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  1. I have been taking Trazadone since January 2014. I started with .75 Traz and have been slowly tapering the past six months. I am now down to .38 Traz after making a cut 2 nights ago from .45 Traz.. I take it at night to sleep along with 7.5 Remeron. I have been doing well with sleeping on the .45 which I have been holding the past 2 months. Last night my sleep was very light and fitful after the cut. I doubt I got that much sleep. Also, this October I will be on year off Ambien 10 mg. I am looking for some encouragement from folks who have been down this road before with Trazadone. Any success stories out there? How did you feel along the way with tapering? How was your sleep? How did you feel one week off Traz, three weeks off, a month off?
  2. Aria's recovery from poly drugs. I had no idea when I walked into a psychiatrist's office 25 yrs ago the horrible labyrinth I'd entered. Slam dunked at a point in my life when I was feeling low and the loss of future possibilities taken away. Being told I was mentally ill, would never function again, needed to be on disability and poly drugged for the rest of my life repeatedly took it's toll. All this impacted my relationships with family, friends and enjoying life. The pdoc constantly added new psych drugs, changed doses and took me off the old drugs at an alarming rate. I became a morbidly obese woman who mumbled or talked rapidly and it was obvious to everyone but the pdoc I was totally messed up on something. I had Seroquel Induced Acute Pancreatitis that landed me in the hospital for quite awhile and my pdoc put in my open med chart I was crazy. I didn't know this till later but ill as I was I did notice some of my physicians were treating me oddly. One good thing about being so ill was I referred to a neurologist for chronic pain and found out my problem was profound drug induced Akathsia. This neurologist actually screamed at me, these psych drugs are killing you, they're killing you. I knew I had to get off these drugs not matter what it took and reclaim my life. At my next appointment I asked my psychiatrist why he was drugging me like this and he looked directly at me (probably for the first time in years he saw "me"). He started sobbing, loudly sobbing, "Oh God what have I done to you", over and over. I'm sitting there thinking oh crap, I don't need this. Our 15 minute med check was up and this guy calmly goes to the front desk to get the next patient and proceeds without any other fanfare. He's robot. A robot. All this in itself was mind boggling. Hell, closure?? No way. I found out I had Tardive Dyskinesia and a few other psych drug induced issues. My face was a road map with twitches and jerking that yelled hey, I'm on massive psychiatric drugs. Will my face be like this forever?? The TD has mostly gone away and I'm so grateful (the pdoc adamantly said I did not have Tardive Dyskinesia from psych drugs). Well, guess what?? The psychiatrist was wrong...horribly wrong. Other doctors, psychiatrist, therapists said you're not mentally ill and never had been. The sad but very scarey part is I'm labeled as profoundly mentally ill and that info is in my medical charts. One pdoc did this...one. I've gone through the gambit of emotions dealing with this. I will probably always be mad at this jerk for what he did to me and for what he still does to others. It affected years of my life and he was wrong. I'm a Success Story because I'm psych drug free and have been for several years. My journey was extremely difficult and I did it on my own hit or miss tapering off numerous psychiatric drugs. I endured drug withdrawals that paralyzed me month after month. Was it worth the hell of tapering? Yes, very much yes. My reward was my clarity of mind, my passions for life returned and I have hopes for my future. I mended fences with family and have made new friends. I strive everyday to be productive. I'm me but a different me because no one could go through all this and not be changed by it. (for more in-depth conversations about my struggles, coping and self awareness with surviving psychiatry please visit my ongoing thread Aria's Psych Journey http://survivinganti...psych-journey/)
  3. Am I in the right place to ask about advice to taper medication as an advocate for my husband?
  4. Hello everyone, This is my first post. I'm not even sure if there is anything you'll be able to do for me other than to offer a kind word. I evidently went too fast during my Effexor titration and have completely destabilized my central nervous system. I didn't realize it until recently, but I think my nervous system had already been sensitized by trying to come off of antidepressants two previous times. Starting in March 2020 I began what I thought was a slow titration of 10% per month of the Effexor. I started out at about 200 tiny beads and got down to 21. Then in September 2021 my central nervous system became completely destabilized and it hit me like a ton of bricks - adrenaline pumping through my body, severe anxiety/panic, and sleeplessness. I went to the ER three times for relief and took lorazepam and Vistaril because I was desperate for relief (I am currently not taking anything). I've had a couple nights since then that I've actually slept through the night, but most nights I feel so revved up that I can't sleep at all. I did add back in just a few tiny beads of the Effexor a couple weeks ago (I now take 30), but for the most part I am just going to hold steady and not make any more changes until I reach some form of stability. My life has been completely upended by this and I have felt suicidal many times. The only thing that gives me a glimmer of hope is the two nights that I actually slept through the night. Other than that, I've hardly slept at all. Every day has become a struggle to survive. I realize that I am on a long road to recovery and may never be fully free from the Effexor. I wanted to get off of it so I could treat my anxiety problems with more natural things, and now I'm dealing with more anxiety than I could ever imagine. It's a very sad irony. If I could turn back time I would never have started taking antidepressants 30 years ago. Any advice you could give me would be appreciated because I'm feeling pretty hopeless right now and didn't sleep a wink last night because I felt so revved up.
  5. Hello, I would like to ask you a question. If I started Trazodone in mid April decided to taper in May 14th, and then finally stopped on June 7th, but still have symptoms on August 14th; how long will I be this way. I will not take another SSRI or SNRI as long as I live. I m sacred and would rather suffer, so long as I can be free of this treadful syndrome sooner. But for how long? I m worried. I like to exercise a lot, eat healthy nearly every day of my life, I started taking this medication for Insomnia related to a change in (work hours) a shift that I work. I have went to work suffering from Antidepressant Discontinuation Syndrome and it was killing me. I developed Tinnitus in Early July, and I still have occasional palpitations. They are worsen with lack of sleep, after I eat, and stress. I never had this issue with before trazodone, in fact, I never had palpitations before, it hit me hard exactly at the peak of my "withdrawal on June 17th. Every symptom that is listed for withdrawal I have had, except sexual dysfunction. Only when I m in capacitated in bed, and can't think about sex does it effect sex drive, but the function has never affected.
  6. Hello everyone! I recently found this website, and suddenly my last few weeks of experience with lexapro have begun to make a lot of sense! I am so grateful for all this community does to help people dealing with the adverse effects of antidepressants and withdrawal. Here is my story. I am hoping for any insights on how to proceed. I do have a psychiatrist, but unfortunately this is not a very well understood phenomenon in the medical community. I am also struggling with self blame and worry that I will become a person who has gotten messed up irreversibly, and I know those are cognitive distortions, but any positive vibes in those departments would still be great! Backstory I’ve been on lexapro twice in my life for several years at a time for GAD, did great, had nausea upon first starting out and some irritability on tapering but overall found it quite helpful and with minimal side effects. I never cold turkeyed - both times I weaned over months if not years under medical supervision. I was also always a good sleeper: could sleep 9+ hours easy. Fast forward to this holiday season. I’m not on lexapro, stable for 6 months. Then I start getting random heart pounding throughout the morning and trouble falling asleep—every time I would try my heart pounded. Got medical workup, all good. Over the course of a week, I tried several sleep meds, including valerian root, Trazodone up to 100 mg, Benadryl and gabapentin up to 400 mg, which helped sleep minimally and only messed me up more: caused daytime anxiety or disinhibition or over tiredness. Some nights I took both trazodone and benadryl. In the end I took a 150mg dose of Benadryl in a desperate attempt to sleep. At about that time I resumed lexapro because my doc figured it was underlying anxiety causing sleep trouble, though in retrospect I don't think I was really that anxious. Kindling? Then I had weird symptoms for 2 weeks, including ongoing insomnia (troubles staying asleep), inappropriate sexual arousal that felt like a pain in my genitals, restlessness, a sense of fight or flight including trouble breathing and a sense of urgency and discomfort in your own skin, sometimes with shortness of breath and chest tightness, oftentimes after eating which I know makes very little sense, poor appetite, lots of stools though not diarrhea, random itching including itching that woke me in the middle of the night). None of the above is my regular old GAD, by the way. My usual anxiety is more mental: turning over worst case scenarios in my head and all that. I had never had any of the above symptoms before, so I chalked it up to withdrawal from my overuse of sleep meds. My doctor, too, told me that sometimes anxiety can morph into other forms, but I was skeptical, feeling like "this is chemical." I also wondered if I was histamine intolerant and started a low histamine diet, which by the way sucks, but I doubt hurts anything because I can still eat enough of a variety of foods. Most of the above symptoms evened out over 2-3 weeks except for upset stomach and fatigue whenever I ate, and I could get unbroken sleep only every other night. So my doc and I decreased lexapro to 5 mg after about a month of being on 10mg, since we thought 5 mg would be more tolerable. Taper First week into the taper, appetite declined so I have to count calories just to make sure I get enough. I itched at times but that’s a minimal issue. There were flutters of restlessness and “monkey mind” here and here and there, and a bit of genital swelling, but overall manageable. The second week sleep got worse: before I would wake and just not be able to resume sleep, but now I would wake with ragged breathing and struggle to resume sleep and be anxious about it. Before that I would just wake up and be awake. I take valerian root for sleep in tiny doses: 1/4 of the 500mg caps per night. I don’t want to take it, but worry about going back to a time when I slept 4 hours per night if that at the beginning of this journey. (Re)-Increase So then on 2/15 doc and I figured I should try a slower taper and do 7.5mg. I did that for 2 days and on day 2 (2/16) the fight or flight returned: restless, uncomfortable in my skin, a swelling sensation in my genitals. I took an extra 2.5 mg (for a total of 10 mg) and later that day felt like my skin had a sunburn for about an hour. I went down to lexapro 5 mg for a day, then back up to 7.5 mg and have been on that dose for the past 4 days. Well, sure enough the "chemical" feeling anxiety did decline and is almost gone, the skin warmth increased and then declined (I also had cold-like symptoms but not objective fever), and inappropriate arousal has also improved (except for today, when it seems worse). I also had some looser stools and the jury is still out on whether that's getting better or worse. [TL;DR] If you got this far, thank you :). My questions are as follow: -- Does it seem like I might be dealing with kindling (or re-kindling)? I'm not sure I fully understand kindling... When it occurs, does it decline? Or do medication side effects sometimes look a lot like a kindling phenomenon? -- re: kindling: if I kindled myself as I backtracked on my lexapro taper, what now? Is it best to hold steady, or to taper? Should I wait and see? There's been a couple days of back and forth but overall I've been on lexapro 7.5 mg for less than a week. If I taper again I will ask my doc for liquid lexapro and decrease very slowly, as I have learned from this site. TIA for reading and for any insights! Keep fighting the good fight.
