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Hi everyone! So glad I found this forum, seems like you have lots of experiences with different situations like this, so I hope my post follows your guidance. If not, I'm willing to correct it. I've been a casual psychiatric patient dealing with officially diagnosed schizoaffective personality disorder, major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder since 10.2020 when I had to leave my job because of anxiety pushing me into insane reaction. Since then my doctor tried many drugs on me until I finally settled on just 150mg bupropion in 2023. I'm on levothyroxine as well (Hashimoto disease) which I take everyday (25mg) so it was just two tablets a day. 12.12.2023 was when I stopped taking bupropion because there was a deficit in my town. Had no bad effects of it. On 16.12.2023 when I had new box of Welbox I accidently took two tablets (100mg) of the sertraline I had since my first psychiatric visit (still it was stored in dark shelf and expiry date says 02/2024) instead of levothyroxine and bupropion. I was scared and unsure what to do, so I just took levothyroxine and decided not to take anything for a while. I called my doctor and she said I'll be fine (she was being pretty ignorant of that, just wondered where did I get sertraline from), but that evening I had a very anxious reaction for a moment. I ignored that and moved on with everything. In the morning I felt really bad and in the evening I got some terrible symptoms. Since then I felt "broken". Nothing has been improving, so I visited my doctor. She said I have bupropion withdrawal symptoms since I haven't been taking it and prescribed buspirone along with it. 18.12 I took that 150mg of bupropion during afternoon. Next day I had buspirone finally bought (deficient in my town as well), so 19; 20. & 21. I've been on 150mg bupropion and 5mg buspirone. The problem was getting worse. I felt my brain was so overloaded with chemicals I couldn't bear it. Hot flushes, head in the grip, some sort of odd sensation I called "brain screams" because it was like head being past its tolerance of everything and nausea. Incredible suffering with things improving very slowly as I stopped taking any meds besides levothyroxine since then. It was so unbearable that I had no relief besides maybe a little from sitting in coldest room and sleeping a lot. I found this forum this year and decided to implement some strategies. I had to be very delicate with myself, not leaving house, not moving head when it hurt. My doctor supported my decision of ditching out any med for now, but she says she wants me to visit her... except I'm not capable of doing I now. Some of the symptoms improved, mainly temperature sensitivity is gone, headaches mostly gone and brain doesn't feel "overchemicalized" anymore. I thought I learnt to control it around 18.01 when I entered a classic two good days - one low mood, prone to overreacting to negativity day, but suddenly I had a similair attack from my body at 22.01 when I felt like losing balance, "drunk person way of seeing", incredibly bad sensations that my brain produced and it turned into severe panic attack. Then I had a nightmare of never recovering and my heart was pounding at night. After a few, absolutely horrible days I suddenly got a lot better. I felt as if my brain parted in two and as I "stayed" on the light side of it I felt decent, but when I start worrying or panic I enter the dark side of it that I can't control. After two days I had another regular low mood, vulnerable day, but I made through it. Sadly, the next day was absolute horror with my body forcing panic attacks on me almost like diarrhea forces you to run to toilet. I somehow broke through that without panicking, but next day was some unbearable sensations coming from the brain: as if it was overloading, like I was losing balance, having some mental mania or something, as if I was drowning in the whole ground. I couldn't stand it at all and forced sleep (which was difficult as the sensations kept waking me up and I only felt asleep like 3 hours later), but next day was some serious nausea and going mad. Beyond my pain tolerance. Last two days I feel better physically, this is when I lost my headaches and my sight restored to normal, but I feel like something is about to happen. I'm so dread of similair attacks happening again that I can't distract myself. Very clingy to people, cannot feel safe, worries about everything, overall I don't feel myself. I'm utterly hopeless for most days. Today marks 7 weeks since that reaction to sertraline and I'm just too tired to carry this on. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Any guidance or support is welcomed as well!

