Hey, it's Kate. This is the fourth episode of uncontrolled substances, the cerebral story.

If you haven't listened to the previous three, start there. They're already in your feed.

Rachel Forbes is an engineer in Seattle. She's 27 and struggles with anxiety.

Generally, my anxiety presents itself as racing thoughts. Kind of like a runaway train.

They just go and go and go and know a amount of logic can really stop them.

Rachel spoke to our colleague, Kadija Safdar. And Rachel said that during the pandemic,

she couldn't find a therapist who could help her. Until February this year, when she saw an ad for cerebral.

And I clicked on it. What drew you to cerebral? So, cerebral was the only one that had the addition of medication management with therapy.

I liked that there was that potential. I wouldn't have to start therapy online and then go looking for a psychiatrist in my area.

Rachel signed up. And the next day, she had her first appointment with one of cerebral's nurse practitioners.

Everything she said just seemed very confident. Like, she understood exactly what I was going through.

She was like sympathizing with me and asking me clarifying questions to figure out like the exactness of everything.

And by the end, I felt really hopeful.

In that appointment, the nurse practitioner prescribed Rachel an antidepressant called bupropion, also known as well butrin.

Rachel would have to take it every day, starting with a low dose before going up to a full dose.

And she was keeping track of how it made her feel.

So the first couple days when I started on the initial lower dose, I was feeling okay. There was some mild nausea.

I had a couple headaches. And then at the point where I hit the day where I was supposed to increase dosage, I was still feeling okay.

Nothing major was happening. And then I increased my dosage.

So my symptoms started increasing. My heart rate is going up like crazy, not just like I had run a marathon, but like I was actively running for my life.

Rachel found one side effect really alarming.

I was starting to get really worried.

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