  7. Hi Everyone, I am just going to jump right into this. I developed anxiety 4 years ago after having several life crisis in a months time. My mom was diagnosed w Dementia. My little sister was diagnosed with stage 3 lung cancer. I was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma.A childhood friend died in his sleep from heart failure. I tipped over from the stress. I went to my GP and she started throwing AD's at me to help silence the anxiety. The AD's only made me worse. I went to the ER one night after experiencing my first panic attack The ER Dr gave me a script for Ativan. I took it for four weeks and then stopped because I was feeling much better. A few days later my world turned on it's axis. I didn't know what was happening. My anxiety was worse, I was pacing, heart racing, Panic attacks daily.... I went to my GP and she said I needed to see a Psychiatrist. To get in to see anyone was 3 months. I started to spiral. I had no idea I was in withdrawal! I ended up in the hospital to get help for my anxiety. I was put on Effexor (75mg)and Klonopin (.25mg). I stabilized and was sent home. I did really well on Effexor. After 4 months on Klonopin I started to slowly taper off. I tapered over 3 months. The taper went pretty well. I was cutting and weighing my pills. 8 months after that I felt good and talked to my Psychiatrist about tapering off of the Effexor. She strongly recommended to go slow and we did. I tapered for almost 7 months. To be honest, the Klonopin was easier to come off of than the Effexor. She put me on Prozac before my last cut of Effexor. Tapered off of the Prozac over 3/ months. I still had some anxiety but it was tolerable. It felt AMAZING to be free of AD'S and the Benzo....then COVID hit and my mom passed away. Anxiety came back w a vengeance. I ended up back in the hospital after a very bad reaction to Zoloft. My new psychiatrist kept telling me to "push through," the first 3 months. I was back on Klonopin but now it was.50mg twice a day.The hospital took me cold turkey off of Zoloft and started me on Remeron and Trazadone. The next day they added clonidine. The klonodine didn't agree w my system at all and I was taken off of that in two days. They released me from the hospital 5 days later. I lasted two weeks on Remeron. I was so disoriented, confused, high anxiety and felt like I could become violent on them so they weaned me off of that over 4 days and put me back on Prozac. Prozac didn't help my anxiety, I had constant headaches for months! I did get an MRI and it was normal. I started to feel more and more depressed on it. I was on Prozac for maybe two months when my psychiatrist took me off of that (tapered over 6 weeks) and put me on Lexapro. I had to have back surgery during this. I did NOT take a single pain med out of fear of making my WD worse. At first I thought the Lexapro was helping? I was still having breakthrough anxiety so he bumped it up. My Psychiatrist retired and a new woman came in to take his place until they could find a new one. She bumped my Lexapro up to 25mg when I told her I was having major anxiety rushes, my face would get bright red, I wasn't sleeping very well. That increased dosage was the worst! I was like a zombie but w heightened anxiety. I couldn't work, I would sit at my desk and space off for hours! I felt awful. So, she told me to start tapering off of the Lexapro (4 weeks total! I knew better...) and she wanted to cross taper me onto Effexor. I started that and boy....the depression was BRUTAL! I was not sleeping well, could hardly focus, anxiety was high, my legs felt like jelly, my head would burn, I felt my brain tingle all the time... I was nearing the end of my rope. I was desperate for a Psychiatrist that CARED. The interim Psych left and a new one came in. She wanted me off of the Effexor because she felt it was too hard to come off of and if it didn't work for me, I would be in for hell. I told her I was scared to switch AGAIN and she assured me that switching to Duoloxetine was it's "sister drug," and I shouldn't have an issue. I trusted her. The last 3 months have been.... (How do describe this hell?!) a daily battle to push through hell on earth. I am still working, I can still function, I take care of myself, my home, my dog. I am a divorced woman with a 22 year old son. I live by myself with my Rottweiler. Life is so friggin' hard when you are trying to get thorough this mess. I now have a WONDERFUL and caring Psychiatric nurse practitioner who truly cares. She is holding me on the last 10mg of Lexapro until the Effexor/Lexapro WD calms down...IF it calms down. I should tell you that I can't believe I have pushed through the last year. My symptoms have been Burning in my head, headaches, tingling in my head, mood fluctuations, burning on my skin, bloodshot eyes, pressure on my chest, sensitivity to heat, depression, sweat easily, joint pain, ringing in my ears, no motivation, grinding my teeth, feeling mentally off at times, at the beginning I couldn't sit still, short tempered, at times in the beginning of the Lexapro taper, I didn't want to talk at times...like I almost couldn't, buzzing in my body, feel like I'm going crazy sometimes, anxiety rushes...etc I am interested in this group for support and the combined knowledge from it's members. I know that NO ONE can tell me when this is going to end. What I am hoping is that someone can tell me what I am going through is normal for all of the med changes? I am honestly concerned if I am still having problems because of the Duoloxetine? My anxiety IS better since I have been on it. I get 8 hours of sleep. I don't drink. I don't use illegal drugs, don't smoke. I eat pretty healthy. I don't exercise. It's tough to get out for walks when you feel like hell and I guess I save my mental energy to work. I know I have rambled on. My mind feels like it's in a vice and also these drugs affect how well I put my thoughts into words. For the most part I am a happy and well adjusted person. I feel like the last few years have been stolen from me because I faithfully followed Dr's instructions and thought they knew best...I was so wrong. Thank you for your time. Blessings to all of you.
  8. Hi all, I have come to this website fairly late (I hope) in my journey with psych meds. I no longer take anything, but 9 weeks from my last dose of Fluoxetine I am still suffering bad waves/windows. Until May of this year, I was still suffering badly with waves/windows from Diazepam withdrawal, which began properly in June 2022. I have been off work pretty much since then. Things got a good bit better between May and August, more like a higher baseline of anxiety/vulnerability to stress, rather than the waves/windows pattern. During this time, I was doing Neurofeedback and the ketogenic diet (thanks to Dr Chris Palmer's excellent book). I was able to do a speech at a family gathering, which feels unthinkable now. In June, I started tapering from Fluoxetine, 20mg (my history with which you can see in my signature), using the liquid solution, reducing by 2mg every 3 weeks. I now realise that was too fast. In mid-August I started getting waves again. I had not done nearly as much reading into SSRI withdrawals as I had with benzos, so I assumed it was the Diazepam waves coming back (which Ashton says can happen), but then at the end of August I got one of my worst waves ever for about 4 days: suicidal depression, 0hr sleep (even during worst of benzo withdrawal I could get 2-3 hours a night), tremors, agitation. At the time, I believed that was because I was given a different brand of the liquid solution - I thought maybe more of the active ingredient was getting into my system somehow, causing serotonin syndrome (because of the tremors). But now having read about the dangers of linear tapering I am guessing that it was withdrawal from Fluoxetine, and my cliff edge was around 10mg, made worse as I was/am not yet fully recovered from the Diazepam withdrawal. However, at that stage I decided to just to jump from 10mg, partly influenced by doctors who said that would be fine. I have now read about the need to do hyperbolic tapering, but I am where I am - 9 weeks off and I do not really wish to reinstate. I am having waves/windows every 3 days, which is very different from Diazepam - that was more like 3 week waves, 1 week windows - but they do seem to be just as severe, particularly the depression. I realise that I am perhaps lucky that I was on Fluoxetine rather than another SSRI (I am well over a year out from stopping Mirtazapine, so I don't think that is likely to be playing a role still). I am interested to hear any indications/opinions from folks on here as to how long it may be before the waves disappear and I return to my previous level of function. I am encouraged by the fact that although they are regular/severe, the waves do seem to have identifiable triggers rather than totally random. This is embarrassing, but I have found that one definite trigger is orgasm/ejaculation. In that process, there is a huge release of dopamine, followed by a decrease but also an increase of a hormone called prolactin which at a high enough level can cause psychosis. I am thinking my dopamine levels/receptors are just too low, because dopamine restrains prolactin production. You may ask, why not abstain? But another clear symptom of my withdrawal is uncontrollable nocturnal emissions, which I didn't even have in my teenage years - roughly once a week, followed by a 3-day wave. I did not have obvious sexual dysfunction while on Fluoxetine, but I am thinking that this symptom is some kind of rebound hypersexuality. Finally, the other clear triggers for symptoms are sweet foods and stress. Thanks for reading - I wish you all continued, and quick, healing.
