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After many years I am working on getting off Effexor (Venlafaxine) XR 75mg. Four days ago I switched from Venlafaxine XR 75mg to Venlafaxine 75mg, and am feeling some withdrawal symptoms! Emotionally upset, and constipation and gas. Should I be splitting this non-extended tablet and taking it every 12 hours? If anyone knows, please let me know. I am planning to taper very slowly, in small increments. Will see how it goes. Also, seven years ago I began developing a neck spasm, which developed and was diagnosed as Cervical Dystonia, also called Spastic Torticollis. It is painful and debilitating. Also have at this point soreness in my neck muscles, and spine, these symptoms have developed since the past year of not sleeping well (another symptom). Only in recent months I began to find that the drug may have caused this condition.

Hello, Part 1, Intro. I would like to start by sincerly thanking websites such as Survivingantidepressants for essentially helping me to understand my plight more accurately. I have found the success story sections to be particularly helpful, and have turned to these wonderful stories to help raise my spirits in times of utter hopelesssness. After lurking around on these websites, often too incapacitated to do much in the way of meaninful writing, I decided that it might be helpful to someone out there if I shared a little bit about myself. This is going to be a long post, and I understand that some folks going through the ringer will not be able to read this post in its entirety due to eye issues, or just information processing issues. I've been there, I couldn't read for probably a year in total. Nevertheless, I hope that you can eventually read this and garner some useful information, or at least some knowledge that you are not alone out there going through this unjust, cruel, and totally unecessary hell that we've been subjected and in my opinion, decived into undertaking. 2 Background. To give a brief background, in January of 2013 I was prescribed 50mg of pristiq, had a bad reaction to it, then switched to effexor 75mg for ~2 months, and then after requesting a medication that doesn't give me sexual dysfunction, prescribed 30mg of cymbalta. All said, I spent about 6 months on medication and I must say that it definitely relieved my moderate depression and my above average anxiety. Simultaneously, I was taking ~10-15 mg of adderall nearly daily for over 7 years to relieve "ADHD". Unfortunately, after going on cymbalta, I had a severe manic and borderline psycotic reaction to all of this stimulating medication, and proceeded to spend a tremendous amount of money over a short period of time because I became convinced that the economy was going to crash and that I needed to prepare NOW. At the time, I had a sneaking suspicion that something was wrong, but I always trusted my brain's intuition, and my ideas just seemed "right". So I basically bought 400 pounds of non-perishable food, and nearly 4 grand worth of prep supplies and equipment. Seeing that I was employed as a graduate student, earning my PhD, my funding was very small, so this basically bankrupted me and I had to borrow money from my family just to stay out of debt. I also opted for a very invasive, and not entirely necessary shoulder survery to correct a torn labrum that had been annoying me for years. I went ahead and had the proceedur finished, and was excited at the prospect of having a fully functional shoulder again. As it turns out, my intentions were pure, but life had other plans for me (if you'll read on and bear with me). At the end of my 6 month stint on this medication, I started to have severe memory issues. I would be trying to explain something to someone, and all of a sudden I would hit a "road block" and couldn't figure out the correct word to say. Obviously, as a PhD student, this would not do, so I told my doctor I wanted off of this stuff and I wanted my old brain back. Well, I tapered from 30mg to 10mg somewhat quickly (as I have now learned), over about 1 month and from there, based on my doctors advice, I "bit the bullet" as he said, and went from 10mg to 0mg. What proceeded to happen was that I went through very similar symptoms over a 1 week period as people often describe for benzodiazapine withdrawal. Indeed, I had been prescribed clonopin for 5 years, and withdrew from thsi medication back in 2012, and for 3 whole months I was basically bedridden and completely incapactated before being able to function in the world again. At that time, I swore I would NEVER EVER take a benzo again for the rest of my life. Unfortuantely, I was unaware of the fact that SSRI/SNRI's could produce similar symptoms. I was even moreso unaware of the fact that SSRI's could produce symtpoms that were even worse and even more debilitating. To make a long and disappointing story short, I went on an epic vacation just 30 days after I quit taking the medication. I had planned this trip very meticulously during my medication induced mania, and spent a tremendous amount of money on this trip - it was essentially meant to be the trip of a lifetime. Instead, it became one of the more awful experiences of my life. Try navigating 5 countries and managing an expliciting budget just 30 days after coming off SNRIs and having awful symptoms. It was just really hellish, but by the halway point I was hoping that my symptoms would abate within 60 days and I would be able to resume normal functioning at the unviersity. I was hoping to put all of this behind me. Upon returning, I discovered to my horror that I was not much improved after 2 months. My symptoms included, but are not limited to: severe memory loss, burning sensations, problems with my eyes (blurry vision, floaters, etc), difficulty concentrating, difficulty thinking, hot flashes, vertigo, and depersonalization/derealization, fatigue, etc. You guys and gals know the deal, it was GRIM, GRIM, GRIM. Looking back however, I actually had it pretty good. 3. From bad to worse This is where the story goes from bad to worse. As a PhD student, I had worked exremely hard to make a good career for myself once I graduated. One way of doing this way to teach a college level class. So upon returning from my trip, I was meant to teach a laboratory class in an advanced course in Biological Sciences in the summer for 1 month. I was so severely depersonalized/derealized, and with all the other symptoms I listed above, that I could barely remember any of my students names, and I certainly couldn't remember any of the subject matter that I was supposed to be an expert in and deticated the last 6 years of my life to memorizing. Ouch. Nevertheless, I pressed on because the course had to be taught. So I did, and the student's didn't seem to mind, although I was acutely aware of the fact that I had lost a tremendous amount of intelectual ability and could no longer "speak off the cuff" and go on intelectual tangents. I recall one student asking me about a relatively simple mathematical formula, and my inability to easily answer this question that drove me to the point of calling my ex-psyciatrist back and demanding a meeting. In this meeting, he indicated that a quick fix for my problems would be a prescription of prozac which has a long half-life, and reinstating this medciation for about a month or two, and then going off of it again. I thought "well, this better work" and went ahead and tried. As I had mentioned earlier, I had shoulder surgery, and as a consequence I needed to take some pain meds to help me through the immensly painful physical therapy sessions. So I was prescribed tramadol, which is an SNRI (UH OH!). One day I will never forget, I took this tramadol, about 1 week after being on prozac, and I had an adverse reaction to this combination that has haunted me for about 1.5 years now. My entire body went numb, particularly my sensory neurons, and I felt like an strange tickling and itching sensation over all of my skin. I never took tramadol again, but as I continued to take prozac over the next couple of weeks, I began to have an odd sensation over all of my skin: it felt as if I had wet paper bags over my entire body, and my face was becoming anesthetized. I returned to the doctor, and told him about this a couple of times and he basically told me "how could that possibly happen, you're probably just anxious". At the 1 month mark, things were not improving, and all of the original cymbalta withdrawal symptoms were still there. Instead of taking me off the medication, like any reasonable human being would have done, this doctor UPPED my dose to 20mg (from 10mg) after I told him about these adverse effects. After just 2-3 days of this, I started having insomia, and I said "**** it" and tapered off quickly in a 4 day period. It was around September 1st, 2013 when I had my last SSRI/SNRI. I should note here that I was miraculously able to finish teaching the course in anatomy and physiology with decent reviews - the prozac did help in the sense that it produced a mild mania again, which allowed me to sort of interact with the students better. What also helped me was the fact that it was around this time that I got together with my then girlfriend who saw me through the worst of the issues, so I was not completely alone thorugh this hell. It was really this wonderfully patient and kind woman who, amongst others, I attribute to saving my degree and possibly my life. 4. Recovery begins Afer coming to the realization that reinstatement was not an option for my body, I had to deal with the fact that my reinstatment attempt was not only a failure, but it made my symptoms like 40% worse. Now I also had tingling and numbness in all of my limbs, profound sinous headaches, and trigeminal nerve problems, and more serious eye problems than before. I was seeing a psyciatrist through all of this, because I was still taking adderall and had developed quite a habit for this pill (later on, I did successfully quit), which was the only way I was going to write my dissertation and complete my degree. This doctor told me that many of these symptoms may disappear after 3 months, so I waited patiently and tried my best to be physcially active and write my dissertation. Unfortunatley, releif came VERY slowly, and it wasn't until the 6 month point that I began to feel substantially better (Feburary-March 2014). At this point, with the help of my wonderful girlfriend, and a moderate dose of adderall, I began to be able to write my dissertation, and in the next ~2 months I wrote a massive chunk of this work. The symptoms sort of started to melt away, and I began to be able to read and function again - although I was still severely damaged and had not recovered. In anticipation of the fact that this might take a very long time, I scheduled my PhD defense for Summer of 2014, so that I could be at my very best. I also began applying for jobs, and succeeded in securing an interview. One unfortunate event that I should mention is that I reinjured my shoulder, so that now it was worse than it was before I got surgery in the first place. I attribute my reinjury of the shoulder to the SSRI withdrawals, and the adderall - the level of fatigue and the lack of awareness of my body due to sensory nerve damage (or what ever the heck it is - I'm still not entirely sure I understand what precise physiological mechanism is responsible for all of the symptoms I experienced) caused me to just not work on my shoulder exercises like I should have, and to play with it the wrong ways while in bed one morning. 