> Hello all-Does anyone have any suggestions for anti-anxiety meds that are compatible with breastfeeding? Most that I have looked up have really long half-lives and although L3, it appears caution is advised. Ativan appears to have a shorter half-life, so that might be more compatible than others? The psychiatrist is not very helpful-telling the mom to "just watch and make sure the baby doesn't get too sleepy". That advice is really concerning because one of the meds he prescribed is an L4 that I really don't feel comfortable w/mom using as I feel there must be other alternatives out there. Baby is young-8 weeks-so of course the long half-lives are more concerning. Thanks in advance
> for any info you have.


Stacy, have you checked med names at LactMed:
http://toxnet.nlm.nih.gov/cgi-bin/sis/htmlgen?LACT? Love that site!
Just an anedotal experience -- a couple of years ago a friend of my
older daughter delivered twins at 37 weeks. BF was going great but it
was the only thing going great. I got a call from my daughter when her
friend was readmitted with symptoms similar to a heart attack or
pulmonary embolus. Told my daughter the symptoms were also consistent
with a panic attack. Found out mom had not been sleeping (at all),
couldn't sit still -- was pacing up and down the main rooms of the
house, couldn't care for babies EXCEPT during BF (and later said she
was glad to be BF as it was the only thing keeping her connected to
the babies). Her husband pushed for an immediate psych consult and the
psychiatrist prescribed a couple of different anti-anxiety meds. I was
surprised and also a bit concerned due to what I'd read about
anxiolytics, especially since these babies were still a bit below
term. The psychiatrist told Dad to watch the babies for sleepiness,
but she (the psych) was concerned that certain other classifications
of meds would take too long to reach needed effect and then required
weaning off of them. In this case the babies remained alert, BF well,
gained weight, etc. The meds quickly did the trick for this mom and
she was her usual self and off the meds within a week. She had no
further symptoms... I learned a lot from that experience!



Also wanted to share a nice "BF is normal" new mom story that was a
part of an ESPN column. Go to
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/071214 and
then scroll down to the Sports Gal's Picks sidebar...



-- 
Karen G
513-325-2550
www.karengromada.com/

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