  9. HISTORY: *1998-2010: Buspar, Prozac, Wellbutrin, Paxil, etc. *2018: started sertraline/Zoloft *2019: Went to ketamine clinic seeking ketamine, but was dx with bipolar II instead. Started Vraylar, Topomax, and Ropinirole. Continued sertraline. *January 2020: Got pregnant. Was advised by psychiatrist to cold turkey Vraylar, Topomax, and Ropinirole and quickly taper sertraline. Began my sertraline taper but was having such intense w/d symptoms from the Vraylar, etc., I was a mess and I cold-turkeyed the sertraline, too. *March 2020: Psychiatric hospitalization. Miscarried in hospital. Hospital docs determined bipolar II dx was a mistake. Started ECT but quit when pandemic started. Started escitalopram/Lexapro 20mg, and aripiprazole/Abilify 5mg as an adjunct. *2021: Started bupropion/Wellbutrin 300mg to help with daytime sleepiness and fatigue. Continued escitalopram and aripiprazole. Increased bupropion to 450mg, then decreased back to 300mg for seizure safety for Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation therapy. *Early 2022: Replaced escitalopram with venlafaxine/Effexor 150mg (cross-tapered over a few weeks). *Summer 2022: Dx with sleep disorder (alpha wave intrusion). Started trazodone 50mg as a sleep aid. *November 2022: Started phasing out aripiprazole by going down to 2mg from 5mg (p-doc's idea). Had symptoms, went back up to 5mg for the holidays. *January 2023: Began tapering aripiprazole again, this time decreasing to 4mg for three weeks. ********************************************** As you can see, I am on a big, hot, tangled mess of psychotropic drugs. Since my diagnosis in summer 2022 with a sleep disorder, and treatment, I am doing better than ever (no depression symptoms for several months). And I'm on way too many drugs. My psychiatrist has agreed with me that it's appropriate to phase out at least one. We're starting with the Abilify/aripiprazole. P-doc wants to go fast; I want to go slow. I checked the drug interaction website that is recommended here. It seems the Wellbutrin/bupropion has major interactions with everything else, so I believe that should go next. I would like one day to get down to nothing except trazodone, since it is treating my sleep problem. Questions: How do you handle disagreements with your psychiatrist? I need to keep her on my side enough that she keeps prescribing my medication. Bonus if she will prescribe the smaller pills that make it easy to taper. What if I want to go slower than she wants to? What if she does not agree that I should get off a particular med? My goal is to keep feeling good through the tapers. Thanks in advance for any help you can provide, Tezz
  10. The Origin Story I developed a fear of throwing up as a kid and was only comfortable throwing up around family members or at home. When I went to school, I developed this weird fear that I’d throw up at school, so for 6 hours everyday I’d be paranoid of throwing up. Eventually, I kept going to the office and saying I was sick. For about a week, this worked and I was allowed to go home, then they sort of caught on that I was not really sick. I didn’t know how to articulate myself, and after being literally disallowed to go home, I started having panic attacks, feeling trapped at school with adults that didn’t care about me/accused me of constantly “faking” my sickness. To be fair, I was, but I was definitely not faking the panic attacks and anxiety it brought me. I got prescribed 0.5mg of Lorazepam at the age of 11 and rarely used it. Even as a child, I hated the idea of taking pills. I really don’t remember if the Lorazepam really worked either, it may have “calmed” me down but the feelings of dread always still remained. Eventually, I got worse and worse and got prescribed Cyprexa in mid-2016. I took it everyday and took Lorazepam when needed, but as I said earlier, I tried to avoid the Lorazepam. The Cyprexa “didn’t work” so I got put on Sertraline in October 2016 at the age of 13 and took it for the next 7 years at ever-increasing doses. See my signature for more detail. Did this solve my agoraphobia that came from my fear of throwing up? No. Hence why I kept trying to increase my dosage. I literally stayed homebound for years. Nothing changed, if anything, it made things worse, but I knew I “had” to take it, because I was told I would need it forever. I tried stopping multiple times but would get these weird sensations in my head (which I have right now) that almost felt like my brain was shutting off. I did get brain zaps but those weren’t my main concern, although it was a weird phenomena to endure. I couldn’t bear what I assumed were withdrawal effects and assumed that getting off the pills would be hard. The pattern was simple: I’d willingly stop taking the pill and after 2 days, I’d feel great. Then day 3 came, and all the weird symptoms came pouring down on me. Then, I’d reinstate. I’d try to do this 1-2 times a year, thinking I’d be able to withstand the effects, however, I always caved, mainly because I needed to go to school. So, the depression started after multiple failed attempts to get off the drug. I felt trapped on those damn pills. I had to take them everywhere I went in fear of missing a few doses. No doubt I was completely dependent on them. Fast forward to COVID times in 2020, where I no longer needed to attend physical school. I only had one job that was incredibly part-time but stopped going because it was too much for me. Zoloft was supposed to help me, to help me get out of my room and live life, but it didn’t. I didn’t accomplish anything. Most days, I wouldn’t attend online class due to how terrible my sleep was. I literally could not sleep at proper times and opted to just sleep instead of attend. I now know that these pills aren’t really great for sleep, especially considering that I took them right before bed. Eventually my sleep got so bad, that I stopped sleeping altogether in 2021. At this point I was basically stopped attending classes altogether. I deeply regret this. Eventually, I got put on trazodone after complaining that I couldn’t sleep at night to my family doctor. It’s not that I had terrible cortisol spikes at night, I simply just couldn’t sleep. I felt dreadful but my word if I can go back to those days that would be amazing. Before, not being able to sleep for me was bad but not a terrifying experience. For the first week of trazodone, everything was fine. It was a miracle, I was actually sleeping! And then, the side-effects started. After a few weeks, I tried to sleep without the trazodone and couldn’t. I thought, “well I’ll just keep taking it, I’m sure I’ll be able to stop anyway”. In January 2022, I asked to go up to 150mg of Zoloft. Throughout the two weeks from January 6th to January 20th, I took 125mg of Zoloft then started 150mg after the two weeks were up, as directed by the doctor. After a few days of taking 150, I noticed that everything was getting worse, so I abruptly stopped taking 150 and went back to 100mg sometime in February or March 2022. It felt better, but it only went downhill from there. This is where I started to suspect that maybe increasing the amount of drugs in my system wasn’t a good idea. Eventually, I became dependent on the trazodone as well and skipping a dose would be hell on earth. I had to practically beg my parents to go to the pharmacy and refill a bottle once I finished it. I actually can’t fully describe the symptoms I felt when I tried to sleep without it. I can, however, say it was torturous. I started violently shaking once and thought I was having a seizure. My parents would often tell me to just “fall asleep” and when I said “I literally can’t you don’t understand” they’d angrily respond saying that I definitely could and would get incredibly frustrated every time I needed a refill, but man, once that drug entered my system, it was so calming, it’s like I was taking a benzo. The side-effects during the day were unbearable though, and most of my days for 2 years were waking up, being in incredible pain, and desperately waiting for nighttime so that I could take it again and sleep. I was obsessed with my sleep schedule, because I thought I needed to be. I would’ve rather dealt with the excruciating side-effects of taking the pill rather than the even worse side-effects of trying to sleep on my own. I also developed GI issues that I have to this day, rarely going to the washroom and having bloody painful stools when I do. Naturally, issues with bloating followed. I literally couldn’t nap during the day and still can’t, as I’d always inevitably get so disoriented and confused after trying, with the inevitable annoying cortisol spike, which was the scariest thing and unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. It was hell. This is where the dpdr really took full form. Taper Timeline I had enough of the chronic fatigue, the vivid nightmares, the inability to sleep without trazodone and the almost seizure-like shaking that came with trying to skip a dose, the derealization and the excruciating headaches that were present from the moment I woke up, so I came to the conclusion that it had to be the drugs. In late 2022, I told my doctor I wanted off. He said that they don’t usually recommend tapering during the winter and told me I had to wait until summer to start tapering. I told my doctor that I needed to stop immediately, to which he replied, “then stop taking it”. I basically had the choice of doing it on my own or waiting until the summer. At this point though, I