5. Hypersensitivity This is a very important part of my story because it explains my great downfall and what happened next most precisely. Basically, as I've read on this website, and others (particularly paxilprogress.com, which was my very favorite and brings me great disappointment to see it taken offline), many people experience an inexplicable hypersensitivity to various substances when going through an adverse reaction or an ssri withdrawal. I too had this experience, most profoundly after my issues with prozac and tramadol. For example, I would drink 1 beer and be totally incapacitated and brain dead for 3 days, and if I got drunk, I would be seriously messed up for no less than 14 days. This was also true for niccotine, or any central nervous sytem agent - and it severely limited what I could do and how I could enjoy my life. Thankfully, I was still able to escape my horrible existance by watching movies and playing videogames. Indeed, videogames very effectively passed time for me in the early stages of withdrawal. Anyways, I also noticed this in regards to other medication - I took one, ONE .5 mg clonopin pill to help releive the "rebound anxiety", if you can really call it that, during my recovery process in the spring of 2014, and it completely incapacitated me for like 2 weeks. I then took a valarin root to try to see if that might help calm my nerves, and another 2 weeks of my life were gone. It's very scary to realize that small doses of commonly taken medication can completely incapacitate oneself, and I seriously had no answer for any of this other than to very cautiously avoid any and all substances if it could be helped. I should have taken this as a warning for things to come, but unfortunately I did not. One night, with my girlfirend, I had ingested a marijuana brownie in an attempt to have a good time and to escape from my unimaginable horror of losing my intellectual ability, my career, and everythign that was important to me (especially losing my emotions, the anhedonia was SEVERE and pathlogoically bad - instead of feeling emotions, I would just feel a vague burning sensation in the frontal part of my brain). This pot brownie was suprisingly effective and I had a good night with her and her friends. The only reason I mention this is because that pot browning made me believe that I could handle a small dose of marijuana without any ill effect - maybe I could find a way to medicinally deal with the agony of my condition. 6. True hell: Boy was I wrong. One night I shall never forget, my friend and college invited me to a party where people were smoking some pot in a casual way. I was just coming down from a daily dose of adderall, so I was a bit anxious and thought I would now have an opportunity to relax and enjoy myself with these folks and have a nice weekend. I smoked the pot, and what happened next was that I went from euphoria stright to utter terror. It's still very difficult for me to write this, and I'm having some emotional issues with articulating what happened, but I basically had a terror (panic) attack for like 12 straight hours, and proceeded not to sleep for the next 2 months. Yes, you read that correctly, I did not sleep for 2 months. The hell of SNRI withdrawals and an adverse reaction PALED in comparison to what I experienced when I smoked pot. ALL of the original symtpoms came back in full force, simultaneously. I went from being partially recovered to fully incapacitated again, and this time I had the awful experience of constant panic attacks that could be set off from any little thing, and PROFOUND bodily anesthesia, in addition to profound derealization and depersonalization. I had esentially lost all progress I had made over the previous 10 months, and became WORSE than I was before any of this started. As I am still recovering from this experience, I can say with some confidence that what happened was that I overdosed on marijuana. The weed in California is NOT the weed I remember back in NY - it's VERY strong and one can overdose on just a couple of hits. I personally took 4 hits I think. I know this is not a forum for drugs, but I must be explicit in my story and explian this because I do not EVER want ANYONE to go through what I went through. Please, if you're on the fence about doing drugs to help edicinally allieviate your SSRI withdrawal symptoms, do not do it. Please, I beg of you, with all of my heart, please do not risk it. 7. Partial Recovery I'm not going to go into all the fallout from my terrible mistake of overdosing on that pot, perhaps I will once it's all over. I should just say that I just BARELY clung onto reality well enough to finish. I thank God every day that I lived alone, and that I was in contact with a very understanding Aunt who had gone through similarly difficult situations. She basically saved both my career and probably my life in the 6 months or so that I endured absolutel hell as a result of smoking that stuff. At this time, I also started attending 12 step meetings of AA, and these kind and amazing people helped me out so very much. I will forever be grateful to these wondeful people for their kindness during this time - these meetings esentially kept me out of the psych ward and off of medication. I want to point out and focus on the positive: I successfully completed my Phd in Biological sciences from a prestigous institution, and defended my PhD in front of the entire department and no one suspected a thing. I also stayed with some friends after I lost the lease in my appartment due to graduation, and then found an appartment in the state of California nearby my old university that I was able to hang out in until I was well enough to make the drive across the country back to my father's house in Pensilvania. I survived, barely. Just barely. *In the very unlikely, by theoretically possible chance that someone else in this wide world is experiencing something similar to that which I have just described, I would like to describe my timeline of recovery. First 3 months, absolute hell - but by the end of the 3rd month, I was able to be somewhat peaceful and calm from time to time. At the end of 6 months I was still having panic attacks from time to time, but I was getting pretty good sleep 75% of the time time and I was able to enjoy myself sometimes. At the end of 9 months is when the panic attacks stopped, and I just had bad migranes most of the time. This is when I began to be able to read and write fairly well, and enjoy life even more from time to time. I'm currently at 11 months, and still feeling pretty bad, but I'm much much better and get good sleep nearly every single night. *If someone else is also trying to quit a stimulant while going through SSRI withdrawal hell like I did, I can outline my timeline for recovery if it might help you. By the 3 month mark, I had all of my phiscal stamia back, and just lacked motivation. By the 6-7 month mark, I have begun to recover intellectual motivation, but I'm still beset by migraine headaches most of the time. I tapered from 10mg to 2.5mg and then off completely over a 6-7 week period. 8. Closing statements Now, I'm currently on the mend. I quit taking adderall immediately after completing my degree, and have been off that toxic and dangerous drug for about 7 months to date. I am also 20 months free from SSRIS, and certainly will never go back that route again for the rest of my life. I'm not employed, and really am not employable at all. I will probably have to find a job at some point, but I'll most likely not be able to go back into academia until my brain fully recovers. I don't know when that will be. For now, I'm grateful to A) be alive, and be able to enjoy some things again. I'm grateful for the fact that I have my health coming back, that I'm able to write somewhat articulately again, and that most of my symptoms are slowly improving. I apologize for this massive essay - I know first hand how difficult it is to focus on things like this when you're going through withdrawal, but I just felt inspired this evening enough to write this post. I hope that this helped someone in some way, and please let me know if you have any questions. There is A LOT that I've left out from my story, especially in regards to the hell I experienced after smoking the marijuana. I learned a tremendous amount about life that I really never wanted to learn, and I've learned a great deal about recovering from ssris, what works, and what doesn't. there's a lot that I don't really know yet, and I could use some advice from the community on a few things. 1) how the heck does one make money and support themselves through this? I'm not entirely sure how to proceed from here. I've attempted to figure out if there's another medical condition that I'm experiencing that is unrelated to ssri withdrawals - got an MRI (totally normal, from what the doctors at the ER said). One doctor said it's possibly a neuropathy, or a metabolic disorder - but nothing concrete. I'm scheduled to go see another doctor in an attempt to get an actual diagnosis so that I could possibly apply for disability, but I'm not too sure what to do. I'm not so sure if going back to western medicine is a great idea, but I did get a lot of releif from knowing that there's nothing highly abnormal with my MRI, so I figure it might be good to rule out common disorders that can cause the symtpoms I'm still experiencing. If there's one thing I've learned from all of this it's that the worst thing I can do to help myself is to introduce new chemicals in my body in order to fix the problem. I've read countless recovery stories on this website and on paxilprogress, and I've been able to determine that if what I'm going through is SSRI withdrawal/adverse reaction, the only real cure for all of this is: time. From what I've read, it takes between 6 months and 5 years for people to recover completely. That's a long time, and I'm not sure how to survive for that long. I've just barely made it through 2 years. Just BARELY. I've thought about taking my life so many countless numbers of times over the past 2 years, but never did it - I don't think I will either. I just think about it, because the pain is so severe and unending. Although things have improved a LOT, and I mean A LOT from last may when I smoked that pot, I'm still far from recovered. I have hope that I'll recover in the future, but I think this process will take a long time. Thank you for reading.

