Can antidepressants affect the desire to CD?

[Camille15]

I'm about to go on a antidepressants for the first time, to help me through a difficult time. I'll be taking (dosage deleted) Viibryd.

Among other concerns I have, does anyone know (from experience) if antidepressants in general can affect the desire to CD. I'm hoping not to lose the pink fog altogether, as its a good source of stress relief and enjoyment for me.

Thanks,
Camille

[Gwinnie]

It actually went the other way for me. I became a lot more open about CD.

Gwendolyn

[whowhatwhen]

It didn't stop how I felt, though back then I wasn't being honest with my psychiatrist either.
I did feel better though in general.

[mikiSJ]

If this is your first time on anti-depressants, BE VERY CAREFUL and keep your doctor informed if anything unfamiliar to you starts to happen. Anti-depressants will affect everyone differently. DO NOT DRIVE UNTIL YOU KNOW HOW YOUR MEDICATION WILL AFFECT YOU.

As with Gwinnie, my prescription opened up opportunities for me.

[MysticLady]

In my experience with them, I feel that they have helped but, I recommend that once your in a good state of mind, to get off them. You'll have to be weaned off them. I would check w/ your Doctor on this, first.

[Kate Simmons]

Meds affect different folks differently. You have to read the potential side effects. Some get side effects that others do not. It is what it is, no guarantee one way or the other.:)

[sandra-leigh]

I did not know I was a cross-dresser until after I had been on anti-depressants for a few months. It took the anti-depressant to fix my mind enough that I was able to contextualize my compulsions to do things like try on bras.

[PaulaQ]

Antidepressants have no known ability to mitigate CD or other TG feelings. They can reduce depression and anxiety (depending on the drug) that one might feel as a side-effect of the stresses of being CD / TG. Believe me, if there were a magic pill to make this stuff go away, lots of us would be on it.

[reb.femme]

I know nothing of the side effects of anti-depression meds, but as Kate said, drugs affect everyone differently. Talk to the person prescribing.

I've been on Prednisolone for just over a year, affects my mood (snappy), sexual appetite is the same, ability is another matter. Such is life for this girl, but seriously, any anxiety about your meds, talk to the professionals.

Rebecca

[suzy1]

The antidepressants didn’t stop my desire to CD, the depression did though.
A few years ago I was seriously depressed and had no desire to do anything!

Modern antidepressants work but you might have to try more than one kind before finding the right ones for you.
Normally SSRI antidepressants are taken at a low dose and then gradually increased over a period of several weeks until you are O.K. with them. It can take several weeks to have a noticeable affect.
But these antidepressants are very affective in the majority of cases. They do the job and I would expect you to be feeling your old self again soon.
A word of warning, when you first start taking them you can feel worse. Don’t give up but stick with it. And don’t suddenly stop taking them but reduce the dosage slowly.

Good luck,

Suzy

[Deedee Skyblue]

I had a funny experience with an anti-depressant. A couple of years ago, I started having very strong urges to dress - stronger than at any time in my life. It was pretty awesome, it was really fun. then they went away and I kinda missed it. Then suddenly they came back as strong as before. It dawned on me that these urges started when I had started a new med, gone away when I went off that med, and then went back on it again. I couldn't believe it could be drug-related, so I did a web search - and within 20 minutes, I found accounts of a dozen people who had similar experiences with the same drug. One of those accounts was here, which is when I discovered this forum and joined.

What linked those folks together was that we had all dressed when we were younger, so we already had an inclination to dress, and we theorized that our anti-depressant lowered some inhibitions and made it easier for us to do something we wanted to do anyway, rather than causing us to crossdress.

see this thread: http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/showthread.php?58153-wellbutrin-and-crossdressing

Deedee

[Stephy]

My experience with anti-depressants was different to most of those mentioned here. I went on anti-depressants in 2004. I was dressing regularly at that stage. In general I had a very low self-esteem, especially of myself in guy mode.

I first went on Cipralex, had a bad reaction and an anxiety attack and was hospitalised for a week. So be careful and aware of any changes when you start taking anti-depressants and talk to your doctor.

