Posted by CrazyMe on December 11, 2003, at 23:29:50
In reply to Re: Effexor withdrawal - Life AFTER Effexor, posted by Blissful_Girl_NOT on December 11, 2003, at 13:34:23
I am a 38-year-old unemployed college educated single mother. As of 10:30pm today it has been 96 hours since my last effexor. I took the taper down route. First I tapered myself down from 150 on the XR's to 35.5 on the non-xr, then I was cutting the 37.5 tablets in half and wondering why I felt so odd (and awful) less than 24 hours later. Even though I am unemployed and without health insurance I finally talked myself into going to see my doctor and she educated me.
I learned that the tablets are not time release so they were dropping out of my system that much faster causing me to suffer from SSRI discontinuation syndrome that much sooner. She gave me a few weeks worth of 37.5XR samples and instructed me to go back on the 37.5 once a day for at least a week, then to go every other day for a week or two, then to stop.
I followed these instructions right up until I discovered that going every other day wasn't as easy as it sounded. The first couples of doses were not too difficult but in retrospect I imagine I still had somewhat of a backlog of the meds in my system buffering me. After that I barely made it 36 hours and then 24 again.
Desperately I turned to the Internet. I looked up SSRI discontinuation syndrome and it's treatments. Unfortunately the all around recommended treatment appears to be to go back on whatever medicine you are quitting which isn't what I wanted to do. A recently released study suggests that a B vitamin deficiency can cause or increase depression so I decided to add that to my regimen. Further research suggested that the addition of amino acids would also be helpful. So I added that too. Another article suggested that Sam-e and 5-htp were beneficial so I added that as well.
So as of 96 hours ago that’s what I was doing.
- 400 mg Sam-e first thing in the morning on an empty stomach.
- 50 mg 5-htp half an hour to an hour later with food.
- 37.5 mg effexor whenever the last one ran out.
- 1 B-Formula with C multivitamin,
- 3 natural multi-amino acid gel caps,
- 10 mg ambien, and
- 100 mg metoprolol (for my blood pressure) at bedtime.But I still felt awful. Shocks, dizziness, nausea, hot flashes, other flu like symptoms. A trip to the pharmacy first thing in the morning, wait patiently outside for the pharmacist to open the door. I've already got Dramamine and some seasickness acupressure cuffs in my hands (got to stop this dizziness and nausea!) I tell the pharmacist that I've got SSRI discontinuation syndrome and ask him if what I have in my hands will help. Yes he says, that and Benedryl. Really? Benedryl? Yes he says, but it might make you drowsy. Not a problem I say, if I can sleep through this, all the better.
I make my purchases and choke down a Dramamine and a Benedryl in the car and head home where I put on the acupressure cuffs (ouch those are tight!) and fall back into bed. Do they work? I dunno, but I took them off after sleeping for a hour or so because my hands were swelling a little and they were uncomfortable. A while later I woke up with that pulsing in my ears and a feeling of vertigo. I hastily slipped them back on and I swear I felt the vertigo fade away.
I have been taking everything on it’s recommended schedule ever since. Except the effexor. My memory is terrible so I made an excel spreadsheet to track what I was taking and when and the times and days of the effects I was feeling. According to the spreadsheet the last effexor I took was December 7, 2003 at 10:30 pm.
I’m still experiencing some mild shocks and some whooshing in my ears but I think I can deal with it with the help of everything else. I had a screaming fit of frustrated rage today, no doubt brought on by a combination of a stupid search engine on an Internet job board, the general facts of my life, the effexor withdrawal and the fact that I started my period today.
I expect the next week to be rocky, but I also expect it to get better. I was full of trepidation when I reached that 48 hour mark and decided to just keep going but I think I’m gonna make it. I hope this information will help some of you. I know that your trials certainly helped (are helping) me through mine.
Good luck to everyone!
poster:CrazyMe
thread:1016
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20031208/msgs/288995.html