Hi everyone I am the only one there that had put on me 40 pounds since taking effexor?!??!! I took 75mg of effexor during 4 months and now I am 40 pounds heavier, despite eating properly and doing sports. I talked to a pharmacist and he said that it can happen to some people, because it do reducing metabolism rate. Also, he told me that trintellix would have less weight gain than effexor. Did someone tried trintellix here? How it was and if you tried both, which you found was the best for avoiding weight gain? Do the metabolism will adapt to antidepressant and rise up at the end? 😮‍💨

Hello friends. First, a huge thank you to everyone who has created this incredible resource. After about 18 years on effexor I started slowly tapering in Feb 2021 and it went fine for over a year. I was at the point where I could no longer weigh the tiny bit of a pill, and made a solution in a dropper, per instruction on this site and another tapering group. Then, like for many people here, at 10 drops I crashed into a terrible wall of withdrawal symptoms. Waking up with absolutely crippling anxiety and dread and loss of appetite were the main symptoms. By reading other people's stories here I learned that this is not uncommon. I started reinstating (am now at 20 drops - double where I was when the withdrawal started), and the anxiety is not as bad but still terrible. Im hoping I get some relief soon. I want my life back.

Just doing my intro post - I've been diagnosed as having treatment resistant depression and have accepted now that any beneficial effects of the venlafaxine I've been on since January 2009 have ended. I also have some pretty debilitating anxiety disorders - both a mix of genetics (several members of my family have depression too) and life experience of childhood trauma from an abusive parent and bullying throughout school. The doctor has started my tapering with a month of taking 300mg (normal dose) one day, then 225mg the next, then 300mg again, etc. I've been referred to a new psychiatrist so hopefully we can talk more about withdrawing safely. I've been pretty sad lately, so it's kind of a miracle I managed to get to the doctor at all. So far, my withdrawal symptoms have been limited to bad dreams and stomach/gut pains - I know from past idiocy where I forgot to get prescriptions filled in time that diarrhoea is one of the fun side effects of WD, so I think that may be next. Or the sweating. The worst bit, though, is the dreams. They're really intense and horrible, and trigger my anxiety. It's like the drugs are angry I'm coming off them, and know all my buttons to press... or maybe these thoughts are always there and the lack of drug is just exposing them. Anyway, I'm also seeing a psychotherapist who is lovely, so I have an outlet once a week, and my best friend knows I'm doing this, too, and has offered her support. Sending you all love, peace and puppies x

Hi there, I have been on venlafaxine 75mg for one year. I hope to come off of these meds. Two weeks ago, I forgot my evening tablets 3 days in a row and thought it was maybe time to lower my dose. So for 2 weeks I have only taken 37.5mg. Does anyone have any support or advice on doing this please? I have had covid, so hard to tell exactly how I am feeling. I have good and bad days even on 75mg but because I have lowered my dose, when I have had a bad day or negative thoughts in the past two weeks - my mind goes straight to blaming it on the lowering of venlafaxine. I plan to stay on 37.5mg for at least 6 months and then would taper from this does VERY gradually. I have a lot of things changing in my life just now - career change (I have started teaching yin yoga) and planning to move from the UK to Spain. I worry that perhaps I go back onto the dose of 75mg and stick here until I have a more 'planned' and slower tapering? Or do I stay strong, remember that my mind is maybe playing tricks with me and be grateful for the 37.5mg dose and stick here for a while? Any help would be SO appreciated as I really don't know who else to turn to.

I have been taking Venlafaxine at 75mg per day for about 6 years. The side effects were becoming too annoying to contiune - mainly flat, blunt unemotional mood, drowsineess during the day (i would fall asleep at my desk whilst working (at home)) and frequent urination, especially at night, which interrupted sleep too much. I have successfully tappered off venlafaxine once before after about 10 months treatment. I did it over 9 months without any issues. Buoyed by that success, i thought i could do it again and embarked on a taper using broken pills and liquid preparations prescribed by my doctor on the UK NHS. I only took 4 months this time which wasnt that sensible , as i now know. The taper ended 5 weeks ago today (24/11/17). Since then i have experienced many and varied discontinuation symptoms both physical and emotional: - physical - nausea, diarrhea, flatulence, dizziness and swimmy feeling in the head; mild visual disturbances; mild but constant headache; mild tingling sensation in the face - emotional - depression, anxiety like i've never experiened before for no aparent reason, irritability, poor concentration; mood swings over a very short time period for no apparent reason etc The semotional symptoms come and go. I will have one or two good days followed by 2-4 days of feeling depresed, anxious, etc On the up side i do feel like im experiencing real emotions like i havent felt for year I have mananegd to control some of the symptoms with supplements such as tryptophan. i also take fish oil, B vits, vitamin C and D I exercise a lot - run 5-6 km per day and try very hard to eat well; lots of fruit and vegetables etc Any suggestions for help would be gratefully received!

Hello everyone. I have been struggling from withdrawal syndrome after "treatment" with various antidepressants /Venlafaxine, Zoloft, Cipralex/. I have severe PSSD (numb genitals, dead libido, almost no erections), anhedonia, bad nausea and some gut issues, lost appetite, altered taste and smell, over sensitivity to light and sound, pressure in my body, brain fog and fatigue, some blurry vision, occasionally cold hands and feet and pain in my right foot. I have read a lot about withdrawal syndrome and it looks to me that these poorly studied drugs have damaged my autonomic nervous system. My shi**y doctor neglects all of this and says it is somewhat anxiety or mental issue (she asked me what withdrawal syndrome was)... It's good that I have found this forum where the truth about these neurotoxic poisons is being said.

Hi, im from Brazil, so my english is not very good. Id like to know if anyone ever took two antidepressants togheter. The reason i ask is because im on paroxetine 40mg and venlafaxine 37.5. I have been on paroxetine since 2017 on and off, always trying to quit, but recently i changed the doctor, i was in severe WD from paroxetine,( i CTed from 20 mg, initiali i was taking 40 mg and started lowering dosage and was feeling so good, i was so stupid i couldturkeyd from 20 mg), and he asked me to try venlafaxine, but had no reliefe, made me so anxious, like akathisia. Now i went back to my old doctor, and he asked me to go back to paroxetine, and i went, but he said o should stay o venlafaxine too, otherwise id have some problems. Now im taking both along with zolpiden( sleeping piil, not benzo) and dont know much what to do. My plan is to continue taking both AD untill i stabilize and then start tappering venlafaxine. And then much time later start tappering paroxetine again( witch is the drug im more sensible to, since im taking it for more or less 3 years.) Any advices would be so helpfull, im from brazil and doctors here have no ideia what is withdrawal. My worst symptom is severe dizziness.