was desperate. I needed to be off. I couldn’t bear the symptoms anymore. Firstly, I decided to just stop taking the medication and after a few days realized that doing that was a terrible idea. So, I requested lower dosages of Zoloft and started meticulously cutting the Trazodone tablets. I tapered both drugs at the same time for the span of only a few months. I regret not researching anything about withdrawal and just assumed I’d be fine if I did it this way. I decided I needed to prioritize the Zoloft first because I was told from doctors that it could inhibit sleep, so I tapered it quicker than the Trazodone. Over the course of a couple months from maybe October/November 2022 to April 2023, I went from 100mg of Zoloft to 0, decreasing by 25mg on my own volition when I felt like it was time, with my last dosage being 12.5mg. I couldn’t tell you exactly when I dropped dosages and regret not recording it, but at the time I didn’t think I needed to. When I hit 0 on Zoloft, I was at about 6.25mg of Trazodone, as I cut the tablets in half about three times. It’s amazing how easy it was to fall asleep at 6.25. It’s like I never needed 50mg in the first place. I realize that 50mg of Trazodone is considered a low dosage, but the efficacy of the drug at 6.25 seemed to be the same. I wonder why that is. Anyway, after multiple failed attempts to sleep without trazodone, with multiple bouts of inner torturous restlessness that came with trying to sleep without it, I finally got about 2 hours of sleep without it after crying myself to sleep. This was monumental for me. You have no idea how much this meant to me after not being able to sleep/nap for more than one second without the use of these damn pills. I felt I needed to stop the taper and try to sleep another night without it, and lo and behold I did. For the next few weeks I started to sleep without the trazodone. Was it restorative sleep? Was is sleep that cured the chronic fatigue that the drug gave me in the first place? No. Absolutely not. I haven’t had restorative sleep for years, but it was sleep nonetheless, and that’s what mattered to me. I felt like I needed to stop taking the trazodone in fear that I’d rely on it again, but had it with me in case I ever felt the need to take it again in sheer desperation… which I did… but only once, in June 2023, which may have screwed up everything for me and I regretted it almost immediately. You see, throughout April-June, my mindset was “well if I get extremely restless and if I’m unable to cope with the flooding of emotions that prevent me from sleeping, I’ll just pop this trazodone next to me and I’ll feel fine!” The reassurance of having these pills available helped me get through the night, but after relapsing and suffering for it, I learned a few things. 1) these pills really are a massive problem and 2) I had to eliminate the mindset of thinking of trazodone as a drug I could just take if incredibly desperate. So, from June 2023 until now I can call myself drug-free. What an incredible accomplishment. Except, what I failed to realize and what I’ve now come to realize is that I tapered incredibly quickly, especially for someone who was influenced under some kind of drug from age 11-20 and that it wasn’t going to be clean sailing. Withdrawal Timeline Late 2022 - April 2023: While tapering the drugs, I felt so incredibly bad but kept going because I thought that this is what I needed to do. Restless 24/7, incredibly derealized, bedbound, frightened of just about anything, couldn’t really walk, talk etc. This was particularly the case when I was close to the finish. March - April was just terrible. It was all a blur honestly and I felt like I was taking even more drugs rather than decreasing. April 2023 - June 2023: Neuroemotions, restlessness, derealization, bad intrusive thoughts, and more, but those were the main debilitating ones. The neuroemotions as I’ve come to recognize it as was awful. Truly awful. I still deal with them to this day, and maybe some of what I’m feeling is warranted, but from the span of two months I basically regarded myself as a man unworthy of living. Essentially, every bad thing I ever did was at the forefront of my mind and I couldn’t deal with it. Telling me “you’re a good person!” was something I simply couldn’t accept. I was drugged for half my life and I have no idea what part these drugs played regarding my actions. I stayed in my room all day during this period, didn’t want to talk to anyone and just wanted to distract myself on my phone and hoped I’d eventually get though it. I never had time to create a sense of “self” because I was always regulated under these drugs that, while a bit helpful, never ever solved the root problem. Zoloft quelled my anxiety but never entirely, and made things worse every year. I’d get an increase of dosage and things would get better, until they didn’t. I had to come to terms with the fact that I needed to create a new sense of self after these drugs. The fatigue was still awful, the headaches less so, but I felt dead, and didn’t value myself at all. June 2023 - August 2023 It begins. I felt like a prisoner in my own mind and I took Zoloft. I couldn’t sleep, obviously, so I popped the Trazodone as well and slept. And when I woke up, I felt like I was back to square one. I had the biggest headache and I was more fatigued than ever with thoughts racing faster than ever before. I then thought to myself, “never again.” So, for the next few sleepless nights I was determined to not, at any circumstance, pop those pills. I felt probably the worst in those 2 days of not sleeping. If this was months earlier, I would’ve popped the pills no question. It was hard, but I eventually slept again without taking the pills and slowly recovered from the torture that I inflicted on myself. The derealization remained, as did the chronic fatigue and hate for myself. For those months, I had to come to terms with the fact that I actually had to deal with these emotions naturally and that pills cannot ever be the long-term answer. The fact is, humans were never meant to be chemically regulated, and having been medicated for so long, I had to realize that life is so much more than just shutting up and taking pills, thinking that it’ll solve all my problems. I remained bedridden, still hating myself. In late August, I had a horrible relapse of not being able to sleep for even a second, which happens more frequently than I’d like. Once in a while, my body would just refuse to sleep, and the first instance of that happened here. It was gruelling and I felt like that was it for me. I felt more disconnected than ever but eventually found sleep after about 40 hours. September 2023 Probably the best month I’ve had in years. I actually had motivation. I still hated myself, but it went from a 10/10 self-hatred to maybe an 8/10 self-hatred. I exercised, went on walks, started to pay attention to what I was eating but remained unsocial. I just wanted to be alone and do all these things. I’d spend more time in the sun before the cold weather started to come, and thought I was making progress. I slept for 9 hours everyday and although I still had derealization and often woke up sort of disoriented and sometimes confused, I had hope that I was recovering. I mean, come on! 9 hours of sometimes uninterrupted sleep? That was a great accomplishment to me. I haven’t had that in years. The sleep wasn’t really restorative but for the first time in my life I had hope. I started to try to wake up earlier because I felt that 9 hours was a long time, and tried to set alarms for 8 hours. This was incredibly stupid. If you’re in a similar state, don’t try to get complacent. Listen to your body. If it needs to sleep for 9 hours, LET IT. Then, it all began. October 2023 - Now Hell. This is where I felt like withdrawal truly began. After bouts of barely sleeping, my mood declined and declined. Derealization hit an all-time high. The back of my head was on fire and the worst was yet to come. Firstly, my appetite became non-existent. I couldn’t eat much, and if I did, I had to deal with the nausea that would ensue shortly after. I even threw up once, which for me is rare nowadays as my previous fear of throwing up made me sort of learn how to suppress throwing up, even when incredibly nauseous. When I throw up, something is horribly wrong. Visual misperception started, vivid hypnagogic/hypnopompic hallucinations, traumatizing sleep paralysis and what would be considered symptoms of “bi-polar” started to begin. Intense mood swings, breakdowns, feeling different everyday, feeling “wrong”, akathisia that’s way more pronounced when waking up or trying to sleep, inner restlessness that is impossible to get rid of, visual snow, closed-eye visuals sometimes resembling what I’d consider what would happen if I took small doses of LSD, after-images, double vision, grainy vision, blobs of colour throughout my vision, visual distortions, and trouble focusing on things with eyes. Most of these visual symptoms were exacerbated 7 months after the last dose. Is this normal? Is it normal for new weird symptoms to develop even months after stopping? This is why I’m sceptical this is all related to withdrawal, but then I ponder whether these debilitating symptoms would be present if I never took the pills, especially Trazodone, in the first place. I’m also inclined to believe this is related to withdrawal is because Trazodone really ruined me. I seriously couldn’t tolerate that drug yet I took it for almost 2 