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Areas › Worry and anxiety › Treatment and medication
Cannabis is the clearest example. Strength and make up vary enormously between products, a small amount often settles people, and a larger amount reliably makes anxiety worse. Without a record you will keep blaming the bad evenings on something else. Three lines in your phone is enough to see it.
This explains how treatments work. Never start, stop or change a medication because of something you read here.
From their bellies comes a drink of different colours in which there is healing for people (Quran 16:69). Healing can come from something that grows, and the verse still names exactly where it comes from.
النحل
ثُمَّ كُلِي مِن كُلِّ ٱلثَّمَرَٰتِ فَٱسۡلُكِي سُبُلَ رَبِّكِ ذُلُلࣰ اۚ يَخۡرُجُ مِنۢ بُطُونِهَا شَرَابࣱ مُّخۡتَلِفٌ أَلۡوَٰنُهُۥ فِيهِ شِفَآءࣱ لِّلنَّاسِۚ إِنَّ فِي ذَٰلِكَ لَأٓيَةࣰ لِّقَوۡمࣲ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ
Then feed on all kinds of fruit and follow the ways made easy for you by your Lord.’ From their bellies comes a drink of different colours in which there is healing for people. There truly is a sign in this for those who think
Qur’an 16:69read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
It is worth seeing how thin the evidence can be even for a well known calming drug. A review of propranolol for anxiety conditions found only eight trials qualified, and they do not establish that it works better than the alternatives, despite its considerable reputation. Reputation and evidence come apart easily, which is a good reason to trust your own careful record over what everyone says.
Steenen SA, van Wijk AJ, van der Heijden GJ, van Westrhenen R, de Lange J, de Jongh A. (2016). Propranolol for the treatment of anxiety disorders: Systematic review and meta-analysis.. Journal of psychopharmacology (Oxford, England) doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
You cannot see a pattern in something you are not keeping track of.
If you are using something daily to manage anxiety, that is worth telling a doctor about rather than tracking on your own.
The dose that lifts low mood is often not enough for anxiety, and for obsessive symptoms it is usually well short. Needing more of it is a feature of the problem rather than anything wrong with the person taking it.
Ask what symptom you are aiming at rather than what the diagnosis is called. Nothing anyone takes recognises a category; it acts on whatever is happening in the body.
How well something works in the moment and whether it is right for the long run are two separate questions. Fast relief is extremely convincing, which is exactly why it is worth pausing over.