Hi everyone- not sure if this is the correct way to do it but I wanted to introduce myself. I've been relying on stories and advice here as I taper (with help from my doctor) desvenlafaxine, and now feel ready to engage in this community myself. I've also been experiencing quite a lot of ups and downs emotionally (windows and waves?) and am wondering if I've gone off my meds too quickly. Currently looking at options for reinstating low does venlafaxine or fluoxetine (see below for tapering- I used the fluoxetine method for weaning). Feeling hopeful that having a space away from my doc, with people who actually get it, will help! Ruth tapering schedule: Jan 26: reduced the pristiq dose to 25mg Feb 2: after 1 week on pristiq 25mg, started fluoxetine 10mg and continued pristiq Feb 9: after 1 week on step 2, stopped pristiq, and continued fluoxetine for an additional 3 weeks March 3: Last day on fluoxetine April 8th: 5 weeks off all meds, 8 weeks off pristiq

Hi all, Been struggling for a while with anhedonia ever since I was put on venlafaxine. I’ve been on and off different meds ( citalapram, setraline, quitiapine) and I’m coming off mirtazapine now. All these meds where an attempt to shift the anhedonia/emotional nimbness(although I can cry for the situation I’m in). I have a one year old son who I’ve videos of me playing with him and really enjoying my time with him but now I can’t feel any joy or love when I look at him which is killing me more everyday. So I can’t quite pinpoint when my symptoms started but I have this pins and needles/numb sensation in the right hand side of my head/brain. Don’t think it’s a withdrawal because I’ve had it all the time I’ve been on mirtazapine and maybe before. Hard to tell if I’m still depressed because I can’t feel any positive emotions, I’ve read it’s maybe to do with the reward system. Seems weird that a lot of the time I don’t feel “sad” but how can I not when I can’t feel any positive emotions. can anyone shed any light on what’s going on? My head is like this all the time so it’s not like the brain zaps. It’s like when your gut goes numb when you sit on it for a while but 24/7 on the right side of my head, all around my ear area. And any success stories overcoming anhedonia would be great, I’m trying my best to stay positive but it’s really hard when I don’t feel any love, joy, connection. Even the simple things that don’t have any pressure( I put on myself because I know I should feel these things for my son) like watching sport or tv shows/films don’t promote anything in me. Help

Graphic content PIED - porn induced erectile dysfunction PSSD - post SSRI sexual dysfunction Before reading, this will be long, i will really appreciate if you take few minutes to read and help me diagnose if my issue is related to ssri or not. I put some sexual details about myself to describe my dysfunction. My story : 1) Background: i am 26 years old, healthy, fit, was hypersexual, high sex drive, masturbated alot, abused porn in the last few years, but never had an issue, i was able to easily get erections in 15 seconds just by resting my hands on my penis, unvoluntary 1 hour long hard erections during long bus rides, unintentional embarrassing erections when a kid jumps on my lap, with no sexual intention. Was able to get hard just by thinking about sex. Now in just a matter of few months, i have zero libido, erectile dysfunction, no urges to masturbate or watch porn. After abstinence, i get brief moments( minutes) of good libido followed by hard erections, only able to have erections in the morning as soon as i wake up and still in bed. Other than that i am dead and unable to get aroused or have erections with the exception of those brief moments i told you about. I have two explanations, porn induced erectile dysfunction and sexual exhaustion or PSSD. Now for the Story : in December, due to anxiety and panic attacks from stress in college, visited a psychiatrist, he prescribed to me venlafaxine (TEDEMA) 10mg. And a benzodiazepine prazepam 10mg. in December, i used venlafaxine 10mg twice a day for a week, then once a day for a week and i stopped. and prazepam occasionally until February. In February, i started venlafaxine but only for a week until my dose run out and stopped. I also used propranolol during January to control my panic attacks. I stopped the snri because i had delayed ejaculation, which i reach the edge of orgasm and it runs away so i have to try hard to trigger an orgasm. Also my penis looked smaller flaccid. In January, i noticed that sometimes when i masturbated, my penis wasn't fully hard, i gave that to 40mg propranolol side effects. In February, March, i suddenly lost interest in my girlfriend and i broke up with her, but i still masturbated and watched porn daily, i notice sometimes my penis wasn't as hard as it used to be. But only sometimes. In April, i notice that when masturbating, i lose erection as soon as i stop stimulation. At that moment i was shocked and since then, i had no libido to masturbate, watch porn. So could PSSD come after some months, or was it because of my excessive porn use and masturbation? Last year i could masturbate 4 times a day and always rock hard. What i tried for recovery: I learned about nofap(abstinence) in August. So in September, i stopped porn and masturbation, i didn't have any desires anyway. After 40 days, i had consistent morning wood of good quality for 2 weeks. After that, it was inconsistent and varied in quality. I had 3 days around day 50, where my penis became very sensitive, and each time i lay in bed, i get very aroused and felt extremely horny followed by the hardest erections i had in a long time. Then back to zero in the evening of the 3rd day. There were short brief moments of libido but they don't last more than a minute. I try talking dirty with a girl i know on the phone to test myself, it feels like a job, i get occasionally a weak erection that lasts seconds. But there were times where suddenly after a while i get very aroused and have an erection. At day 70, i masturbated 4 times with few hours in between, first time i had inconsistent erection where it could be good then fades away. Secons Second time, i had a good erection all time, 3rd and 4th time, i was limp and slightly hard as i was about to ejaculate. I regained morning wood after 3 days. Now and since few weeks, i only can have an erection in the morning if i try to stimulate myself with hand, not very strong but good overall. But in the afternoon and night, no matter how hard i try, i cannot make my penis become erect. Also some mornings i feel some libido and i could get erections by fantasy, but only while still in bed before waking up. Please help me diagnose if this is pssd or porn related. If this is pssd, definitely i will prefer to die, i had bad days where i punch the wall and the closet, i cry in bed every night feeling bad about myself, and i think about suicide especially i am alone and i don't have family or friends. I never cried since i was 14 after my father's death, now because of pssd worries i broke down and cried. I quit college, lost all hope and motivation for life, please don't tell me it's depression, i was depressed all my life but never had sexual dysfunction like this.

I have depression and anxiety. My former prescribing ARNP started me on Latuda to augment sertraline (an off-label use) but I didn’t notice any effects. We then switched 150mg sertraline to 20mg trintillex from November-December and I felt good but I had eye twitching and found out it was expensive so I decided to try an ADHD medication as recommended by my prescribing ARNP. I lowered my trintillex (I think to 10mg) and started the ADHD med but I was anxious and nauseous on it so I stopped and went back up to 20mg trintillex. A few weeks after that, I started having severe symptoms (see below). I have a feeling that increasing the trintillex caused my current symptoms but Latuda is not covered by my insurance so I want to get off it as well. I know I need to titrate slowly but I don’t know which one to start with. I was working with an ARNP and we discussed starting sertraline and then decreasing trintillex but she dropped me after I asked started asking questions about and wanting to change the tapering schedule. She discouraged me from stopping the trintillex alone and said my depression would get worse. Since January 11th, I have been experiencing debilitating anxiety, crying uncontrollably (for the first two weeks), nausea, vomiting, racing heart, heat sensitivity, insomnia, stomach pain, suicidal ideation, obsessive thoughts, memory issues, cognitive issues, itching, agitation, feeling detached, irritability, waves of panic, self doubt, and constipation. My questions are as follows: Should I start decreasing the Latuda or the trintillex first? Do you think decreasing the Latuda could help my anxiety symptoms even though it didn’t seem to have a positive affect on me when I started taking it? Would it be unsafe for me to start decreasing trintillex without adding another SSRI? Would it be safe for me to start on sertraline before dropping the trintillex? To the best of my memory: 2006-2010: sertraline 2006-2007: risperidone 2010-2016: took fluoxetine and citalopram as mono therapy 2016: trial Effexor for a few months 2016-2020: escitalopram (polyrugged with Wellbutrin) 2016-2020: Wellbutrin, months on and months off May 21-Nov 21: tapered from escitalopram to sertraline 150mg August 21: trial of lamotragine (rash) August 21: started latuda (off label) at 20mg, then up to 40mg and 60mg but back down to 40mg November 21: two week taper from sertraline to trintillex 20mg, experienced eye twitching and itchiness (5mg trintillex for 5 days, day 6 decrease sertraline to 100mg, day 10 decrease sertraline to 50mg and increase trintillex to 10mg, day 14 stop sertraline, 10 days of 15mg trintillex and then up to 20mg trintillex) December 21: quick taper down on trintillex to I think 10mg and trialed dextro-amphetamine for a week, 10-40mg, anxious and nauseous (1/2 of 40mg pill in am, then 1/2 pill am and 1/2 pill pm, then 20mg am and no pm, then 20 mg am and 1/2 pm, then maybe 20 mg am and 20 mg pm) December 21: quick taper back up to 20mg trintillex, some lip and foot twitching January 22: lorazepam for a few days January 22: clonidine .1mg-.4mg per day, currently taking .1mg am and .1mg pm January 22-March 22: ashwagonda, L-theanine, and probiotics Current medications: Latuda 40mg Trintillex 20mg Clonidine .1mg am and .1mg pm Fish oil Vitamin D Levothyroxine .112mg

