Experiment….

I’m coming off my beta-blocker for an experimental period. I’ve been on various types – for my tachycardia – for the last five or six years and none have suited me too well. Several gave me insomnia, nightmares and seriously disturbed sleep; a couple made me so dozy and apathetic that I found myself regularly watching daytime TV (seriously). One gave me a severe allergic reaction that had me vomiting all night after just one pill.
The current one – Oxprenolol – has had the fewest side-effects of all, but I still had to cut the dose by half for it to be tolerable.Even then, it still had me feeling tired, still having difficulty sleeping, still feeling a bit ‘spacey’ and didn’t seem to do a lot for my tachycardia. I still get one or two (usually) short attacks a month.
I know what the main triggers are for my tachycardia attacks – stress, physical tiredness and irregular mealtimes. Most of the time, those factors are under my control. So, wondering if I need a daily beta-blocker, I’m finding out if I can do without.
It’s been two days since the last dose and withdrawal symptoms are as yet minimal – mainly a feeling that my blood pressure is up (slightly blurred eyesight, a ‘pressure’ feeling in my sinuses). But I’m OK so far. My main worry is what will happen to my moods – the Oxprenolol had a mild anti-depressant effect that definitely made a difference to my overall mood when I started it. But,so far, everything seems fine on that front. No change in my energy levels yet and my sleep is still all over the place. But we’ll see.