Then I went on Effexor which worked well for me. I found that the anti-depressants made me feel better about myself in general and so helped me accept my male side more. This enabled me to reduce and stop CDing as it was causing a problem in my marriage. However, the desire to CD has still been there in the background and I have recently started to CD again. I am still on the same anti-depressants. So there is no rule - it all depends on the individual's reaction to the drug, their personality and personal circumstances.

[giuseppina]

Hello Camille

You can find information about the standard side effects of vilazodone here: https://www.viibryd.com/ .

Stephy, one of the more serious possible side effects of venlafaxine (effexor) is elevated blood pressure. It doesn't mean it will happen, but it's a good idea to monitor your blood pressure until such time as you and your prescribing doctor are satisfied it doesn't significantly affect you at the dose you're taking. I'm on venlafaxine; I'm not seeing the high blood pressure issue at all, even at the dosage I'm taking.

I don't think taking antidepressants is the right way to deal with crossdressing, but that is my philosophy. Crossdressing usually doesn't have the medical risks associated with medications of any sort.

One side effect common to most SSRIs is they affect libido, mostly by reduction or shutting it down entirely.

Antidepressants may elevate your mood, but they don't touch the negative thought patterns associated with mood disorders. That is something you have to change yourselves.

[whowhatwhen]

Oddly enough for me the libido wasn't effected, I stopped feeling anything down there for years before I started taking antidepressants but they didn't restore it either.
It's something to talk with your doctor if you're concerned about though.

[Cindia]

One of the side effects of this type of anti depressant is a loss of libido, so if you're one that has a sexual component to dressing, the answer is possibly. The makers of Viibryd are claiming it has less of an effect on the libido though. Its new on the market, so if how much less remains to be seen.

[Alice Torn]

I have been on meds, since 1990! Some were terrible about making me extremely drowsy, and listless. Others, worked a little better. I was on prozac for several yrs, but just got off. It had killed my libido! Now, i am feeling more like dressing, but i am still on lithium, which i am weening off, after 23 yrs. I have some med for anxiety, when i need it. I have had some emotional and mental disorders.

[docrobbysherry]

Never mind the side effects. Just see how many celebrities have gotten hooked on prescription drugs. Never mind the nameless masses that take illegal and/or legal drugs that were improperly prescribed.

The danger is the dependency MANY folks develop from using them. It's similar to alcoholism. Except many folks can function at near normal, and in some cases better, on them than with booze. :drink:
Just be VERY CAREFUL!

Been there, done that!:sad:

[giuseppina]

Hello Doc

I appreciate your concern, but antidepressants are not addictive in the same sense as benzodiazepines (Xanax, lorazepam, etc.), narcotic painkillers and other like drugs.

While users do get withdrawal symptoms if they stop these drugs suddenly, no competent medical practitioner would advocate this. Most patients do not develop a tolerance for SSRIs, tricyclics, and MAOI inhibitors (the three classes of antidepressants currently available) requiring dosage increases over time to get the same effect. If the antidepressant effect is lost, most practitioners will try something else if increasing the dosage to the maximum allowable doesn't work with tolerable side effects.

[Camille15]

Hi All -

Thanks for the good advice and feedback. I am definitely taking care here and working with the prescribing psychiatrist. And to be clear, I'm not taking these to deal with any issue related to my CD'ing. It's more about depression and anxiety in other areas of my life, which I've already done an extraordinary amount of work on with other therapists too, not to mention plenty of physical exercise. It's all stuff that started only last year, and I don't have plans to stay on this indefinitely. Just as an aid to help me get through until certain environmental factors naturally get easier to deal with.

It's nice to hear that for most accounts it doesn't affect CD'ing, though who knows for sure as everyone is different. Thanks again for all the advice. This is definitely a caring group.

Camille

[suzy1]

Never mind the side effects. Just see how many celebrities have gotten hooked on prescription drugs. Never mind the nameless masses that take illegal and/or legal drugs that were improperly prescribed.

The danger is the dependency MANY folks develop from using them. It's similar to alcoholism. Except many folks can function at near normal, and in some cases better, on them than with booze. :drink:
Just be VERY CAREFUL!

Been there, done that!:sad:


SSRIs are not habit forming [they don’t work that way on the brain] and have saved countless lives including my life!