Hi, I wrote my introduction on the 4th of October 2019 ☼-francisco-on-the-way-to-a-success-story At that time, I was seven months of all meds – I stated that the post was a combination of an introduction and a success story since things were on course at the time. Since that post, my mental has been put to the test like never before but it's now been around one year and 10 months since I stopped taking meds and I believe my mental health has passed the test. I was given a diagnosis of bi-polar by a consultant psychiatrist in the autumn of 2011 after years of volatility in my mental health and began taking meds six months later. I started with Lamictal (Lamotrigine) – after a few weeks on a low dose, the dose was increased – the next day I noticed a rash all over my body and stopped taking it. I was then given Abilify – I was on this over for a month or two but stopped taking it since it caused me insomnia and really intense pain in my wrists. Next, it was Olanzapine/Zyprexa (5mg) to deal with my elation – the 5mg worked well but when the dosage was increased to 10mg and 15mg, it caused nothing but depression so I went back to 5mg. I was then given Prozac to deal with the depression side of things – this however, caused me the worst depression I ever experienced. I was on it for a bit over a month until I could take no more and stopped taking it. My psychiatrist then prescribed me Venlafaxin/Effexor in September 2012 – I started at 75mg and eventually made my way up to 300mg. As the dosage increased, my depression did get better but the side affects most certainly got worse – constipation and intense sweating in bed at night. Also, I always felt the medication was causing me brain fog, despite what my psychiatrist was telling me – ‘all these meds do is treat depression’ I was told and basically, how limited intellectually I felt was in fact an actual reflection of the abilities I was born with. I was really getting fed up with the side affects and decided to do what a lot of people in my situation do – come of the meds without telling my doctor. I slowly tapered down the anti-depressant but came off the Olanazpine quite abruptly – result: disaster. The depression came back in a big way. Around this time, I remember one sleepless night lying in bed just saying to myself over and over – ‘I just want to die – I wish I had the courage to kill myself’. Went crawling back to the psychiatrist in July 2015 and told him the truth – needless to say, he was quite annoyed but prescribed me Cymbalta/Duloxetine (60mg) and agreed to reduce my dosage of Olanazpine to 2.5mg. The Cymbalta no doubt stabilized my mood at that time – I was pretty dam low, as you can imagine. Once again, I felt it was limiting me but after the volatility I had experienced, I was happy for a bit of stability. In the summer of 2017, I began to learn a lot about the affect diet and exercise can have on mental health. Up until that time, I thought I ate and exercised healthily – how wrong I was. Over the course of around a year, I completely changed my diet and exercise regime – I experimented a lot and ended up with my current diet which is essentially a Mediterranean diet – meat, dairy and eggs a few times a week but primarily plant based food – mainly unprocessed. A lot of my free time now is spent cooking and preparing food. After I started with Cymbalta and before I changed my diet and lifestyle, I felt that my depression/elation cycle was going on in the background but the medication was keeping it in check. As my dietary and lifestyle changes kicked in, I began to feel that the cycle was longer there – I was essentially stable. I got married in July 2018 to the woman who stuck with me through the diagnosis and all the mental volatility over the years. Immediately, we started trying to conceive – I really wasn’t mad about the idea of trying to conceive while I was on medication – I know that women are advised to come off meds before becoming pregnant and I wondered if my own meds could have an affect on any potential child I conceived. Did a bit of research – heard a bit about meds possibly causing fertility problems but nothing about meds causing birth defects etc. For a number of months after the wedding, we tried hard to conceive with no success. Consequently, I made the decision to start tapering. Not surprisingly, my wife was initially reluctant given what happened previously when I tried to come off meds – this shook my confidence a bit but I really believed that I could cope this time round, given the dietary and lifestyle changes I had made. Unlike the previous time, I told my psychiatrist who to my big surprise, did not object in the slightest. He initially suggested that I stop taking the 2.5mg of Olanazpine altogether – he told me that according to the research, 2.5mg has no real anti-elation effect – it only really aids moderate anxiety and sleeping. I genuinely believed that the olanzapine was indeed helping my sleep so I decided to continue taking it and instead drop the Cymbalta from 60mg to 30mg at the beginning of November, 2018. I was on the lower dosage for three months – I didn’t notice any major withdrawal affects during that period. Consequently, when I saw my psychiatrist three months later, I suggested to him that I stop taking the Cymbalta altogether – once again, to my big surprise he was very supportive. I continued to take the Olanzapine for another month – I had planned to stay on the Olanzapine for three months but given what the psychiatrist told me previously about 2.5mg not really having any anti-elation affect and given how I hadn’t experienced any major withdrawal affects up until that point, I decided to come off completely at the end of February 2019. A part of me was worried that my sleep would go to hell without the Olanzpine but once again, I really believed as long as I stuck to my diet and lifestyle, I would eventually enter into a natural, healthy sleeping pattern – this transpired. Also, around four or five weeks after I ceased the meds completely, I started having withdrawal effects – my nervous system reacted and consequently, I felt very edgy and jittery and my concentration levels went down significantly – obviously, work was quite difficult during this period. Also, it’s not easy to say this but my performances in the bed room were pretty mediocre during this period also (not uncommon I suppose). This was quite severe for around five weeks and then gradually started to diminish. I fully expected some withdrawal affects so they did not surprise me one bit when they came. Once again to stress the point, self-belief was hugely important at this stage – I just knew that as long as I stuck to my diet and lifestyle – essentially, the way I was designed by nature/evolution to eat and exercise – the withdrawal affects would pass and I would reach stability. In the year since I posted my introduction, I had to deal with an extremely stressful project at work which was further complicated by a certain pandemic, the very difficult birth of my first child and a lot of subsequent and extremely heated disagreements with my wife under very stressful circumstances – as I said above, my mental health has been put to the test but I haven't gone back on meds and have absolutely no intention of doing so. As I type this post, I’m in fact currently staying in my parent’s house following a particularly nasty exchange with my wife – in many ways, my family are great but I’ve already heard ‘I think you should be taking medication to get you through this difficult time’. I know they mean well and just want what’s best for me but they just don’t understand me and never really have. For most of my life, I’ve been miserable and it wasn’t because of some chemical balance in my brain which would have been triggered no matter what – I had to deal with some personal problems which were really inhibiting me. Like my medication, those problems have been put to bed – I’ve been married for over two years and have been a father for a year. The first year of my daughter's life has been extremely difficult for all the reasons mentioned above – it's been difficult but I've coped. My marriage is in a very bad place right now and if it does survive, it’s going to take a lot of work and compromise between my wife and I. If it doesn’t survive, I firmly believe I’ll be able to cope with all the difficulties which come with marriage breakup as long as I find the support I need – the kind of support which this forum offers – guidance from people who’ve experienced similar things. If I was still seeing a psychiatrist now, I reckon he would have drugged me up to my eye balls in an attempt to get me through this difficult time. If I wasn't taking meds and hadn't made all the lifestyle and dietary changes I made over the last couple of years, I would have completely collapsed in the face of all the adversity I've had to endure. I'm still standing, however. Life now is extremely difficult like it is for a lot of people but I've found a way to manage. Now, I want to find a good life.  I have no problem saying that I have the bi-polar gene. I experienced all the symptoms and those closest to me can verify that. However, I don’t consider myself mentally ill and do not believe that I was born with a chemical imbalance in my brain. As long as I live the way I was designed to live, my bi-polar gene will be completely suppressed – it simply won’t be an issue. For the most part, I believe that the symptoms I experienced were basically a reaction to all the things I was doing wrong – my diet, my exercise routine, my work environment, my learning environment, my past relationships etc. I plan to keep the potentially harmful parts of my bi-polar gene suppressed for the rest of my life and in order to do that, my life is going to be quite mundane – no substance abuse, regular moderate exercise, healthy sleeping patterns and I’m going to have to continue to spend a lot of time (but not too much time!) cooking and preparing healthy food. However, I will take ‘mundaneness’ any day of the week over mental volatility and side affects from psychiatric medication I’ve had to endure over the years. Having come through all that, the stability and strength I’ve found are all the sweeter – ‘spring would not be so welcome, if we didn’t have to go through winter’. As well as the mundane lifestyle I mentioned above, I’m also going to have find a working environment which I'm designed for. In January 2010, I had a nervous breakdown at work. The job I was doing at the time was a fairly basic office job. The company undertook a large project which I was part of which turn out to be extremely stressful for all involved and which I simply could not cope with. One day, I simply left the office and never went back – didn’t hand in my notice, didn’t tell my supervisor, didn’t tell family/friends. I went home, packed a bag and took off on a train to another city where I stayed in a hostel for a week. Subsequently, I was unemployed for three and a half years while I was trying all the medication mentioned above. Once I found the medications which stabilized me, I once again started doing similar type very basic office jobs – most were temp jobs completely unrelated to the what I studied in university and which needless to say, I didn’t exactly thrive in. These ‘go-nowhere’ jobs were all I felt capable of doing while I was on meds. I never built a career based on my university qualifications because I just felt so hindered by all the personal problems I was going through back then. I ain’t no office worker – I'm an introverted, insightful writer and researcher. In university, I received a first for my masters in International Relations. That was a hell of a long time ago but I feel I just have to get back into research once again. My own personal and fairly primitive research over the last decade or so helped me recover from a very serious mental health problem when all the so called experts were telling me that I would be on psychiatric medication for the rest of my life. I would love to build a career based on writing and researching about mental health and helping people who have also been told that they will be on medication for the rest of their lives. I believe I’m on the right forum to achieve this goal and look forward to contributing to the great work which is done here going forward. Many Thanks Francisco Quote: ‘Spring would not be so welcome if we didn’t have to go through winter’   Previous Meds taken (Not all at once - Mid 2012 to July2015): Lamictal, Abilify, Olanzapine, Prozac, Venlafaxin/Effexor Side Affects: Skin rash, insomnia, worse depression, constipation, intense sweating at night, brain fog Most Recent Meds: Cymbalta (60mg), Olanzapine (2.5mg) Taper: dropped Cymbalta to 30mg for 3 months until end of Jan 2019 - stopped Cymbalta completed at the beginning of Feb 2019. Stopped Olanzapine completely at the end of Feb 2019 Withdrawal: around 4/5 weeks after ceasing meds completely, my nervous system started to react - felt very edgy, irritable and couldn’t concentrate for around 3 or 4 weeks. Have been feeling stable since despite numerous stresses in my life

