DOSE: T+ 0:00	100 mg	oral	Hydroxyzine
T+ 0:20	75 mg	oral	Hydroxyzine

BODY WEIGHT:

120 lb

Taking a Large Dose

I'm prescribed Hydroxyzine for anxiety, take-as-needed. I hardly ever need it, so I end up stockpiling it to take in large doses when I don't have anything else.

This day, I actually was feeling pretty anxious, with sweaty palms and shortness of breath, and I wanted to completely sedate myself, so I took 4 25mg pills at about 3pm. A typical dose is supposed to be 1-2 25mg pills every 2-3 hours. My boyfriend was going to get home at 8 so I figured I'd have enough time to relax, play some video games, and be awake enough to hang out with him when he got home. After about 20 minutes I could feel it kicking in but wanted to get really gone mentally so I took 3 more 25mg pills for a total of 175mg.

One thing I want to point out is that Hydroxyzine does not have the mood-altering effects of other anti-anxiety meds. It's a sedative, but what euphoria I can get is so mild it's negligible. So taking this hoping to get a mental "high" is not really effective. I took a very large dose hoping to increase the mental effects.

By 4pm I was slurring my words, moving slowly, and breathing slow. I couldn't focus on the game, and hardly wanted to move my fingers to press buttons. My boyfriend was texting me and it took a very large effort just to come up with a response. My mouth started to get uncomfortably dry. By 4:30 I was so physically tired that I couldn't sit up, I had to lie down. My mind felt foggy and like it was being wrapped in a wet, heavy, warm blanket.

I wrapped myself up in blankets in my bed and didn't wake up until 7:45pm. My boyfriend texted me and I tried my best to force myself awake so I could let him into the house and talk with him. It took an incredible amount of effort. When he got in, he was having a rough day and tried to talk to me about it. I remember feeling incredibly guilty that I could hardly keep my eyes open, and I was so slow mentally that my responses (if they even made sense) weren't helpful at all. I had to force every word out of my mouth, which wasn't made easier by the fact my mouth was so dry no amount of water could help.

He had to go to work in the morning, too, so we went to bed at 9pm. I passed out nearly instantly. My boyfriend tried to wake me up at 7am when he left, but could only get me alert enough to kiss him goodbye for a second. I had 2 alarms set for 9am and 9:15 but I only woke up at my alarm at 9:30, causing me to be almost late for an appointment. My throat hurt from being dry all night, and I was still sluggish and couldn't think straight. I had to drive about half an hour to my appointment and I remember being very scared of my reaction times being dulled and possibly getting in an accident. When I got to my appointment I tried to talk to my therapist but had very long periods of silence between words, could not recall recent events, and repeated things a lot.

When I got home at 11am, I fell asleep again until 4pm. When I woke up I felt a bit better but still foggy. Hydroxyzine has a half life of about 24 hours so at this point I started to feel a little more normal, but I didn't fully return to feeling normal until the next morning. In total over 48 hours I ended up sleeping 30 hours.

All in all, Hydroxyzine is very helpful in low (25-75mg) doses for mild anxiety, irritability, and insomnia. When, 3 days later, I took 50mg for irritability it worked fine and I had no excessive sleepiness, just a feeling of physical calm. But the more I take, the more the *physical* effects are increased, not the mental effects. It's more likely to just make me pass out than any feeling of euphoric sedation that benzos or opiates give. It's basically like taking a ton of nyquil without the bad trips that can come with that.

Exp Year: 2019	ExpID: 113122
Gender: Female
Age at time of experience: 21
Published: Jul 1, 2020	Views: 11,869
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Hydroxyzine (570) : General (1), Medical Use (47), Alone (16)