Posted by Tancred62 on April 12, 2004, at 10:31:29
I've read several posts that noted vivid dreams (often nightmares) after the initiation of SSRI treatment. I've been taking Effexor for a while without noticing such dreams, but after missing a dosage yesterday, I had one of the most intense periods of dreaming in my life last night. And these dreams were absolutely baffling in both their content and persistence (all night, essentially). Furthermore, they included very "loud" aural components along with that strange dream-within-a-dream structure where I would "wake up" from the dream only to find myself in another one. When I actually did wake up and then went back to sleep (once in the whole night), I quickly resumed dreaming for another 3 or 4 hours and was sometimes be able to guide and control the characters and objects at will, but mostly the dreams were out of my control and featured scenes and phenomena that left me scared and exhausted. I also believe I was talking in my sleep and moving my arms and legs. The caveat to my assumption that this dreaming was due to effexor withdrawal is the fact that I had a big meal of sauteed shitake mushrooms before going to bed. I know that many mushrooms, even the edible ones, have various psychotropic chemicals, and I wonder if that was the culprit, for the dreams were indeed like some kind of magic mushroom trip; albeit one I don't want to repeat.
Any insights?
poster:Tancred62
thread:335504
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040409/msgs/335504.html