Hi Everyone, I am currently trying to taper down from 150 mg Quetiapine XR. I am down to 87.5 mg by now. The 75mg capsules I take each contain 6 pallets of 12.5 mg each, so to reduce my dose further I need to switch to capsules that contain a lot of spheroids instead of a liquid formulation. I explained this to my GP and she said that in the Netherlands (where I am currently residing as an expat) they don't have either the capsules with spheroids or a liquid formulation, which I find difficult to believe. Instead, she offered to switch me to 37.5 mg capsules which I found contain 3 pallets of 12.5 mg each just like my original medication so it is no use. I tried to do a google search to look up options but in the brochures, I do not find any information on whether the capsules contain pallets or spheroids and how many. Does anyone have an idea how I could get this information? I am planning to visit some pharmacies to ask but I find that it really helps to have some knowledge before asking the question otherwise I usually just get a 'no it is not possible' even when there might be an option available but it requires some looking into. Thank you very much in advance

Hi everybody, This is my first SA post. Thank you for all the incredible work you do. I hope my signature shows up at the bottom of the page, if not I'll have to figure it out! I'm 4 plus years into protracted venlafaxine withdrawal, which I'm sure I don't need to explain to you has been horrific, years 0-2 the hardest by far. I wish I had reinstated early on, but I was advised that this could make things worse so I toughed it out, and maybe this was the right advice. Anyhow I'm here now, and feel like I'm getting closer to healing although who knows how long till I get there completely. I would really appreciate hearing from anyone who has had high blood pressure during withdrawal and had it treated successfully (or unsuccessfully) I had low/normal blood pressure before withdrawal started, but it has been extremely high at times through the past 4 years, worse during a wave, up to 190/120 recorded. Whenever I’ve had it checked out by my doctor the 24 hour readings come back as borderline high on average. Recently although I feel much less affected by the adrenaline type symptoms and more fatigued, slowed, cog foggy, my blood pressure seems to be more consistently high. My GP wants to start me on medication (labetolol as we are trying for a baby - at 42 I can’t afford to wait until this is over). I’m so scared, the last thing I want to do is start another pharmaceutical medication, my hope was not to have to take anything ever again! But my BP last night was 180/110 and I also don’t want to have a stroke or a heart attack (this runs in my family). When I look up online beta blockers seem to have their own withdrawal syndrome (looks less severe than venlafaxine w/d but still pretty crap), which is obviously the last thing I f****g want, having slogged my way through hell and high water to get this far through protracted venlafaxine withdrawal. Would love to hear from anyone who knows anything about high BP in withdrawal, or anyone who has started any BP meds in W/d and how they found them. I could do with some reassurance big time as I feel like I’m just falling into the same trap as when I started the antidepressant all over again. Also taking meds to manage the withdrawal from other meds just feels abhorrent. But Baylissa always says we get doctor phobic in withdrawal so I don’t know if I’m being balanced about this. Thanks ❤️

Hi Everyone, I've been reading the site for a few hours and am really grateful for so many of the contributors who share so much of their time, heart, and knowledge to help others come off medications they no longer want to be on. I am going to start tapering off this weekend of 75mg of Venlafaxine, which I found out through another Dr. I never should have been on to begin with. I have an estrogen problem that cannot be solved with SSRIs and became diagnosed with severe depression after the birth of my first and only child who is now 6. I went untreated for 2.5 years until I had a suicidal desire in Feb 2016, after that incident I got a diagnosis and went on 50mg of Sertraline and later up to 75mg. I took Trazadone to sleep at 25mg due to the insomnia caused by the Sertraline. One of my sisters and my mother also suffer from depression and my sister mentioned Wellbutrin worked really well for her so I asked my Dr. to switch since I felt like an emotionless robot. My insurance wouldn't cover the name brand so she prescribed Venlafaxine at 75mg and I have been at that does for 1 year and 3 months. I will post updates here about my progress and look forward to reading about others too. I'm not sure how to do the signature with the dosage part but will try... 8/2019 - 75mg of Venlafaxine

Hello, my name ist Kosta i live in Vienna and I'm 21 years old. My introduction, When I was 16 my mother deported me to the psychiatrist because she couldn't handle my anger towards her. They prescribed me Escitalopram, I don't know how much... Then two years later they changed my meds to venlafaxin because i did nothing but sleep all day. From November 2019 to March 2021 i "tapered" my venla****sin every other month by 37,5mg. I had no or just very little w/d symptoms until I jumped from 37,5 to 0. My w/d was ok, for one week I've had some dizziness and brain fog. After a month I had a severe panic attack followed by another a month later which threw me into severe depression. From November last year(2020) to march 2021 I've tapered by 10% of the initial dose. Then I discovered this side and I use the hyperbolic tapering now. Since then I didn't really try to taper much because I'm really scared of the withdrawal symptoms although I usually don't have them that sever. The problem is I'm in a pretty bad mood right now.(I was in a psychosomatic rehabilitation two weeks ago). I have severe anxiety because memories from my past are haunting me and i fear I will never be able to quit venla and I have to kill myselfe or someone else in the end. The 10% rule did me good i had no withdrawal symptoms, although I don't know if the current anxiety has something to do with my last reduction a month ago. I've had this kind of anxiety also when i didn't taper but since my breakdown after jumping to cero in 2020 I kind of feel like having a trauma from the withdrawal. So my question is, what's the right time to taper and if i have no w/d symptoms would you advice to taper faster like a cut every three or two weeks with a week hold in between like brassmonkey? My current dose: around 50mg 190mg of bits weighted by my digital scale. Greetings Kosta