Hello, I came across this website through google search "vraylar" My med history can be viewed in my signature. I have been browsing this website for a while and I finally decided to register an account. I guess I feel desperate and really need some advice meanwhile waiting for a horrendously long time to see a neurologist and an ENT doctor to check what is going on and rule out other underlying situations. I was first diagnosed as bipolar back in 2018 when I was still in college by school's healthcare center's psychiatrist. We tried Abilify first, switched to Lamictal and quetiapine after intense akathisia (it went right away when I ct abilify and switched to Lamictal and quetiapine). Then quetiapine gave me stuffy noses and by the beginning of 2019 I realize these meds didn't make me feel well at all, so I did taper on my own and became med free from 2019-end of 2021. In the beginning of 2022, due to relocation to a new city, entering master program at a nice grad school, breaking up, worrying about whether I can get a job/go into a PhD, I had intense stress and caused me want to seek help from psych med again. My school referred a nurse practitioner (later found out to be irresponsible as hell) and she put me on vraylar 1.5 mg beginning 2/11. First 2 days feel ok until 2/14 I realized that feeling of "muscles bursting out of my skin" was caused by vraylar. I talked about this with the NP and she added mirtzapine on 2/25. It did not work and the NP told me to just stop both on 2/27. The rest of my med history is in my signature. The nurse practitioner is perceived as irresponsible because she dropped me immediately after I was hospitalized and disabled my account so I can't even access my medical record. My development of symptoms: 2/14 - 2/27: intense feeling of "muscles bursting out of my skin/inner vibration" and restless/akathisia 2/28 - 3/16 (after stopping vraylar and mirtazapine): continued above symptoms, and muscle twitches/faciculation appeared: sometimes my finger, legs, and arms would twitch around. When I hold objects in my hands they tremor a lot. during hospitalization: 3/17 the inner vibration alleviated during the day (might be due to trying lorazepam at night of 3/16), then came back at night in full force through out the entire hospitalization; muscle twitches spread to head. I felt my right ear had some infection and the nurse gave me some ear drops. 3/23: discharged, severe akathisia, along with all symptoms described above. 3/24 - 3/28: inner vibration/akathisia alleviated, but came back on 3/25. 3/29: inner shaking alleviated for a day, and then came back full force on 3/30. all other symptoms continued. 3/30-4/10: a period of "inner vibration alleviated for a short while and came back throughout a day." all other symptoms continued. Starting from 4/09, a "squeaky noise" joined along with feelings of flowing sand/electro current running in the back of my head. 4/11-4/18: inner shaking was replaced by "bugs crawling under skin" and the intensity varied. On 4/11, right-ear tinnitus joined. On 4/16, a loud thump can be heard in my right ear as if the muscles in my inner ear also joined the muscle twitching symptom. 4/19-4/28: "bugs crawling under skin" almost disappeared in core area and manifested more in limbs, all other symptoms continued. 4/29-5/7: every morning when I wake up I felt something exploded in my chest and made me extremely agitated. all other symptoms continued. 5/8 - 5/22: no more morning wake up explosion. The inner vibration came back in legs. Started to have very low energy since 5/8. all other symptoms continued. 5/23: woke up with the most severe electro shot/numb feelings in my limbs, as if there was no blood flowing at all. all other symptoms continued. 5/24-5/28: strong electro shot/numb feelings in arms when lying down on back, although nothing was on my arms. all other symptoms continued. 5/31: all of a sudden full body inner vibration came back this day. all other symptoms continued. 6/1 - now: no more full body inner vibration. electro shot/numb feelings mainly manifest in hands and feet. all other symptoms continued. Now I know the symptoms that still manifest are paeathesia, tinnitus and faciculation. They are still very disabling and by no means I am functioning. The faciculation has dropped from around 70 tics/hour to around 20-50 tics/hour. I am just very scared that it might be permanent and that even if I healed, all other non-psych medications that didn't give me trouble in the past would trigger all of these terrible symptoms again in the future. I don't know what to do. Nothing seems to be stimulating or make my situation worse, but nothing helps neither.

Hello! I'm new to this site! I am happy to have found this forum reassuring and full of mutual help! I apologize in advance for my grammar errors, I am from Quebec and I don't speak English so I use Google translate! ☺️ Here is my little story! In August 2023, my doctor prescribed Sertraline (the French name for Zoloft) at my request. I was experiencing a lot of anxiety about a vestibular disorder that I have been living with for 1 year, it is very difficult to live with. So, I start Zoloft, the first week at 25mg everything is fine! The second week I increase to 50 mg, stomach aches and heart palpitation, sleeping problem, difficulty urinating! I tell myself that it will pass….5 days after starting my second week all the symptoms are getting worse and worse, and a strange feeling in my genial zone….a bit like arousal without thinking sexual…sorry for the details, a frequent urge to urinate and pain similar to cystitis, like needles in the bladder! Just sitting down caused these symptoms or going to the bathroom! The symptoms were almost constant! So I made the decision to stop everything and I called my pharmacist and explained the situation to him… although I had been taking this medication for a short time (1 week and 5 days) he told me to take a 25mg the same evening. and the next day stop everything, which I did! Slowly everything was reducing but it was still there. A week after stopping I started to have muscle spasms in my thigh, hips and buttock. Constantly these spasm was there. So I made an appointment with my doctor to explain the situation to her, she’s a woman so it’s less embarrassing. She recognized all the symptoms except that of genital arousal. She was very reassuring with me and told me that everything would gradually go away over time. Today it's been 3 months since I stopped everything, the symptoms are less and less frequent, and sometimes I feel these genital symptoms towards the end of my period or during my ovulation...but it's very mild and not like in the past. beginning. I read the story of HopeFull and Cathy French on this forum which I found very reassuring and it gave me a lot of hope that my symptoms will go away! I didn't have a diagnosis so I don't know if what I had was pgad like people say, but it looks like it but without the pain! I no longer have any urinary problems either, everything is gone. All that remains is this feeling which sometimes comes back slightly! Sorry for the very long text and thank you very much for your welcome and your listening! 🥰 Rudbeckie 🙂

