CapeFearless

[capefearless]

Good morning. I am a woman in my mid-fifties. In the past seventeen years I have changed nearly everything about my life including leaving an abusive relationship, losing custody of three daughters, changing careers (several times), finding new love, trying to establish new relationships with my daughters, changing locations (several times). I have changed everything except my weight which had gone from normal to obese during my first marriage and since then only got higher. I am following Jon Gabriel's method which says that people can become emotionally obese and must address the emotional issues to release the fat.

 

So I was a little (a lot) too eager for progress and went cold turkey off my cymbalta on April 15. I wasn't sleeping well before I went off my meds and now it is worse. I am also having major mood swings, crying jags and had some serious depression the first two weeks (though that MAY be lessening).

 

Yesterday I found this forum.

 

Here I am. Where to go from here....

[mammaP]

Hi, you are in the right place, the rest of your life starts here .

Someone will be along very soon to help with your questions. I'm quite new

myself and am very glad I found this place.

[Nikki]

Hi....

 

Nice to meet you. I gained weight from meds. They shut down a fat burning enzyme.

 

I believe I too, eat emotionally.

 

What you are describing sounds like WD from cymbalta. I don't know how to taper from cymbalta however I have taken other meds and experienced WD from getting off of them, or trying to get off of them.

 

I stop or alleviate the WD you might want to consider going back on cymbalta at what does I am not sure (others will stop by to help) stabilize and then begin a taper.

 

The changes you discussed are life changing. Took courage on your part.

 

Nikki

[Jemima]

Hello Cape Fearless,

 

Going cold turkey off of 60 mg. of Cymbalta is definitely not a good idea! Your best bet to feel better is to go back on it immediately, and I would start at 10 mg. Try that for at least four days and see if it alleviates the withdrawal symptoms. If not, it may be necessary to increase the dose, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Once you've stabilized on a dose you can then begin tapering off the drug very slowly and carefully.

 

Please don't delay going back on the medication much longer. It's generally safe to reinstate within a month of quitting, but the longer a person waits the more likely reinstatement WON'T work. Here's a topic on the subject:

 

About Reinstatement and Stabilizing

 

And here are directions for making liquid medication if necessary:

 

How To Make A Liquid From Tablets or Capsules

 

Welcome to the forum. I'm glad you found us so soon after quitting.

[capefearless]

I did not go off my meds thinking I had a safety net of going back on. My plan was (and is) to be off them. If I have been off them about a month haven't I already maybe been through the worst of the withdrawal?

 

Other than going back on Cymbalta, are there ANY other options?

[Jemima]

Cape Fearless, you are already in withdrawal and chances are it will get worse without reinstatement. There are people on this forum who've been in withdrawal for years, although it does get better as time goes by.

 

What happens with antidepressants is that they make changes in the structure of the brain. The brain is changed in a way that isn't normal but that is dependent on the drug. Abruptly stopping the drug is like yanking a crutch away from someone with a broken leg - BOOM! Down she goes!

 

These changes to the brain remain long after the drug is stopped abruptly. Stabilizing and then tapering off gradually gives the central nervous system support while it changes back to a normal state. Needless to say, this doesn't happen quickly.

 

To the best of anyone's knowledge here, reinstatement is the only way to go. I hope that you'll consider it because you could be putting yourself in a great deal of pain for months or years by sticking with your cold turkey plan. Please browse through the Introductions and read about people who have gone off their drugs cold turkey and found this forum after it was too late to reinstate.

[Barbarannamated]

CapeFearless,

 

I encourage you to grab this opportunity, reinstate a small dose as advised, and save yourself from months ~ or possibly years ~ of moderate to severe problems caused by a cold turkey withdrawal. I found this site too late to reinstate and am now 2 years out from my last dose and still suffering greatly. At 1 month out, I had similar symptoms to you. I was VERY functional compared to later months.

[capefearless]

CapeFearless,

 

I encourage you to grab this opportunity, reinstate a small dose as advised, and save yourself from months ~ or possibly years ~ of moderate to severe problems caused by a cold turkey withdrawal. I found this site too late to reinstate and am now 2 years out from my last dose and still suffering greatly. At 1 month out, I had similar symptoms to you. I was VERY functional compared to later months.

 

 

Thank you for writing, Barbara. I'd like to learn from your experience but I am really really resistant to going back onto the meds. Can you tell me any more about your experience?

[Altostrata]

Welcome, CapeFearless.

 

Excellent suggestions, Jemima. One thing, though -- you CANNOT make a liquid from Cymbalta. It's one of those coated bead drugs.

 

CapeFearless, to titrate Cymbalta, you open the capsule and count out beads -- see http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/283-tips-for-tapering-off-cymbalta-duloxetine/ This covers all the options (I think).

[Jemima]

 

CapeFearless,

 

I encourage you to grab this opportunity, reinstate a small dose as advised, and save yourself from months ~ or possibly years ~ of moderate to severe problems caused by a cold turkey withdrawal. I found this site too late to reinstate and am now 2 years out from my last dose and still suffering greatly. At 1 month out, I had similar symptoms to you. I was VERY functional compared to later months.

 

 

Thank you for writing, Barbara. I'd like to learn from your experience but I am really really resistant to going back onto the meds. Can you tell me any more about your experience?

 

Here is Barbarannamated's Intro topic - all 26 pages of it: http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/1083-barbarannamated-pain-depressionchicken-egg/

 

Why do you think cold turkey is better than a gradual tapering off of the drug? I don't understand your "resistance" at all. Getting off the drug ASAP doesn't mean that symptoms will stop ASAP - in fact, the opposite is usually the case.

 

If Barbarannamated's story doesn't convince you, you might try reading mine (see the link in my signature). I "tapered" - too fast - off Lexapro over a three and a half month period (10 mg., which is equivalent to about 1/3 of your Cymbalta dose) and have suffered from withdrawal symptoms for the past seventeen months. The first month or so off Lexapro seemed to be going all right, but it was a straight shoot downhill from there. By the second month I spent most of my time in bed, unable to function or to sleep. I was able to go out and get the bare necessities only with a great deal of effort and only for short periods of time. I slept for maybe five hours every 36 to 48 hours. I had horrible tinnitus, food sensitivities, and anxiety. This went on for at least six months with brief "windows" of normalcy here and there. I began to function - to all outward appearances - in a normal way from last August onward, but I am still very easily upset and suffering from emotional blunting. I am not yet back to normal after seventeen months, and that is after a "taper".

 

Cold turkey sometimes works for people who have not taken an antidepressant for very long (a few months), but for anyone who has been on psychiatric drugs for years, cold turkey is asking for trouble.

[Altostrata]

CapeFearless, don't put yourself at risk. Cold turkey is a gamble. Try taking 10 beads of Cymbalta, stabilize on that for a month or more, and taper from there.