I was diagnosed with a dissociative disorder in July 2020, and put on 20mg of citalopram. In around August 2020 I was put on 0.5mg of Clonazepam also. I was also put back on my contraceptive pill in October 2020 which I had been taking since 2014, but stopped taking shortly before the dissociation started. I recovered fully by December 2020, and tapered off the citalopram by cutting it down 20>15>10>5 over a few months. Also tapered the Clonazepam the same way 0.5>0.375>0.25>0.125. Stayed recovered until around June 2021. Symptoms returned along with fatigue, more severe memory problems. Put back on citalopram but didn’t last longer than a few days. Tried sertraline 50mg for two days, bad reaction. Now a month into 75mg Effexor, one week on 37.5mg IR, and 3 weeks on 75mg XR I feel even worse, like a ghost who doesn’t exist at all. No memory, no sense of time, completely spaced out and detached, feel like I am dead/not here. No emotions and no real sense of survival. Doctor is not helpful, no one understands. I don’t even understand. Getting worse on the Effexor, would like to come off it ASAP. Struggle to think clearly or logically so can’t really count beads. Any advice or help appreciated.

Hi everyone, Im new here am wondering if anyone has had experiences with seizures while taking anxiety meds or while attempting to taper off them. My story begins about 13 years ago when I started taking Zoloft. I was in grad school and struggling to manage my stress, so my primary care put me on this medicine and that’s when the chaos began. It did help tremendously with my anxiety, but I was also having these strange blackout episodes. The first was when my husband and I had gone to a concert, had some beers, and walking back to the hotel I started having trouble walking. Almost like my brain forgot how to tell my legs to move. I collapsed on the sidewalk and couldn’t move or speak for about 15 minutes. I did come out of it and was fine, but only after the EMT’s showed up and had no clue what was happening. Then it happened again a couple months later. My friend was over and we were drinking wine. I went to the bathroom and again collapsed, not able to speak or move, etc. At this point my doctor switched me to Effexor (150mg) and I was fine for years until I stopped taking the Effexor and started having seizures again shortly after. Because of the seizures I was put on lexapro and again was fine for a long time until I recently ended up in the ER twice again with the seizures. Both times I was drinking with friends (nothing out of control, some wine and cocktails). I have full recollection of the events until I didn’t and woke up in the ER. Doctors told me the seizures were Delirum Tremens, but I don’t drink often and certainly not enough to have withdrawal seizures. And I did have the seizures in the past while I was completely sober. I’ve had all the various tests done to rule out neurological disease and am perfectly healthy on paper. So why the seizures??? Mixing with alcohol is so stupid and I know a very bad idea. But even a moderate amount can cause seizures??? There’s no other explanation I can think of. And about 45 days ago I slowly tapered off 20mg of lexapro that I was taking for about 5 years. I also stopped drinking all alcohol and am taking the best care I ever have of myself. And I feel horrible. So dizzy and unsteady I worry I’m going to collapse and have seizures at any moment. I can barely function and don’t know what to do. I’m terrified. So just wondering if it’s just me? If there’s something very wrong doctors can’t find. If it’s all in my head? Any advice, please share…

I apologize in advance for the long post. Like many of you, my story is very nuanced and some details are difficult to skip. The past year has been a nightmare. I took my last dose of Klonopin in late November 2021, and I am feeling a mixture of shame and confusion and anger over what happened to me and who I’ve become. History Like many of you, my story starts in my primary care physician’s office. In 2010, I went to my doctor because of depression. I was 19 and was prescribed Lexapro (or Celexa – I honestly can’t remember). I was told I had depression and generalized anxiety disorder and honestly, it was a relief. It was so validating that my pain was not dismissed and comforting to know there was effective treatment. In retrospect, although I took those pills everyday, my depression never lifted. After I gained 50 lbs, my doctor suggested I switch medications in 2015. I was in the middle of my master’s program and had trouble sleeping. I had a terrible reaction to Prozac; I experienced severe anxiety and panic attacks. Looking back, I’m not even sure if my doctor tapered me off of Lexapro; I think she just told me to start taking Prozac. She referred me to a psychiatrist, a harsh and demeaning woman who prescribed me Wellbutrin, Xanax and Buspar. When nothing worked, she told me I must have borderline personality disorder which, according to her, is not treatable with medication. I was desperate for help. I saw a couple of practitioners at my university health center for the severe anxiety and insomnia. I had gone a few days without sleep. The health center gave me Trazodone and Effexor and assured me I didn’t have BPD (at that time, I cared about diagnoses – I cared that I would not be seen as ‘crazy’). For the next few years, I was relatively stable on 150 mg of Trazodone and 150 mg of Effexor. I finished my master’s degree while juggling multiple internships and a full-time job. I still struggled with severe anxiety, even more so than depression. Panic attacks were a once a week occurrence for a long while, and by the end of 2019, they happened nearly daily. I was working full-time and obtaining my doctorate by that point. I had some family issues that really stressed me out. Plus, I am naturally extremely sensitive – an empath, I suppose. Hearing sad stories, even if it’s just on the news, greatly affected how I was feeling. I was ambitious and was offered a well-respected job two hours south of my hometown. It would be my first time away from home. I remember a distinct moment in October 2019 when, due to stress from family issues and stress about the new job, I had a panic attack that rendered me paralyzed on the living room floor, held all night by my mom. I thought, “Wow, I really need professional help.” I made an appointment with a new psychiatrist. That’s when the real hell began. The nightmare of 2020 I did extensive research on a new psychiatrist. I found someone with great reviews who specialized in women’s health and said she did not believe in overprescribing. After three months on a waiting list, I had my first appointment. She actually listened to my life story, asked good questions, and I opened up my heart to her. I thought, wow, she must be such a great doctor because she didn’t try to push pills on me after one 15 minute appointment. I was so grateful. Over the course of a few appointments, she told me that she treats lots of patients like me who don’t respond to antidepressants. She said it was because people like me are actually bipolar. I told her I had never experienced mania before. She said that I could be bipolar II – and that my “hypomania” manifests as anxiety. Saturdays where I spent hours writing my dissertation, or days when I would Zoom with my friends, I found myself suddenly second guessing my behavior – was I only productive and engaging because I’m hypomanic? The doctor took me off of Trazodone and Effexor and prescribed me the following in the span of a year: Lamotrigine, Zoloft, Mirtazapine, Symbyax, Seroquel and Klonopin. I was usually on three medications at a given time. While under her care, I had panic attacks daily, experienced intrusive thoughts and even had to sleep with my mother most nights. I accumulated some other diagnoses: panic disorder, OCD. I voiced concern throughout the process; I wasn’t comfortable leaving antidepressants and introducing antipsychotics and benzos, which I knew were highly addictive. She reassured me that under her expert care, I had nothing to worry about. Withdrawal from hell I read “Anatomy of an Epidemic” in the beginning of 2021 and did a lot of research online. I decided I wanted to get off medication. When I voiced this to her, she started writing in my medical records that my judgment was no longer fully in tact. She was vehemently against me coming off of medication, saying that I will not be stable, but stated she couldn’t force me to be on meds. So she withdrew me off of Klonopin, Seroquel and Lamotrigine in five weeks. I experienced terrible side effects. When I voiced my concern to her, after a night of vomiting, she said that there is no such thing as psychiatric withdrawal. “Withdrawal” was a term for street drugs, not medication. She said that the vomiting is from my increased anxiety, which is what my life would be like if I wasn’t medicated. So I stopped telling her what I was feeling and she discharged me a week prior to me taking my last dose. A few days after I took that last dose, my body gave up on me. I experienced horrific physical and emotional side effects. I was rendered absolutely disabled. I did not sleep for five days straight. I couldn’t attend work. I sobbed to my boss and HR when asking for time off. My brother and mother took time off of work to take care of me. I had to be transported to my aunt's home when they could no longer take time off of work. My extended family saw me as a broken shell. I begged them with everything I had not to hospitalize me. To summarize, I experienced: Physical convulsions (not actual seizures; I think they are psychogenic seizures) Severe insomnia Anxiety unlike anything I had believed possible; irrational fear Panic attacks several times a day Crying spells Depersonalization and derealization Constant intrusive thoughts Suicidal thoughts Deep shame and questioning my core values Brain fog and confusion Rumination Hypersensitivity Nausea and vomiting Headaches Emergence of an autoimmune condition Over the course of two weeks, I lost 20 lbs. I needed help bathing. My abs hurt from the constant convulsions. I couldn’t think straight. I called my psychiatrist’s office, but she discharged me as a patient because I was no longer on medicine. I had an emergency session with a different psychiatrist, and my family made the decision for me, with my permission – I needed to get back on Klonopin. I needed to sleep to heal. I was prescribed Klonopin, Ambien, and Amitriptyline. Over the course of the next few weeks, I slowly regained my strength. I could no longer drive, I could no longer read (I have been a bookworm since I was a child, so this was very hard for me). I couldn’t listen to music. I could only watch nature documentaries and kids shows. Everything else was too intense. Second withdrawal On memorial day in 2021, about a week after finishing my doctorate, I made the decision to start tapering Klonopin again. I learned about the Ashton manual and websites like these, which helped. I talked to people who went through similar experiences. I decided to go slow. I ignored my psychiatrist, who told me that, despite what I went through, my Klonopin dose was tiny and that it’s fine to take it for the rest of my life, or to stop taking it after a week of cutting the pill in half. I found a new psychiatrist who genuinely believes in these poisons they prescribe, but nevertheless agreed to help me taper slowly and follow my lead. I don’t tell her much about how I’m really feeling. I experience the dehumanization that people with mental illness feel on a daily basis. When I share my story with others, people look at me like I am crazy. Doctors have told me that what I went through is not possible. Even my loved ones… I could feel at times that they were humoring me. I slowly regained my strength, and though I am not fully myself again, I am better than I was. I can drive, and I can go to work, and I can listen to music, and I can even read sometimes. I took my last dose of Klonopin a couple weeks ago, and I sure do feel it. The depression is heavy, and panic attacks returned, and I still convulse sometimes. I have one more medication to go – Amitriptyline – and I hope to start tapering next year. Mourning and finding meaning What I am struggling the most with is fully coming to terms with what I went through. I don’t mean to self pity, but it’s how I feel. I trusted a system so wholeheartedly only to be fired as a patient and left worse off. I can’t help but wonder… who even am I? Sure, I’m starting to feel more like who I was before I began withdrawing, but looking back – I’ve been medicated my whole adult life. How do I know what was me and what was the medication? Who am I underneath it all? Will the depression that I felt as a teenager just remain as my normal? I also don’t understand the point of what I went through. What is God or the universe trying to tell me? What am I supposed to do with this knowledge? Everytime I discuss it, I am met with humoring looks and pitying stares. Was I such a bad person that this is punishment? At the end of the day, I realize I have a lot of privileges that other people don’t. I’m not ungrateful. I know that my family saved me. I know that it could have been so much worse. I could have been on the streets. I could have been hospitalized. But I am so angry, so hurt, so upset for myself and the thousands who went through this and more, only to be sidelined with a story that will never be considered credible by the powers that be. Thank you for reading.

