I wrote at length about my decision to stay on my antidepressants while pregnant. It was the right one for me, and so far, knock on wood, Emmett is nothing but alert, healthy and happy.
I did end up going off the Wellbutrin at around 7 months. It was sort of by accident, because I ran out of pills and hadn’t ordered any more. There were no side effects to the instant withdrawal and I felt fine without it. I did stay on the 10 mg of Lexapro until 3 weeks before my C-Section.
At that time, I decided to taper. The reproductive psychiatrist I had met with told me that there was a 10-30% chance of having a baby who is slightly fussy (or fussier) post birth if you keep on the meds. Still, she encouraged me to stay on them, because the fussy-factor dissipates within a few days. However, I tapered with Fia and I wanted to do the same this time around. I can live with .01% risk of staying on an antidepressant while pregnant. But 10-30% felt high to me, even though it’s a short-lived problem.
My taper wasn’t fun. I felt that dizzy/spaced out feeling pretty constantly. But I went with it because when you’re that pregnant, you feel exhausted anyway.
Emmett was born on January 25, 2012 and he has, knock on a forest, been an incredibly easy baby thus far. However, about a week after he was born, my hormones were raging, my nerves were getting frayed and my husband was pushing me to go back on the Lexapro before things went south.
I consulted a lactation consultant who informed me that Lexapro is now an L2 drug. Here is the website that explains the categories and gives a list of drugs. An L2 is a drug which, has been “studied in a limited number of breastfeeding women without an increase in adverse effects to the infant. And/or the evidence of a demonstrated risk which is likely to follow use of this medication in a breastfeeding woman is remote.”
L1 is the safest, L5 is the most risky.
I was so relieved to hear that Lexapro had been studied, that the first thing I did when I got home was take a 5 mg dose. I’ve been on that for about 2 months, and just last week went up to 10 mg. I was feeling a lot of anxiety and intensity about things. I was hoping 5 mg would be enough, but it wasn’t. I have noticed an immediate difference in my state of mind.
Wellbutrin is still an L3, which means it’s moderately safe, but no controlled studies have been done. I may go back on a small dosage of that as time goes on. We’ll see. I have some semi-obsessive issues I’m trying to deal with that seem to be getting worse. Like my obsession with cleaning. I feel like it is getting a bit out of control–which is ironic because I think “control” is what it’s all about. I will blog about that soon, as I have some ideas on how I may try and tackle this.
Anyway, I just wanted to update all of you who were interested and/or in similar situations as I was with the whole antidepressant arena. Thanks for listening.
Picture of breastfeeding via Shutterstock