years. I figured that there’s no way that the damage done by that stupid drug would take a short time to correct. I also deal with tinnitus, weird sensations in my brain (I can’t even describe them, it feels so weird and sometimes painful) orthostatic hypotension (which probably resulted from these drugs in the first place, I had a problem with this my entire life and apparently it’s a side-effect), even worse sleep than before, the furthest disconnection from reality ever, short-term memory problems, anhedonia, extreme malaise, muscle pains, hyper-vigilantism, light sensitivity, tremor in the head and arms, the list goes on. Some days I’d cry in despair due to how utterly braindead and disconnected I feel. Every time I wake up, it takes me a few hours to go from completely disconnected to incredibly disconnected, which seems the same but there is a difference. Before Christmas of 2023, I went to the hospital to tell them what has been going on. Much of my visual symptoms weren’t really prevalent at this time. I couldn’t really speak so I wrote everything down for them to read. As I’ve never really been thorough with my symptoms to doctors throughout the years, because I hated the idea of opening up to anyone, I wrote this massive essay about the complete timeline of my symptoms. The doctor looked at it for about ten seconds and prescribed me Mirtazapine 7.5mg. Now look, forgive me if found that a little sketchy. I waited hours in the hospital, basically spending the entire time listing everything I’ve ever gone through to eliminate ANY POSSIBLE CHANCE OF CONFUSION (mainly because I had enough of constantly going to doctors throughout the years and just wanted answers once and for all), they spent about 10 seconds reading it and prescribed me medication. They were actually going to perscribe me Lexapro again, but I told them I had trouble sleeping (something they would’ve known if they read the whole paragraph) and they instantly changed their mind and gave me Mirtazapine. At this point I’m very skeptical and confused. Did I really need to sedate myself again and end these months of progress without medication? Something felt off. At this point I was also on a waiting list to see a psychiatrist that lasted months, and the appointment finally came in the beginning of January, and through this live chat, I saw a psychiatrist. I explained my problems to him and got prescribed a different medication: Prozac. I never told them about the hospital visit, because I didn’t want that to influence what they were going to give/tell me. I then asked the psychiatrist something patients probably rarely ever ask them: “how exactly do these meds actually work?” I’m sure you can guess their response. He told me I had this chemical imbalance, something I was told all those years ago, and that these pills work by correcting the balance. I knew by now that this explanation was utter nonsense. If chemical imbalances were solely the issue then I’m sure these pills would work like magic and this forum wouldn’t exist. They don’t. Not at all. If only psychiatrists actually were honest. I’m longing for the day that I ask that question and they respond with “I have no idea”, because that’s literally the only correct answer. Nobody knows how these pills work, they just do for some people and don’t for others. Remember, without these supposed mental illnesses, these psychiatrists are jobless. That’s something to keep in mind. They have an incentive to lie to patients and lead them down a rabbit hole of polypharmacy. It’s actually disgraceful. I knew everything was a sham after I got prescribed that Prozac. I knew that maybe something else was going on with me. That’s when I had the thought that maybe these pills were the problem all this time. I began to start researching about what happened to people after they stopped taking their antidepressants, and everything seemed to make sense. As a person who tends to be very skeptical (which was definitely brought on with my experiences with psychiatry and pharmacology), I wasn’t really sure whether to believe I was in “antidepressant withdrawal.” My whole life I was told I was mentally ill by doctors, so who am I to go against their word. I even went to a doctor shortly after and got told I had ADHD. What? You’re telling me this whole time THAT was the issue? It didn’t make sense. I got prescribed Vyvanse and told that it was utterly ridiculous that it was withdrawal and told that “even the most avid of heroin addicts feel better after 7 days off.” This remark truly confused me. Surely that isn’t the case. This is where my trust levels went to an all-time low. I was suddenly put into this hellish wave of a plethora of symptoms, and was prescribed 3 different medications from 3 different doctors in the span of a month. Something was off, so I kept doing my own research to rule out all possibilities. I then found this website and spent hours looking at other people’s stories and figured that this must be what I’m going through. Sure, I was an anxious mess before taking pills, then again I was 11 and a highly sensitive and fearful child. Sure, I had problems regulating those emotions, but sometimes I wonder if I could’ve just outgrown it. I didn’t hate my life as a child necessarily because I had friends and lived normally at times. Literally the only issue was that I got incredibly agoraphobic and was reluctant the leave the house and my parents as a child. Going to school sucked, but at home I would be left to my own devices, frying my brain playing video games, which I attribute to my attention span issues. I literally lived online, depressed, on pills that never helped in the long run. I had symptoms resembling OCD but they didn’t really consume me the way it did after taking pills and after going off. Ask anyone I know and they’ll tell you I was a very joyful child who loved humour and loved doing any activity I could, despite the fears that I had. I truly believe that I could’ve conquered this with proper guidance as a child. Some children are just sensitive and scared. Sometimes they’re like that for no obvious or “logical” reason and sometimes because they’re confused about living in this world they never asked to live in, but they do and that’s a beautiful thing. Everyday is a struggle. Some days I’m convinced I’m dying and others I’m convinced there’s healing to be done. Some days I read the horror stories and immediately catastrophize and some days I read success stories and get that extra bit of motivation. There’s no telling where I’ll be in a couple months but I cannot let these pharmaceutical companies win, so I don’t know. I just hope to get to a point where I can tackle my crippling agoraphobia once and for all, without the use of chemicals which never really helped in the first place. I have to believe that after these hellish, torturous symptoms subside, I can tackle life with a different perspective and get help the proper way. I see people recover from what I’ve had as a child all the time, and I have to believe that I can too. I never lived my life. Ever. My life has been me just existing, never doing anything of note. I’m 20 and sometimes feel like my life is already over. But it can’t be. There has to be some life in me, some life I never got to live under the influence of drugs. I see all these stories of people being drugged their whole lives find actual purpose, and I got to believe that my life has one too. The Present So yeah, I’m currently feeling dreadful, the worst I’ve ever felt. I don’t know who I truly am and when I remember events from the past I find it hard to believe that yes, that was indeed my life. I’m in constant pain, similar to the type of sensations I felt when originally trying to withdraw from the medication, but with even more vigour. I can barely speak and I’m constantly uncomfortable. I look like I’m high all the time. The visual symptoms are the worst, it fuels my dpdr to an even more unthinkably unbearable state, not to mention the tinnitus. I find it really hard to suppress my screen time due to not wanting to be alone with my own thoughts. I realize that I need to eventually push myself to stop looking at screens all day, but usually when I do, the day that follows is absolutely horrific, and all my symptoms return with a vengeance. This has happened every time I try to detox from my phone. There are some days where my symptoms go from a 10/10 to a 7/10, where I still mainly feel terrible but not in hell. Originally, I didn’t think this was related to “windows and waves” but I realized that windows don’t mean the complete elimination of all symptoms, but rather a time where the symptoms become more tolerable. In fact, the physical symptoms remain the same and sometimes new ones form, but there are some days where I’m just inexplicably able to tolerate it more, and some days where I simply can’t. Am I 100% convinced all of this is withdrawal? Not entirely, but that’s why I’m here. I’m here to learn, mainly out of despair. I know I’m an anxious person, but this is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. As soon as I stopped taking the meds, everything and I mean EVERYTHING got worse. There must be a correlation, right?
  11. I have had an adverse reaction to trazadone and Buspar while I was withdrawing from diazpam and it ended up with adverse reaction and neurotoxicity I've had a test that shows the neurons death/ loss. If there's anyone here with severe brain damage that's left disabled you can try to contact me.