One has to do the research and stick to the facts. To frighten someone off from listening to their Doctor and taking these modern affective anti-depressants could have tragic results sherry.

It’s the doctor who is the expert and knows a lot more about the subject than we do!

There will always be a small number of people that have adverse reactions to any drug but that does not mean we must run away from a medication that is helping millions of sufferers of clinical depression.

[sandra-leigh]

A word of warning, when you first start taking them you can feel worse. Don’t give up but stick with it. And don’t suddenly stop taking them but reduce the dosage slowly.


There are (at least) two issues with starting anti-depressants.

The less commonly known issue that if you start anti-depressants during a time when you are having a great deal of difficulty concentrating and thinking ahead (maybe even forming much coherent thought at all), then you might start to get suicidal thoughts after starting the medication. The reason for this is that if your thought processes are sufficiently muddled, you might not have been able to think clearly about how bad you feel, so as the anti-depressants start clearing your mind your thought processes may improve to the point where you are able to feel bad again and may be able to hold thought processes long enough to get flashes of suicide methods, all before your brain clears enough for you to no longer feel as bad.

Now, the above is completely separate from the issue of "side-effects". Side effects to anti-depressants tend to vary from person to person and medication to medication; there are even cases where the "brand name" of a medication is fine for you but the "generic" has side-effects (or vice versa.) Some side effects will clear up as your body becomes accustomed to the medication; other side effects may become worse in time. Your body's exact response is difficult to predict, which is why it is not uncommon to end up having to try a bunch of different anti-depressants until you find one that you can tolerate.

In me, the primary side effects tend to be in sleep or dream disturbances. I have had an anti-depressant that seemed to be doing me some good overall, but which gave me such long vivid (and interesting!) dreams that my body was not getting restorative sleep so my body was getting more and more tired, so I had to change. I find I can just about count on the fact that for the first 1 1/2 to 2 weeks after starting an anti-depressant, there will be days I will not be able to get up at any predictable time. One of the anti-depressants that I seem to tolerate relatively well (other than it keeping me up late), other people report keeps dehydrating them.

The "stick with it" guideline applies to (most) side-effects, and applies to instances of suicidal thoughts after having previously been in bad mental shape. However, you need to know yourself, as you might happen upon an anti-depressant that makes you feel very bad. One of the ones I tried, half a pill was enough to make me feel bad, and a whole pill made me feel completely awful, much like the worst of the times before I had any medication at all. After some scattered doses over a two-ish week period, I was terrible. Oh, and my GP had just gone on vacation. :( Despite the strong warnings in the literature to never go cold turkey on that particular medication, I cut it out completely and suddenly; I had a couple more miserable days, and then I was free of it. NFW I am taking that one again!

[Chickhe]

It does not change your desire to dress, but my experience was it does change how your libido works...my best guess is that you respond more like a female to stimulation and your body fat does change a bit...more belly fat more facial fat...so you actually look a little more feminine in some ways. ...its all very subtle though. The main thing...focus on learning to feel better about yourself.

[donnalee]

That class of medications has had terrible effects on me, primarily that there were large memory gaps, including whole days lost. I would awaken to find the stove left on and burnt food on it in combinations that I would have never put together if I was conscious of it. It was beyond scary and I discontinued use immediately. I tried a different one, had the same symptoms and quit that as well. There is none I would be willing to take again.

[Beverley Sims]

I think antidepressants give you a heightened interest in other interests in life and therefore there is a lesser desire to dress.

[Meg East]

I took them for a couple of years. In my opinion one problem is too may GPs use SRIs as a cheap bandaid for what they perceive as an underlying problem.

[Gwinnie]

I came out to my wife a little over a year ago. She was cool with it. But I had no interest in going out or going shopping alone or anything like that. I started anti-depressants in Nov. I was to meet my wife at a grocery store on a friday night after work. I got to the area early so went right into a Lane Bryant to look at clothes and even got a dressing room. I would have never ever had the nerve to do that before. Now I'm looking at wigs and planning a trip to another town with my wife so I can go out dressed. Kinda scares me a bit as I never would have done this before the pills.

Gwendolyn