My dr had me discontinue my Effexor 37.5mg/day after starting it on 12/28/21, and discontinued on 1/28/22, and immediately start Bupropion HCL 150 mg 24 HR ER on 1/29/22. Felt wonderful this past saturday, 1/29/22, felt absolutely great on sunday 1/30/22 at church, the best I had in a long time, then sunday afternoon hit, cleaned the house inside and out and the dizziness, confusion, nausea, headaches, etc... started kicking in, I felt awful, couldnt drive, no appetite, and then continued on throughout the next day, attempted to work, i work from home so I am constantly on the computer taking calls, taking pts, so my eyes constantly are moving, severe brain zaps kicked in in the morning and continued ever since, dizzyness, severe headaches, sinus pressure, inability to focus, chills, shakes, had to clock out midday this past monday due to symptoms, same yesterday, no improvement, severe constant crying, i feel like I am losing it...i am also a group member on the Facebook Group "EFFEXOR (Venlafaxine) Tapering, Discontinuation Syndrome and Protracted W/D" and they suggested I also come here to speak with someone about recommendations to reinstate due to also taking Bupropion as well. Any help would be greatly appreciated. I am making myself work not to lose anymore money, my dr doesnt seem to concerned about it, have a phone appt scheduled with her tomorrow, only due to the fact i pushed for a sooner opening then my original appt this friday, I am at a complete loss and the only thing that I can deduce the cause to is Venlafaxine Withdrawal Syndrome being the cause, but hard to tell as i started Bupropion, and I am afraid my dr will just throw another med at me instead of figuring this out. The reinstatement recommendations on the Facebook Group page stated the following, " How the person quit the drug and how long he or she's been off it. If you've just quit cold-turkey 37.5 mg Effexor a few days ago, you might reinstate at 18.75." I am wanting to know what others thoughts are on all of this, this is all new to me, and I have completely frustrated and feel like i'm losing it right now. Sorry for the ramble, I make not being making much since in this post due to all my symptoms and trouble with focus, memory, etc...please bear with me. I just feel like crying all the time. :(

Okay so I am currently 38 and I have been on anti-depressants since.. 18 maybe a bit younger. For the past 8 years (at least) I have been on effexor XR (Venlafaxine) on a dose between 150mg - 300mg - oin the higher end for about the past two years. Recently I started getting anxiety attacks, so the doctor put me on Mirtazopam but I read up on that and didn't like the sound of it. At around that time I saw glimpses of having a sex life in the future and the thing about Effexor is that while it hasn't decreased my libido, it takes me ages to orgasm, by which time all parties have somewhat lost interest. I have accepted that I may be on anti-depressants for the rest of my life, so I didn't consider just coming off them entirely. I spoke to my doctor and the result is that I am switching to Dothep (Duloxepine) 150 mg. But the process is complicated. 7 days on 150mg Effexor (down from 300) and 30 mg Mirtazopam. That is where I am currently. Then 7 days on 75 mg Effexor and 15 mg Mirtazopam. After that two days of nothing. Then start Dothep, 25mg, increasing by 25mg every two days. So far I have experienced: Giant, voracious hunger (this can’t be overstated, we are talking total compulsion). Agonising stomach cramps (admittedly after eating way too much) Bloating Heart palpitations/chest flutters Chest pain Really limited attention span Headache Dizziness/vertigo Limited tolerance for other people Anxiety Oddly though, my mood thus far has been pretty good with the exception of worrying about weight gain because I finally got to a weight I am happy with and I am not keen for that to change.

Hello, I'd greatly appreciate any feedback or relevant links to my question: Are there studies showing that reducing antidepressant dosages also reduce their effects on the brain proportionally, helping with neuroplasticity? In other words, as I reduce Venlafaxine from 75mg to 25mg and maintain at 25mg for 3 months without withdrawals, does that mean the effect on the brain from taking 75 mg over 6 years is reduced even by a little percentage? Did you feel any different when you were tapering or you had to be completely free for a while before you felt the changes, if any? Regards, My History: From 2012, I took 75 mg XL Venlafaxine along with 36 mg XL Concerta for 6 years until it felt like they were not helping much. Mood was not getting better and I was exhausted all the time. I tapered over 4 months and quit both meds in November 2018. Got terrible withdrawals around December, 2018. I was not taking any supplements during that time. On top of that, I eliminated sugar, gluten, takeaways from diet during withdrawal period as per a nutritionist recommendation. After 7 months of fighting the withdrawals I re-instated both meds in July 2019. I had to increase the dosage - 150 mg of Venlafaxine XL and 72 mg XL of Delmosart - for both before the symptoms started to stabilize in 2-3 weeks. After waiting 10 months, I started tapering Venlafaxine again around April, 2020, very slowly this time (10% every 1-3 months). Delmosart XL is still 72mg. Also taking supplements this time. Hoping for better results this time around. Now I'm at 25mg of Venlafaxine XL. Starting to feel mild symptoms now so I will be slowing down the tapering even more.

Hi, Not sure if this area is still active. I am new here, history in signature. Here due to experiencing withdrawal symptoms and looking for advice/support. Thanks!