Hi, I just signed up today. Started taking sertraline February 2021. Was initially on 50g and after a few weeks put up to 100 mg. Developed stiff hands, jaw and throat to point it affects speech when really tight. Also memory loss etc but not what is bothering me as much as the physical symptoms. Severe bruxism even with mouth guard. Stopped taking abruptly after 6 months as wanted to see if jaw and hand problem went away. It’s been over two years and still no different. Has anyone experienced similar. Thanks

May 2024 be a year of healing! At the end of April 2023 I had a total knee replacement. 10 weeks later out of the blue came adrenaline surges. I did not understand what was happening to me. My stomach shut down and I couldn't sleep from all the surges. When I reflect I think I was in a very sensitive state from being on an antibiotic and aspirin and nsaids for 10 weeks. I have always had a difficult time with meds. I went to my doctor and she put me on Zoloft to increase my serotonin. I was reluctant but trusted the doctor. After 13 days I was lying on my couch a human zombie. I didn't want to die but if I did I was ok with it. I had so many side effects. My doctor wanted me to push through but I said no. I did not know anything about tapering so in 5 more days I was in WD. Though I didn't know it. I had some ok days then the adrenaline surges and insomnia and intrusive thoughts hit me. I ended up in a facility because I was scared and thought I needed a new med. They put me on effexor. Then I descended into the darkest pit. After 19 days I got out and my new doctor had me do a quick 8 day taper. During the taper/ CT I found myself in the worst mental state of my life. I was scared of everything but knew I would not go on another med. I found SA and the success stories have been a life line. I knew nothing about this only that a friend had been through something similar and made it through. I cannot believe what my body and mind have endured the last 4 months. I came here because I need some peer support. My husband has been a rock telling me I will heal everytime the depression crashes over me and I have a hard time believing this is my life. Which is almost every day. I have had a few days where who I am is stronger than the symptoms and I can feel a little hope. Usually in the evenings there is a break. Only had a few minutes/ hours where I felt almost myself. I'm looking for positive support where we can commiserate but ultimately there is a building up of each other. I am trying to accept this healing and would like to make a friend or two that gets it. I still have some very debilitating days. My belief in God and my husband have held me when I wanted to let go. I will add a signature but I need to go through my journals which triggers. Wishing and wanting for everyone peace and love and healing!

