Posted by Lasagne on November 13, 2003, at 21:14:42
In reply to Re: Strattera - helping or hurting?, posted by Mila S on November 12, 2003, at 22:54:15
Hi:
Maybe you need to switch to an antidepressant while you taper off the Strattera. If you don't think the Strattera is giving you positive benefits when you take the medication regularly then it is an expensive medication to take just to prevent yourself from going into a depression. From my experience it takes more than a month to reach the optimal benefits of Strattera. Yet, I have read on this site that some people don't respond well to it at all. If you feel you are in this category then you may need to temporarily take another antidepressant medication so you can have control over the depression symptoms and then a few months down the road after you have completely tapered off the Strattera, then maybe you can try going off the antidepressant slowly to see how you function. The more I learn about Strattera and the SSRI's, I am finding that many people experience uncomfortable withdrawl symptoms when going off of them. According to my doctor the only way to reduce the withdrawl discomfort is to slowly ween yourself off of them. Last year I tried reducing my Prozac and I felt lousy. My doctor then suggested that so many days a week I should take my normal dose (60 mgs. MWFSun) and then the other few days I should take the lower dose (40 mgs. TTHSat) until my body adjusted to taking the 40 mgs. everyday and then to work on making the switch from 40 mgs. to 20 mgs. and so forth. Once I tapered down I did fine for a little while and then next thing I knew the depression came back full force making me realize that I will need to be on medication for the rest of my life. I suffered for years with depression before finally receiving proper treatment. There is a clear genetic tendency in my family towards mental illness, so I am a firm believer that antidepressants and Strattera have life altering benefits. There are of course some people who do not respond well to them at all, nevertheless their bodies get used to the chemicals being in their bodies after a trial of medicaiton and then when they try to abruptly discontinue the medication, they often have withdrawl symptoms as their bodies adjust to not having the chemical in their body anymore. I don't see this as the same type of chemical dependence that people get from abusing illegal drugs or alchohol because when I was going off of Prozac, I didn't feel an uncontrollable urge to down a bunch of pills to to ease the discomfort. From my personal experience with my brother who was recently hooked on crystal meth, stimulants carry a devastating level of dependence with them that will make you do anything to make the 'downer'/withdrawl symptoms disappear. I didn't experience anything close to this when going off the Prozac.
Lasagna
poster:Lasagne
thread:133458
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20031111/msgs/279552.html