  12. My journey to hell began November 21st, 2022. After suffering from a relapse in obsessive-compulsive disorder and hypochondria, I spiraled. Then on January 26th, 2023 everything imploded I started to experience insomnia for the first time ever. And insomnia that I didn’t realize existed. When I would attempt to fall asleep I would get what felt like a rush of adrenaline in between wakefulness and the first stage of sleep and I would be wired. On January 29th, 2023 I was at the end of my rope. I felt like antidepressants would be the answer since my psychologist that I’ve been seeing since 2015 had suggested them over the years. I didn’t feel the need for them until I spiraled and everything imploded. I went to a mental health clinic in the Phoenix, Arizona area called Mind 24-7 and was prescribed Paroxetine 20 mg and Trazodone 50mg. My insomnia continued until I went Mayo Clinic on January 31st there they said it was a manic episode and prescribed Trazodone 100mg. I didn’t feel safe so I voluntarily admitted myself to a behavioral hospital for 8 days. There they continued Trazodone 100mg and increased the Paroxetine to 30 mg. I was discharged on February 8th and on February 13th had a follow up with a psychiatrist. Because of the sexual side effects and emotional bluntness of Paroxetine 30mg we cross-tapered Paroxetine with Citalopram. Going from 20mg to 10mg of Paroxetine and 20mg of Citalopram. Along with Trazodone 100mg nightly. I experienced a range of side effects trying to cross taper. On the 6th week I developed severe insomnia. That even Trazodone 200mg wasn’t touching. On March 29th,2023 they told me to stop taking Citalopram 20mg cold turkey. Since then I believe I’ve been going through withdrawals from Citalopram 20mg. But I do suffer from OCD and hypochondria so I’m not sure what’s going on. My symptoms are as follows. Some will wax and wane. Insomnia; I don't even feel tired or drowsy anymore loss of appetite suicidal ideation (April 25th and 26th but around 4:00 PM on April 26th it went away like a light switch) crying spells brain fog head buzzing hypersensitive to sound when attempting to sleep sensitive to cold on my forearms hyperarousal several or one finger twitch's after gripping something a panic attack that lasted a day and a half
  13. I started to taper off Prozac 20mg 5/2020. I got down to 3mg 11/2020. I became depressed. Under the care of my Doctor Psychiatrist, From 12/2020 to 5/2021 I have started and stopped 5 different meds and increase and decrease Lamictal. My brain is a mess. I have had every thing from Brain zapping, brain numbing, paranoia, headaches, insomnia, muscle weakness, unexplainable fear, intrusive thought that have turned into ocd, left side of my face and eye hurt on and off, unable think clearly, slow speech, anxiety, depression, thoughts of suicide, nausea, weight loss, I can't even name it all. On 5mg Lexapro 37.5mg lamictal, and 25mg of trazadone Started Lexapro 4/3/2021 Slow titration,, my brain is very, very drug sensitive, 4/14 7.5mg. side effects so bad, and anger, anxiety through the roof, doctor encouraged my to go up 4/30 10mg. Could not take the side effects dropped 4/10 7.5mg. Doctor said he does know if he can help me. Told me to stop Lexapro, and go on a med holiday . 4/16 Lexapro 5mg. Holding,. don't know what to do? Do I hold here for awhile. Doctor is no help. He thinks I can stop Lexapro with in 2 weeks. Since I dropped down lexapro 5mg and started L theanine and Magnesium glycinate, things are slightly better. I found a new doctor but can not get in until the end of June. Since I am so close to no drugs I would like to see if I can continue my goal of being drug free. Med history 1995? Prozac 20mg not help anxiety ? Paxil Caused anger stop Serzone More depressed 1998 St Johns wart stop 1998 Prozac 20mg 1998 trazadone 50mg took for a few months stop 2000 lexapro 20mg. 2015 taper off Lexapro, fast taper a few month crash tried to reinstate Lexapro did not work Tried Effexor, did not work stop Oct 2015 Hospital 1 week Seroquel xr 50mg Viibryd 20mg. Did not even get up to 20mg. So drugged, I could not hardly work 30 minutes after taking so dizzy. Stopped at home 12/2016 Abilify, couldn't tolerate stop 12/16 Wellbutrin couldn't tolerate stop 12/16 Stopped Seroquel xr 50mg. To nauseated and couldn't eat. Heartburn Don't remember tapering 1/2016 Prozac 20mg. slight improvement 5/2016 Lamictal 200mg. 5/2020 through 11/2020 taper Prozac down to 3mg. depression and anxiety insomnia 12/2/2020 Zoloft 12.5mg 12/13 25mg. 12/24 37.5mg 12/28 50mg. Bad side effects Felt like brain sitting on eclectic fence 4 day tapper stop 1/5/2021 up lamictal from 200mg to 300mg. 1/13 lamictal 400mg. Brain started ruminating and obsessing 1/17 lamictal 300mg. 1/22 lamictal 200mg 1/22/2021 Seroquel 50mg for sleep Became paranoid. nausea headaches 1/29 stopped 1/29/2021 Trazadone 50mg 4/25 25mg 2/5/ 2021 Lamictal 150mg. 2/24 100mg 4/9 75mg 4/21 37.5 2/12/2021 Wellbutrin 75mg. Became hypo manic 2/16 stopped 2/16/2021 Seroquel 50xr 3/3 100mg 3/17 150mg side effects to much, arm and leg muscles became very week, nausea headaches 4/23/2021 panicked and stopped. doc not return my call Brain went crazy, paranoia ( should have learned, not to try it again) 4/3 2021 Lexapro 5mg 4/14 7.5mg 4/30 10mg 5/10 7.5mg 5/16 5mg Now: 5mg Lexapro 37.5 Lamictal 25mg trazadone L theanine 200mg Magnesium glycinate 100mg Omega 3 2000mg Turmeric 1500mg .5 mg melatonin
  14. yoshi4844

    yoshi4844

    Hey, I am almost 20 years old and super new to the world of AD's. I know how complex they are and how unknown they are but also I am no doctor, just a student interested in the medical field and psychology. I have been reading these forms for only a few sleepless nights. Sorry for any grammar mistakes in advance. I am currently taking AD's for my anxiety, which I assume has built over the past couple of years since COVID-19. Had my first panic attack this Jan 15 of 2023 (no great changes in my life which happened around this time) which impacted my sleep. Went to the ER where they said it was a panic attack (blood work, blood pressure, etc only abnormality was slightly high WBC). The next days, I only have symptoms when I am laying down (sudden spike in increased heart rate and lightheadedness). It is very bothersome when I trying to sleep. Always happens when I am about to doze off, I begin to feel dizzy (even though my eyes are closed) and lightheaded) which immediately deletes my drowsiness from existence. Go to doctors which want to give me AD's immediately and therapy but I get suspicious about the AD's and deny them until the next day after I got another sleepless night and took them. I am prescribed 10 mg generic citalopram pill and hydroxyzine 25 mg tablet. Only took the hydroxyzine a couple times before it stopped making me drowsy. I then switched to melatonin for a few times before it made me only drowsy but couldn't sleep. Tried my best to willpower through it for about a week and a half. I was already 1 week late to school and also my job. Feel new symptoms in the day like elevated heart rate (baseline levels slowly increase as the day goes on, reset once I go to bed and rest usually around 80's to 100's RHR), chest pressure and my body reacting to anxiety more than it should (i.e im a little anxious in my head but my body is reacting as if I was super anxious like can't speak or get really sweaty lol) Average sleep was about 0-4 everyday with a couple of 6 hour sleep gaps (used to sleep 8-9 all the time I love sleep). Never had real dreams just half awake fever dreams that were stressful and thoughts but I was mostly conscious the whole time. Went to the ER a couple more times in this week and a half. On my 3rd visit, I had an xray, ultrasound, blood work, and monitored while I had a 1 hour nap. They found nothing noteworthy and my shakiness disappeared after they took blood from me. (normal WBC this time) Seeing the impact my anxiety had on my school and social life, I finally give in and take my first citalopram dose on Jan 29 @9pm (prescribed at bedtime). Jan 30th I get scared and decide to not take them. On Jan 31th I take them and decide to continue taking them to give them a chance. With every pill I feel something in my brain but it isn't a bad feeling. Feb 3rd while having covid fever, I felt my whole body change after taking my dose. I check my heart rate and it finally lowered to normal levels. I was able to sleep this night semi normally. Feel like myself again 100% until feb 6th. I continue taking my dose regularly and monitor myself. I had a MCOT monitor on during this due to my repeated ER visits. Slowly realize that even though I go to bed from 10:30 or 12, I am now semi napping until 3am where (like clockwork) I go to take a piss and then sleep like a baby (and dream) until noon in which I wake up feeling good. This is great except I have classes and meetings before noon all the time. Also I got normal side effects like gassy stomach and brain zaps but I didn't care as long as I slept. Also slight increase in laziness but I was already lazy before so it didn't change much. If I tried to wake up before noon, my body would punish me. One time I woke up at 11am and felt drowsy until 6pm. The next day I went to my psychiatrist for the first time @9am and felt like a zombie for that whole day and the next. During my visit, she said she didn't like how I was prescribed Citalopram as a starter medication because of risk of QT prolongation and at night (said no drowsiness is associated with the drug) and tells me to switch to zoloft (generic) and trazadone for sleep. Originally she thought I didn't need AD's and just needed to sleep but I said that the citalopram was working well but if I had to switch I would like to have both on hand so I don't go back to hell longer than I need to. I am prescribed sertraline generic 25 mg (1/2 pill 50 mg) @morning and trazadone 25 mg (1/2 pill 50 mg) before sleeping. I ask her if its ok to stop my citalopram without slowly tapering and she said it was fine since I was only a few