Hi everyone, beware! My story is very long, I’m mostly just sharing my experience in hopes that anyone else this has happened to knows they’re not alone or crazy despite what they’re doctor says and it’s reassuring to know people have experienced this and recovered. i am new to this site so i am still getting the hang of how things work! i am a 21 year old female, a mother of two beautiful babies and married to a very amazing supportive and kind husband. Approximately two and a half weeks ago both of my children (2 yrs old and 10 months old) came down with croup, a common illness in children that causes inflammation and restricts the airways sometimes making it difficult for them to breathe. So naturally, like any mother, i became very anxious and when my son was struggling to catch a breath i began having a panic attack. i have had panic attacks in the past (maybe once a year if that?) and they never lasted longer than a few minutes at a time. Well in the middle of this panic attack i remembered that my OB had prescribed me 50 mg Zoloft after id had my daughter just Incase i were to have post partum depression because I’d had it after having my son. (It had been a very dark two months of crying spells and feeling hopeless. I’d taken Prozac for the PPD and found it odd but also great that only a few doses brought me right out of the ppd so quickly when they said it’d take a few weeks to even work, so i never took any again after that week and was fine ever since!) Typically i only take medication as a last resort, even Tylenol. i will not take it unless i absolutely need it, but in the middle of this panic attack i told myself i could take it for a few days to help me the way the Prozac did. 😑 So i took it, determined it would help me. I had just finished a z pack the day before that (I’d been sick with my children) and i now know that z pack and Zoloft have a moderate reaction together. Anyways, i awoke the next morning with my heart racing and i sweating and i could not sit still to save my life. Just pacing around the entire house standing up and then sitting back down but no matter what i did nothing could calm me down or relax me. I felt like i had just smoked a ton of crack or something! My mind was racing and there was this burning sensation beginning in my chest and just spreading and shooting through my extremities. It was constant but would intensify in waves, the panic attacks were constant too, I’ve seen alot of people who say they thought they were having a heart attack while feeling this way but i knew this wasn’t that, i knew immediately that this was from the Zoloft. But i was sure this was it, i had destroyed my brain, i was on the verge of losing it completely. But at this point I️ got horrible pains in my stomach and (TMI) i began having diarrhea followed by complete loss of appetite. My mom had come over and ended up taking me and my two kids to work with her because i was terrified to stay home alone with the kids while my husband was at work. This continued for the next three days. I became a zombie just completely consumed by my own thoughts, like there was a war going on in my own head. I couldn’t understand what was happening to me, the ONLY emotions i had were dread, fear and hopelessness. I broke down when my son was looking for my approval when he did something funny and i couldn’t even force a smile. I couldn’t feel a single bit of happiness, excitement or anything towards other people even my freaking children. My mom took me to my doctor, my HR was 162 and i don’t remember my blood pressure but it was higher than normal but not dangerous and i explained everything going on and watched as he wrote down that i had general anxiety disorder and panic disorder (which is not true at all) and told me that one dose could not effect me. I began crying and told him that this WAS NOT ME. Ive never been so unstable and i told him three days ago i was completely functional and perfectly fine!!!!!! Of course I’ve struggled in the past with some depression and anxiety when things happened like a family member dying or after having a babyAfter explaining this he said maybe i am a low cyp2 producer or something like that and wrote me a prescription for Xanax to stop the panic attacks and to come back in one month. And we could look into other SSRIs 😂 yeah SURE. I didn’t even need them in the first place!! i left feeling a little better about having something that should calm me down but freaked out again when the Xanax did nothing. My heart was STILL racing, my mind wasn’t slowing down, the burning was still there in my chest but physically my body felt heavier and slower. I ended up going to the ER the next day when nothing changed where the doctor denied blood work at first and asked if I’d like to see a psychiatrist. I was mostly calm while explaining everything to her but I could just see in her face she didn’t believe a word i was saying. She told me Zoloft couldn’t do something like this and that it was just me. She was, and i quote, “98%, actually 99% sure that this is not the medication doing this.” Then proceeded to tell me maybe i am just now beginning to exhibit symptoms of panic disorder because some people don’t exhibit any symptoms until they’re in their twenties and then used PSYCHIZOPHRENIA as a freaking example 😡 and then that’s what began the intrusive thoughts. I left the hospital feeling more hopeless (aside from the random nurse who came and told me that Jesus loves me on my way out, that was encouraging) than before. I started convincing myself i was just losing my mind and it terrified me, what if i snap and hurt my kids? What if i black out and try to kill myself? What if i hurt my husband? Y’all, my family is everything to me and these thoughts were KILLING ME. The worst things i could think of just kept running through my mind over and over. Just as i was about to have my mom take me to a facility where i could be monitored or get some help or anything because i was so afraid i would just lose my mind, i got my first window. It was the first bit of hope i had felt since it all happened! And then i knew, what is happening, is not me. I finally had the ability to get out of my damn head for a little bit and i began googling and googling every single thing i was experiencing. By discovering that this exact same thing has happened to so many other people gave me great comfort, not that anyone else having to go through this is comforting but that IM NOT ALONE AND I AM NOT GOING CRAZY!!! So currently it has been 2 weeks and 4 days. The only remaining side effects are loss of appetite and waves of anxiety which trigger intrusive thoughts followed by depression. I still get some windows and distractions help a lot. But mornings are extremely hard, i wake up anxious and depressed and it takes a while to calm myself down, reading a lot of other people’s stories helps me to relax some. Driving around helps a lot too and sun light makes me feel much better. I’m hoping since it was only a single dose that i will fully be back to my regular self soon since thanksgiving and Christmas are just around the corner and I’d love to have my appetite back so i can enjoy the food!! I guess the only plus side I’ve found to all of this is i will have a much greater appreciation for life after overcoming this and i lost 12 pounds lol i just really hope to enjoy my baby girls first Christmas with her too. Three weeks ago i loved mornings, waking up before the kids and having my coffee and enjoying tv waiting for them to get up and come play. Now i dread mornings and have constant mom guilt because i feel as though i have been failing them. I think the hardest thing has been the intrusive thoughts, it absolutely terrifies me when i have them. It just blows my mind how carelessly they prescribe this medication to people. I feel so stupid for not feeling the need to research or check what I’m actually taking and what it can do to me. I just always trusted that doctors wouldn’t prescribe anything to you that could hurt you, i know there are a lot of good doctors out there but i feel like they should be more careful with this stuff. I mean both the doctors i saw gave me a list of benzos to choose from and i just looked at them like they were crazy both times. Im not touching any of that crap again. I’ve even looked into anti biotics and those are even dangerous too!!!!

