![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 4 of 4. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by SamIAm on February 20, 2005, at 22:09:28
What medication did you wean off of and at what intervals did you lower your dosage?
I appreciate you sharing this info. with those of us still in the processs of getting off our medications.
Posted by Damos on February 20, 2005, at 23:44:12
In reply to Damos please share your withdrawal journey..., posted by SamIAm on February 20, 2005, at 22:09:28
Effexor-XR which came after a truly horrible experience with Zoloft.
Was on it for just over 2 years max 225mg, went down in 75mg intervals i.e 150 - 75- 0. Didn't have too many problems making the initial drops other than the zapps for a few days and occassional dizziness. The problems started when I went to 75mg every other day. My system just ended up so confused and I began to have what I thought at the time were a bunch of unrelated symptoms (until I Googled Effexor Withdrawal) and found this place. After a week or so of this chaos I decided after speaking with my doc just to stop and get it over with. It's been 15 days now and things seem now to have settled down. Days 3-5 were the worst in terms of physical symptoms: itchy, dizzy, dyslexic, nightmares, inability to sleep, nausea, joint pain, headaches, flashing lights and seeing things. Pretty much all the usual suspects. Then Day 10 I think it was I rolled out of bed and into an emotional abyss. Days 10-12 were like emotional big wave surfing and I swung from feeling like a pane of glass in a hailstorm to a live hand grenade. The inability to sleep more than about 2 hours up to about day 12 didn't help but that has settled down too. I'm still feeling a little aggressive at times which is really abnormal for me, but I'm hoping that will settle in time. I took 2mg antihistamine (max 4x /day) for the itching etc and 1000mg of paracetamol (max 4x /day) for the headaches and pains etc. Just didn't want to add anything else into the mix. Still just taking each day as it comes and trying not to get too ahead of myself. The people in this wonderful place helped so much and a few of them have appeared on the previous thread.
There's plenty of people here who've had a harder journey from darker places than me and I can only thank them for shining a light for me to follow.
Let me know if that's not enough info.
Posted by SamIAm on February 22, 2005, at 10:40:57
In reply to Re: Damos please share your withdrawal journey... » SamIAm, posted by Damos on February 20, 2005, at 23:44:12
Wow! That was a drastic drop. When I tried going from 37.5/mg XR to 0 I had every withdrawal sympton there is. Now I will be trying tablets starting out at 75mg--taken 25mg/3 times a day. This will leave me more of an ability to control the downward weaning.
Thanks for taking the time to share your story.
> Effexor-XR which came after a truly horrible experience with Zoloft.
>
> Was on it for just over 2 years max 225mg, went down in 75mg intervals i.e 150 - 75- 0. Didn't have too many problems making the initial drops other than the zapps for a few days and occassional dizziness. The problems started when I went to 75mg every other day. My system just ended up so confused and I began to have what I thought at the time were a bunch of unrelated symptoms (until I Googled Effexor Withdrawal) and found this place. After a week or so of this chaos I decided after speaking with my doc just to stop and get it over with. It's been 15 days now and things seem now to have settled down. Days 3-5 were the worst in terms of physical symptoms: itchy, dizzy, dyslexic, nightmares, inability to sleep, nausea, joint pain, headaches, flashing lights and seeing things. Pretty much all the usual suspects. Then Day 10 I think it was I rolled out of bed and into an emotional abyss. Days 10-12 were like emotional big wave surfing and I swung from feeling like a pane of glass in a hailstorm to a live hand grenade. The inability to sleep more than about 2 hours up to about day 12 didn't help but that has settled down too. I'm still feeling a little aggressive at times which is really abnormal for me, but I'm hoping that will settle in time. I took 2mg antihistamine (max 4x /day) for the itching etc and 1000mg of paracetamol (max 4x /day) for the headaches and pains etc. Just didn't want to add anything else into the mix. Still just taking each day as it comes and trying not to get too ahead of myself. The people in this wonderful place helped so much and a few of them have appeared on the previous thread.
>
> There's plenty of people here who've had a harder journey from darker places than me and I can only thank them for shining a light for me to follow.
>
> Let me know if that's not enough info.
Posted by Damos on February 22, 2005, at 15:03:37
In reply to Re: Damos please share your withdrawal journey..., posted by SamIAm on February 22, 2005, at 10:40:57
Mate, it wasn't so big when you know that people like Jiggitykid went from 300mg - 0mg in one hit. Each of us can only try to do what we feel is right for us and share our experiences to help others. The general consensus is that most Dr (GP or Shrink) don't know bugger-all about the effects of these drugs, and sadly in a lot of cases don't seem to much care either.
Take it easy mate, you'll get there.
This is the end of the thread.
Psycho-Babble Withdrawal | Extras | FAQ
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.org
Script revised: February 4, 2008
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/cgi-bin/pb/mget.pl
Copyright 2006-17 Robert Hsiung.
Owned and operated by Dr. Bob LLC and not the University of Chicago.