weeks deep. Since I am in zombie mode, I stop citalopram cold turkey but also refrain from taking my new meds since I can sleep and am drowsy all day anyways. (technically for 3 days no meds). On feb 20 in the am morning, I am back to old habits of same old symptoms that didn't go away and came back a little bit worse. I take my trazadone and go to sleep. Wake up at noon and take my sertraline at that time consistently. Felt light headaches for the first couple of days on it. After 5 nights of trazodone, (3 great ones and 2 where I woke up at 3 am) I stop the medication because it made me super constipated and I also had diarrhea (???). On the fourth day of sertraline I notice I have anxiety trembling (which previously I only had while laying down) during the day. I try to calm myself down to no avail and choose to ignore it. My heart rate is slightly lower than normal but I think its just the zoloft doing its thing. This night I slept a beautiful 10 hours. On the fifth day the shaking is worse but now I feel my old anxiety of having to keep myself busy and productive, heart rate still slightly lower though. I try to calm down again and it doesn't work but I am not concerned since my sleep was great the other day. This night I was not so lucky. On the night of February 26th I only get 2 hours of sleep. Before I went to sleep I ate until I realized that I ate so much without feeling hungry or full. I wake up at 2 am feeling really hot and sweaty (room is like 55F tops) then I stay up until 4am tired wanting to sleep. At one point I feel like I blinked really hard and then woke up from feeling like I fell. Can't sleep so I get on my phone and do my research including finding this website. Around 8 am my mom wakes up and I go to talk to her. While she's talking to me, I begin to break down into tears and freeze up and can't talk. After a while of crying, she ends up having to feed me a banana and milk. It works and I calm down feeling like that wasn't me (I was frustrated but not to that point). I begin to wonder if it was my body reacting bad to the zoloft and so I call my psychiatrist and leave her a voicemail. I head to the ER and my psychiatrist responds to me while in the waiting room and everyone basically tells me to drop the zoloft (sertraline) and go back to the celexa(citalopram). I decide to stop cold turkey my sertraline and take my old dose of 10mg of citalopram at 3pm this time. Everyone goes to work and I am home alone. I begin to have waves of fear while reading this site and I get another panic attack. The fear was just as great as before and just as before I just wanted to die so it would end. I called a hotline they gave me which did not help at all and then called my brother which he helped me calm down. I was still shaking and my heart rate was up but I felt ok in my head. I felt like I wasn't in control of my emotions so I went to the psychiatric ER this time. I am told that the sertraline was too low to even have an effect on me and that it was probably caused by dropping the celexa without tapering. There I am given a benzo, trazadone (i think 50 mg), and a place to sleep. I think I slept around 8pm and woke up around 7am felt pretty good. However they gave me a 20mg citalopram to take at 10am even though it wasn't my right dose or time to take it. Anyways that was like today so I am pretty up to date. I still am shaking only in the left half of my body a little bit but I don't feel anxious. If I don't get a response soon I am planning to continue my citalopram 10 mg @3pm like normal. However, I do have many concerns and am hoping I still have hope for my nervous system. If it is appropriate to get these questions answered here, here they are: *what is the predicted state of my nervous system due to my mistakes? *Did I just mess up really bad and like am in the perfect situation for kindling? (reinstated to same full dose a week after dropping and then double dose the next day at different????) *Many of the supposed citalopram withdrawal symptoms happened to line up with sertraline side effects, was it a case of both occurring? *Did I mess up my nervous system by dropping all my meds cold turkey? *If the zoloft wasn't what made my anxiety worse, would it be a good idea to keep citalopram until stable and then slowly taper into sertraline to see if it doesn't force me to sleep and is better? Thank you for your time and support
  15. Hello, I’m new to this forum, looking for some advice / insight. I had a bad COVID infection back in July of 2023 that created sleep disturbances and neurological symptoms that lead me down the road of psychotropic drugs. 2 short stints with Klonopin (shy of 3 weeks) and Valium (about 3 weeks), both at low doses and eventually Trazodone for insomnia that I’ve been on for 4 months everyday at varying doses but generally 100mg the vast majority of nights. I have been off of benzos since November 21st 2023. While it’s possible I could still be experiencing withdrawal on that end, I’m beginning to become suspicious that my problems are more tied to the nightly use of Trazodone. It’s extremely hard to unpack what is what but ever since I started this medication, I’ve had a rash on my face, have a persistent stuffy nose, feel depressed all the time, and rapid cycle in a very consistent pattern between depression and feeling VERY stimulated, the point of masking the depression and feeling like a “rush” of chemicals is coursing through my brain. On paper it might sound manic, but it’s not euphoric at all. It’s terrifying and it’s usually accompanied by severe anxiety, stiff muscles, joint pain and transient itching, pins and needles all over my body. There’s also the element of stress / trauma being in this state for so long that I’m also having difficulty unpacking how much that is adding to these mood swings. Long story short, I’m starting to think I’m having an adverse reaction / possibly even an allergy to Trazodone. Also, I can fall asleep now without this drug but I still take it for fear of withdrawal. Problem is, I feel so awful on this drug already, I’m starting to wonder if this is a case that warrants immediate discontinuation? I feel like the drug I’ve been dependent on for sleep is poisoning me, daily. So what’s the best path? Keep poisoning myself with a slow taper? Or stop?
  16. Hello, 47F currently on 20mg Lexapro, have taken 10-20mg the past 6+ years for anxiety. I’ve tried weaning off a few times over the course of those 6 years, but life circumstances always arose that made me go back up on my dose, or start up again. I got 100% sober in 2015 from pot and alcohol and haven’t relapsed. Don’t want to go back to that life. I’m in a really good spot in my life right now to talk to my Dr about trying to wean off again. He’s been my Dr the past 5 years, so he knows me pretty well. How I’m in a good spot: came out of the closet at 40, been married 3 years, my job of 15 years is in a really good groove, I exercise and meditate regularly, don’t have any bad people in my life, have a great sober network of friends. Physically/spiritually/mentally stable. Been doing a bunch of reading about tapering down. Want to talk to my Dr about liquid Lexapro to go down in 10% increments, but not sure if that’s available in the US. I am considering the method of tapering down one day a week to 18mg for one week (keeping my 20mg the other 6 days), then taking 18mg 2 days a week the following week (keeping my 20mg for 5 days), etc etc, then keeping 18mg 7 days a week for 6-8 weeks. Does this sound too slow? I also plan to track my mood either on a physical journal or an app. I plan on telling lots of friends and family what I’m doing so I can have them in my supper circle, if I haven’t mentioned it already. I am terrified of the withdrawal effects. But I want to try again, to taper off completely and use all my coping skills I’ve been using these past 6 years, so I will be able to stay off Lexapro for good. I’m tired of the side effects. Constantly craving carbs, sexual side effects, you know what I’m talking about. But I’m also aware that I may never be able to completely come off them. And that will be okay. I’m open to that possibility. I think in the past when I tried to taper down, I did it too quickly, and the effects were too difficult to handle. I’m so grateful for this site to help me in this process.
  17. Hello y'all! I'm a 24 years old med student from Europe and I took Escitalopram three years ago for anxiety and OCD. It exacerbatet the problems and led to PSSD. To counter the PSSD i recently took Trazodone and then Bupropion and after the bupropion i had a major crash and developed a blank mind, brainfog, complete emotional numbness as well as full body numbness. After two months I had windows where I felt almost back to normal until I crashed another time and now everything is even worse. What gives me a bit of hope is the fact that after this huge crash I had also some windows, but I also am in despair because I crashed after the drug witdrawal and I read the stories of Sofa and Totenkopf who never really recovered. What is now very bad is the fact that i cannot sleep at all. Like my mind is so blank that i just exist in a constant state of nothingness and I cant fall asleep at all. I slept about 1 hour in the last three days. I am super afraid that i die because I may be not able to fall asleep ever again. Thank you for your help! Taurus
  18. Hi there! I have been withdrawing from cold turkey Paxil for approximately 11 months now. I am so much better than I was, but definitely have farther to go. Yesterday we had to put out dog down after a bad accident on Monday that left her partially paralyzed 😢😢😢 I have been a basket case these last 24 hours. My grieving seems so much more magnified than when other pets have been put down. I was wondering if anyone has gone through something similar where it comes to grieving a loss during withdrawal? Was your grieve exaggerated? Really struggling right now. Would appreciate any comments. Thanks ya’ll! And hang in there…withdrawal does get better with time.
