r/rtms

Tl;dr

Started TMS for anhedonia expecting mild physical side effects, got hit with a rollercoaster of mental health side effects. Seeking advice.

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M33, previously diagnosed with GAD,CPTSD and depressions.

Before starting treatment my diagnoses were well managed without medication. Yes I had some baseline anxiety, intrusive thoughts and so on but functioning well enough to work.

The primary issue is severe anhedonia and mild/moderate depression and anxiety.

I have tried two rounds of SSRIs. The first round gave me genuinely the best 6 months of my life. Complete remission on symptoms from all my diagnoses I would say. But I relapsed almost immediately after quitting.

A few years later I tried a second round, which had little to no effect. And I had many side effects especially cognitive ones such as memory - so I gave up on it.

So fast forward to today - I found out about TMS and did so much research on it, especially seeing how it apparently had almost no side effects apart from some headache - I thought I would give it a try.

But what happened surprised me.

I did the high frequency left side treatment for 2 days and i had immediate reactions the day after starting:

- changed sleep pattern (to little sleep)

- general agitation and restlessness, as if I drinked too many coffees. Felt an urge to just jump and run around? So weird..

- headache

- lightheadedness

- highly anxious

- complete intolerance to nicotine!! I would get a racing heart and anxiety Spike. As a nicotine user of 15 years, this was really surprising but maybe a good reason to quit?

So after this i told my clinic that, I was getting way too high anxiety and it's affecting my work.

They then recommended that I switch to low frequency right sided treatment.

After doing so i noticed:

- immediate effect on sleep (slept more, positive)

- less anxiety

- drowsy during they day, got urge to sleep midday

- memory and focus affected negatively. Would forget words, what I had eaten during the day and so on. Very scary and bad feeling.

And during the past 5 days I've also had some seemingly random and transient positive feelings:

- Clearer and sharper vision, more colors

- seeing beauty in things again

- waking without a tight anxious chest

Ultimately I am writing this after waking up at 3AM in the morning after my fifth night. I haven't been waking up mid night like this for many years, when my depression was much worse. I'm highly anxious and with suicidal thoughts (wouldn't do anything, just classic depression symptom to me). Yesterday the clinic was closed so had no treatment at all. Today I'm supposed to do my 5th treatment.

But I am worried now. Are these symptoms normal? Can someone with experience of all this advice me?

Is TMS a mental rollercoaster, but it'll all get better?

I have specific avoidance and struggle with the evening time and having anxiety attacks then and my life is really small because of it. I’m trying to figure out if this would help me?

Hi everyone,

I am participating in a TMS double-blind study due to post-COVID depression and cognitive problems. So, 50% chance im in the intervention or placebo group. I just had my first treatment session and am naturally curious which group I am in, even though this is of course part of the study. I found the TMS session felt quite intense and painful, a sharp pain extending to my teeth/jaw. Also, my right hand started twitching very noticeably. Does anyone have proof or experience/feedback based on these symptoms that this was the real treatment, or can a placebo treatment even mimic this? Thanks for the input! Take care everyone!

Pretty sad I went in helpful till the end and even my sleep improved but no changes or improvement in depression anxiety ocd. I'm extremely disheartened and had so much hope. Don't know what the next step is. Any advice?

I do not have ene for anything ,I have Humana Medicare PPO , 62 years old Female .

Did the mapping and the anxiety and depression treatment. Tomorrow I start doing the OCD treatment as well. It didn't hurt at all and I didn't get a headache. Only thing I have to work on now is my patience because I know it takes so long to start working and I am looking forward to it. I asked if people need a 2nd round later they said no one at that clinic has needed another round but it was mentioned you could need it if you develop more stress in your life later. Have any of you needed touch up rounds or a full 2nd round? I was worried about my vacation that takes place on my last week (7th week) of treatment but they said it was perfectly fine and that up to 10 days missing is ok and mine will be 7. They're going to do my final week of treatment when I get back

I feel okay. Most of the time I’m not thinking about so that’s a plus but here and there I have crying spells and start to feel horrible about myself again, idk when to really expect results but I do wish it were sooner. I asked my therapist to change our meetings to be more frequent and he agreed so I’m hoping the increased therapy will help. Just feeling really down and anxious today I guess