrrr.

Plus I don't really want to medicate everything. "One pill makes you larger, and the other makes youj small....."

I think I know what you mean. I have medications for two distinct issues: Crohn's and neuropathic. It is highly likely that some of my neuropathic issues were either initiated by or have been exacerbated by meds I take for Crohn's . . . and some of the meds I have tried for my nerve issues have most definitely triggered Crohn's flares. My body loves inflammation and drug side-effects, and it seems to be breaking, system by system, at an alarming rate right now.

I have days I wish I could get someone to "stand in" for me, so I could have a break. Today might be one of them . . .

Lefthanded, I am similarly afflicted with drug responses, but I have noted through experience that some "forms" of drugs are better than others. For me, Klonopin is good
and other Benzos are very bad (I have not tried Ativan, but I had paradoxical reaction to Valium and semi-paralysis with Zanex). It is too bad that modern medicine is not good enough, with all its computer help, to determine the EXACT type and dose which is best for a body. It would of course be best if the Creator would just recalibrate the whole works so it WORKS.

In modern times, though, we are so replete with chemical challenges in the environment
that we hardly stand a chance unless we are made of rubber or some synthetic non-reactive substance. I first got very sick at Stanford due to chemical exposures (multiple)
which turned me from a very healthy girl into a person who could barely function, but did
get through one quarter before transferring. I think our chemical stew is a big mistake.

Have you tried any holistic or natural remedies....say St. John's Wort? I haven't ever tried it but I've heard good things about it. You'd have to check your other meds to see if there is any sort of contradictory reactions between them and the natural supplements, though.

Sometimes I feel like taking a break and just living with it for a while. I can say that because I'm not in terrible pain or have some of the symptoms others experience. Sometimes I look at the amantadine and the provigil and the caffeine, etc., and I think, "Never mind, I'll just be tired."

I like Mariel's idea . . .we need a button!

I want to be rebooted or reformatted like a computer. Or, how about the system restore where you pick a point in time before the computer started to go haywire and restore back to that date? I pick somewhere in 2003 before all of this garbage started for me!

xanax in small doses is helpful for me. Klonopin makes me anxious, jittery and cant sleep. its a pill to sleep! Ativan in small doses does help, but I cant go higher than 1mg at night or I am wide awake.

I find the same thing with conscious sedation. Like for the MRI. They give you versed, demerol and ativan, and ....yep! Im wide awake! They look at me like I am crazy. I tell them I cant help it, I dont react properly to their meds. They overmedicated me once to the point of restricting my breathing, and kept yelling at me to "breathe!" during the MRI. This last time they gave up, and just knocked me out. Said with my tummy back wash issues, no one should medicate me like that and put me out of reach in a machine.

Why is it that some folks take tylenol and get sleepy, and others can take propophol and be wide awake? look at michael jackson and heath ledger. They simply took massive amounts of meds to sleep and still claimed to be unable.

and the ones that mother gives you don't do anything at all...