  19. Hi: I’ve been on AD for 29 years, tried going off twice with disastrous results, and am now considering/beginning my third attempt. Here’s my story… I was always a slightly anxious child. My last 2 years of high school I started experiencing depression along with increased anxiety (my home life wasn’t great). The first 2 years of college I did pretty well (it was such a relief to not be living with my parents!). But the last 2 years of college, my depression started again, along with moderate anxiety. By the time I graduated college, I’d been severely depressed for over a year. My therapist suggested anti-depressants and I started on Paroxetine/Paxil at age 21yrs in 1994. It worked amazingly well—my depression and self-critical thoughts were gone and anxiety was reduced, yet I still had full access to my emotions. And the only side effects I noticed were decreased libido and difficulty orgasming. In 1997, I switched from Paroxetine to Bupropion/Wellbutrin in attempt to alleviate the sexual side effects. It worked but the Bupropion amp’d me up too much, so my doc added Sertraline/Zoloft. This “cocktail” of Bupropion and Zoloft seemed to balance out the increased energy/lack of appetite effects of the former with the decreased energy/increased appetite of the latter. I felt great—my depression and anxiety were managed, my libido/orgasms were back and there were no other noticeable side effects. In 1998, some friends who were against ADs encouraged me to go off. My life was stable and I had a good support network, so I was confident I could come off ADs without too much trouble. I tapered off both Bupropion and Sertraline over 2-3 months. I didn’t have any negative side effects/withdrawal symptoms…. until ~2 months after my last dose. That’s when I was overwhelmed by psychological symptoms: deep, dark depression and despair, crying all the time, feeling horrible about myself/lack of self-esteem, lots of anxiety. I had a hard time functioning, especially at my job. This was all pretty much the same as what I experienced before taking ADs, although turned up a notch, especially crying all the time. After a couple months, the symptoms were still raging, so I went back on Bupropion and Sertraline. At my old dosage amounts, I was still mildly depressed. So I increased the amount of both drugs which got me back to my previous “baseline”. Life sailed along from 1999-2006. While I didn’t like being on ADs, I felt it was my only option for having a good quality of life and had made my peace with it. In 2006, my life was going really well, so I decided to try to go off again. This time I tapered more slowly, over 4-5 months. I was fine for 3.5 months after my last dose and thought I’d successfully put ADs behind me. But then the same symptoms as the previous time I’d come off came roaring back (depression, constant self-critical thoughts, crying all the time, total hopelessness, hard time functioning/going to work). I held out for a couple months but then gave in and went back on Bupropion and Sertraline. Once again, I needed to take a larger dose of both meds to get back to my previous baseline but they “worked” (my mood is good, anxiety is totally manageable). Sadly, at the higher dose the sexual side effects returned. After the second failed attempt in 2006, I thought I’d never try to go off again… But in Sept 2022, I decided to see if I could at least lower the amount I was taking and maintain equilibrium. So I reduced Bupropion from 262.5mg (SR 150mg + IR 112.5mg) to 225mg (SR 150mg + IR 75mg); and I reduced Sertraline from 125mg to 100mg. I didn’t notice any changes, so in April 2023, I reduced a little more: Buproprion down to 187.5mg (SR 150mg + IR 75mg) and Sertraline down to 75mg. Since this last taper, I notice I get irritated much more easily and can be snappy with people in a way I wasn’t before. These small successes had me starting to reconsider trying to get off the drugs again. I randomly came across an interview with Dr. Mark Horowitz talking about the 5-10% hyperbolic taper, got really interested and have been doing a lot of research and reading ever since. Now I’m considering tapering using the 5-10% method with the hope of eventually being AD-free. I’m learning so much from this forum and other sources. Foremost is that I’m not alone when it comes to the challenge of getting of ADs. I had no idea how wide the range of side effects these drugs can have. Now I wonder if some of my mysterious health issues might actually be caused (or at least exacerbated) by being on ADs for 29 yrs (intractable belching/bloating/gut issues, poor temperature regulation, poor memory, etc.). I’m glad to be here. I have some questions brewing but I’ll leave those for another post, except one... Question: I couldn't find where to enter my "drug signature" so it will automatically appear on every post I make. Can someone kindly tell me how to do this (or do you just have to remember to paste it into every message you write)? Thanks so much, Dancing Bee -------------- 1994-97: Started on Paxil/Paroxetine for major depression + moderate anxiety 1997: Switched to Bupropion/Wellbutrin + Sertraline/Zoloft 1998: Came off both Bupropion & Sertraline with ~2 mo taper—horrible symptoms so went back on 1999-2007: Con’t Bupropion & Sertraline 2007: Came off both Bupropion & Sertraline with 4+mo taper—horrible symptoms so went back on 2008-2022: Bupropion 262.5mg (SR 150mg + IR 112.5mg) & Sertraline 125mg Sept 2022: Reduce Bupropion to 225mg; reduce Sertraline to 100mg Apr 2023: Reduce Bupropion to 187.5mg; reduce Sertraline to 75mg
  20. Hello, I have been on Lexapro for almost 19 years—only off one year was I was pregnant with my firstborn. After 10 years of being on Lexapro (10mg), after dealing with my mother’s death and a newborn baby, I had developed insomnia and anxiety and was put on Trazodone (100 mg) and then later klonopin .5mg taken as needed. Been taking Trazodone for about 8 years now and klonopin on and off for 5. in January of this year after following my doctor’s advice, I tapered lexapro over the course of 6 weeks. Well, obviously it was too quick and hell broke loose shortly after I March. Along with crippling anxiety, panic, crying spells, body jolts, depression ,depersonalization, etc., my biggest and most prominent symptom has been insomnia. Most of the week I sleep a broken 1-4 hours. If I’m lucky, one night a week I will crash and sleep for 8-9 hours. I take klonopin only twice a week max if I hadn’t slept in days and I’m getting in a really bad place (I know this is not optimal, but I feel I’m out of options.) I must note that I also stopped taking my birth control pills at this time, as well and not sure if lack of hormone are also contributing to insomnia. I had reinstated at 2.5 at the end of March, and thought I was feeling okay but May even though my sleep was still off, so foolishly I dropped to 2.2mg. When this happened, I lost all control and had to go back up to 2.4 after 6 weeks of hell and no signs of stabilization. It’s been 3 weeks since I’ve been at 2.4 and my sleep is as bad as ever. I read horror stories about people’s sleep never returning or it taking years. I’ve already been dealing with this for 6 months. I have tried everything from magnesium to melatonin to glycine to weighted blankets and black out curtains—nothing works. Am I doomed to never sleep again? Every area of my life has been affected by this…my marriage, my children, friends, work, etc. I feel like I’m really losing myself and feeling pretty hopeless.
  21. Please forgive my poor English.I took trazodone for 2.5years and stopped 2 years before.Now my symptoms are :I can’t feel pleasure when rubbing my glans penis,as well as when ejaculating,I have muted orgasm. Besides,I also feel painful tightness at my occiput and upper jaw.However,my libido or sexual desire is normal, and I can have good erection .Can anyone here give me some advice? Thanks a lot.
  22. I have severe GAD diagnosed in early 2018. After trying to manage it on my own for a couple of months I finally asked my dr for an anti anxiety medication. she put me on 75 mg of Effexor, and I started taking it on May 2019. It worked incredibly. in February 2023, my main stressor for anxiety got resolved and wanting to get pregnant soon I decided to taper. I tapered from March 2023 - June 2023 using the bead counting method with my drs instructions. At first I thought I got away with it but I was wrong. Just like many others of us I developed severe insomnia and haven’t been able to shake it off to this date. I reached back out to my dr and worked with a psychiatrist both of whom agreed I benefit from sleeping meds. I tried taking 25 mg of Vistaril and while that worked okay, it made me very groggy the next day. Then my psych decided to switch me to Trazadone 25 mg and that worked ok. Today, I have not been able to sleep at all and it’s too late to take anything. I’ve taken the day off from work and made an appointment with my dr to talk about potentially reinstating — Effexor is not safe during pregnancy so maybe something else. I just don’t feel good in general and am feeling like I’m suffering more than I need to and need something to give. thanks in advance for welcoming me to the community, we’ll get through this!
  23. I am on 30mg mirtazapine and 50mg trazodone for 3 months. I would like to taper but not stable enough. I have been through hell with valium, hopefully this shows in my signature although I can't see it here. I am still not functioning and suffering beyond words. As I write this horrible painful jabs of anxiety stab up my arms and throat. If I wait to heal, and do a long slow taper, will the ad withdrawal be okay? Does ad withdrawal cause anxiety that makes you call out, rock, suffer pain, be unable to function? I have been on the mirt 3 months. I imagine I need to wait another 3-6 months before starting to taper? I do not care about having anxious thoughts. I do not care about brain fog or suffering depression. I need the physical anxiety feelings of pain in throat and chest, painful surges up body and arms, gone. I want to be able to sit back on my sofa and watch tv. I am worried I am too traumatised to recover. I have suffered for over a year with internal aka, writhing around, pulling hair, banging head, unable to breathe, crawling around, violent shaking of every body part...now I am 6 months off the valium and these most serious symptoms have stopped, but still have the painful surges and the painful throat and chest tightness. I was only getting 2 hours sleep until the mirtazapine. I now get 4-6 hours sleep. I don't know how much longer the drug will keep working for this. I worry I will need to kill myself every day, as my "life" is intolerable.
  24. It was over two years ago that I finally weaned off of sertraline and trazodone, which I was prescribed to get through a "short" rough patch in 2019. I tried to get off a few times prior, which I now understand probably "kindled" my system. I thought I was being cautious. When I did finally get off of these things, I experienced sensations and emotions that I never could have imagined: my first panic attack (and I've been stuck in a low-grade state of panic ever since) suicidal thoughts each morning, when I jolt awake and have trouble breathing (still the case) DP/DR set in, and I have constant tension on the right side of my body, probably a sympathetic nervous system malfunction (though the DP/DR has resolved, thank god) irritable and oversensitive to just about everything -- movies, music, other people, the news (this is unbearable and makes it hard to function) tinnitus very loud; lights are so bright I feel like they're passing through me (this alone is enough to set someone over the edge -- and has not resolved at all) I'm so tired in my soul, it's impossible to convey. I have held on this long and tried many things. Somatic therapy, other drug therapies, rTMS. I'm staying with friends in Switzerland to try a new social context that gets me out of bed every day. They've been encouraging but I'm suffering tremendously. I'm just not going to last in this condition. It's such an unbelievable waste. Any advice you can give this late in the process would be so very welcome.
  25. I recently completed a 14-month taper off of 30 mg of Flurazepam in July 2023 (after more than 10 years of use) and did a quick taper off of 6.25 mg of Ambien in October 2023 (after 6 months of use). I started taking 125 mg of Trazadone to help me sleep during my Flurazepam taper. I’ve been on Trazadone for 3 years and I’d like to taper it because it’s doing nothing for sleep. It’s like an empty pill that I keep taking because if I stop taking it, I’m immediately back into sleepless nights. I need some semblance of sleep to work and support my family. I am desperately hoping to get my natural sleep back after tapering Ambien and Flurazepam this year. Is Trazadone holding back my sleep? It should be helping it but I think I’ve built a tolerance to it, plus I’m likely in benzo induced insomnia. Does anyone have any experience with being trazadone tolerance? How hard was it to taper off of trazadone?
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