I was suffering from dysthemia due to my lowering grades and addiction to porn and stuff. I don't even remember what came first. Anyway I had a breakup and that affected my studies, social life and everything for about a year. I went for therapy to my university counselling team and that helped for some time. But soon I had to go back to my addictions to cope up with life. Then came quarantine. I took a long break from studies just like everyone else probably did. And sank deep into my addictions. I stayed up all night watching movies, tv series, talking to people who didn't even matter and slept all day. I would occasionally cook for my parents and that was all. I was happy. And then I adopted a cat. But after a month my online classes started. And my mom could never accept me having a cat. So eventually I had to send the cat back to its owner. And when I realised I wanted to stop my bad habits once and for all. It was too late perhaps. I was feeling all sorts of guilt and ruminating over the past made me feel suicidal at one point in quarantine. Online classes started and I found it difficult to focus on my studies. I couldn't remember a thing I was studying. I thought I needed help with my depression and my mom suggested that I should talk to my university's counsellor. But I made a stupid mistake. This is probably the mistake that I'm going to regret for a long long time. Four years ago I was diagnosed with moderate depression and I was taken to a psychiatrist for that. I underwent treatment and therapy and I got somewhat better and stopped taking the meds without informing the doctor. Back to the present, I looked up that doctor online and consulted him and started taking meds without even meeting him in person. I wish I had not done that. 15 days later my mom took me to his chamber as I was getting way worse and the initial problems that I had were worsening. He only kept adding more and more antidepressants to my prescription after every 15 days. Now its been 2 months of feeling nauseated, zombie like feelings. I haven't felt like myself in all this time. I feel like these medicines have done more damage to my brain and nervous system than anything else ever did. I so regret going to that psychiatrist. His true intention wasn't to help me but only to push more and more drugs towards my way. He started me on 50 gm desvelanfaxine and 7.5 mg mirtazapine. 15 days after that I was feeling way more suicidal and irritable than before. So he amped up my dosage to 100 mg desvelanfaxine. And now I'm on 150 mg desvelanfaxine with 10.5 mg mirtazapine. I want to get off of these meds. I don't know what to do or how to get off. I feel like they've made me lose my brain's natural capacity to remember things and focus on tasks. I've also been given 100 mg modafinil for concentration and focus which are issues created by the antidepressants I wanna get off of these and any suggestions would be appreciated My psychiatrist isn't helping me neither are my parents. So I'm literally on my own now. My parents won't take me to any other doctor.

What are the guidelines or shared experiences about beginning a taper when a person is already experiencing long-term adverse effects of an anti-depressant, or protracted withdrawal symptoms from previous too-quick tapers? Using myself as an example, I had been in protracted withdrawal for a couple of years due to a very fast taper, and also due to changes (in types and doses) of anti-depressants. I also felt I was having adverse effects from Effexor for about a year prior to my planned taper which I started this May. It therefore seemed pointless to wait for any kind of stability before beginning to taper - the issues were long-term and not settling at all. So I planned then started a 10% taper. After 6 weeks I can see it was too much for my nervous system. Looking back, I wish I'd twigged that those compounding issues indicated a need for an even gentler taper, say 5% or even 1%. I've searched but not found a topic on this. If there isn't one, perhaps people who know more than me could turn this into one? (And if I've missed the relevant topic, sorry, and could someone point me at it?)

A look at how GlaxoSmithKline suppressed clinical trial information regarding their antidepressant drug, Paxil The secret emails you weren't supposed to see. The paper trail which reveals how the results of drug trials were glossed over. The cover up with links to suicide in teenagers. A Panorama Documentary: Paxil Study 329

Psychiatrist Dr. Colin Ross, M.D. discusses the truth about side effects with common psychiatric drugs including antipsychotic medications, antidepressants and others.