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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 3 of 3. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Smittygirl on September 19, 2007, at 19:55:10
Ive been on a million of antidepressants/antianxiety meds and have finally decided to get off of all of them for good.
i'm experiencing severe fatigue(among many other things but those I can handle-the pain, confusion, crying, headaches, lack of cooridnation,twiching,nausea,ect)...I've been off of my last antidepressant (cymbalta) for 2 weeks and instead of getting better, i am getting worse. Everyday I am more and more tired. I take amphetamines(dexadrine,adderal) in the morning so I can work but now even they don't seem to be helping enough but I can't increase the dose any further. Has anyone else gone through this intense fatigue and if so, WHEN WILL IT END???
I would also like to know if while still on any meds such as paxil, welbutrin, cymbalta and like meds...what kind of side effects did you experience? Did anyone else develope a sleeping disorder as I did? No matter how long I sleep I do not reach REM or Stage 4 so I am never rested...which is exactly why I had to start the daytime amphetamines. I was unable to work without them. I am hoping that my sleep will improve soon now that I am off of the other meds and I can eventually get off of the "uppers" as well. Instead, I'm getting worse, but if I know that is temporary I can live with it. I would also like to know if any women who have been on antidepressants had any sexual side effects...if so can you let me know. I don't know if I am "broken" or if it's the meds since I have been on one med or another (or a combo) since I hit puberty. Has any other woman out there NEVER been able to orgasm or is it just me and may have nothing to do with all the meds I've been on for the past 17 or so years? PLEASE let me know if you have experienced similar sleeping or sexual side effects ON the meds and if you've experience similar fatigue OFF the meds and let me know how much longer I can expect to have to live like this. THANK YOU for reading this and especially to those of you who may reply.
Posted by Tennisplayer on September 26, 2007, at 9:35:18
In reply to questions for women re:antidepressant withdrawal, posted by Smittygirl on September 19, 2007, at 19:55:10
Smitty girl, I am so glad I found your post. I have recently come off of Cymbalta. When i was on Cymbalta I was sleeping almost all of the day and like a zombie, but didn't realize that was what was making me like that. I also take Lortabs for chronic severe pain from interstitial cystitis. While being like a zombie and sleeping most of the day and night for 9 months or so I lost 20 pounds--most people gain on Cymbalta). Then when I finally realized what was making me so apathetic and sleepy and stopped it, I didn't read that you are supposed to taper it. So I got horrible withdrawal effects and I am still going thru them. I started tapering off about two and a half months ago and have beeen totally off of it for about 3-1/2 weeks now.My system is apparently the opposite of yours. When I went off of it I became insomniac, hyperactive, ragingly angry and irrtable, hypoglycemic (with symptoms of that magnified about 10 times), ragingly hungry and stuffing myself with carbohydrates (that is really all I want) every 3 hours or so. I am gaining weight now, barely able to settle down enough to accomplish anything--can't stay focused on any one thing, pace the floor, etc. have terrible night sweats and hot and cold flashes, etc. the first week I had horrible nausea, headache, fatigue, weakness and disturbing LSD like nightmares. I tried Ambien a night or two but then read up on all the horrible things that can happen on it, and i am trying to go off everything except my pain pills. I know a tranquilizer would probably help, but I don;t want to get on them either. It is getting better--I am starting to sleep more solidly thru the night, and while I'm not bouncing off the walls during the day, I do have a good amount of energy and don't have to take two 3 hour naps during the day like I did when I was on it. I am retired, but do babysit my 15 month old granddaughter two days a week for 10 hour days by myself so I have to stay alert, and that is hard sometimes. I play a lot of competitive amateur tennis doubles, so I am very active physically even though I am 67 years old, married etc. What I wanted to ask you is why you started Cymbalta. What kind of sleep problem did you have originally? I asked my doctor about trying to get some "uppers" of some kind to help keep me awake when I was on Cymbalta especially to keep alert when babysitting, but he said that would be a bad idea, and I really agreed. It probably would add another nervous system impairing drug to my body and cause an addiction also.
Don't give up hope about the orgasm. I didn't have any either the whole time I was on Cymbalta and a small amount of Amitriptyline (12.5 mg) at nite for the pain. But only recently I did have a couple of orgasms again, and it was wonderful to feel alive and like a human being again. Even tho orgasm is important, the other awakenings I have had since stopping that mind-numbing, personality obliterating drug are even better. I love music again, feel feelings again, enjoy beauty and scents and a hundred other things I had been living without for so long. I don't know what could be done to get you started on the orgasm thing,but sometimes people are so reserved and control themselves so rigidly they can't let go enough to have an orgasm. But if you are on any kind of psychoactive drug at all (and some blood pressre medications etc.) you won't be able to see if you can have an orgasm or not. Most of them wipe out the intense nerve connection synapses etc. that you need to have to feel an orgasm. Usually you don't even feel any sexual feelings or impulses of any kind, let alone a full blown orgasm. With that increased ability fo feel pleasure also comes increased ability to feel pain, so you have to watch it, but it is worth it. I wondered if you ever have any pleasant physical sensations in that part of your pelvic region at all. As children even I can remember feeling a pleasant sensation from climbing a rope in the gym or similar type things. So the equipment is there to feel the pleasure, but some of our society's twisted ideas about sex being nasty and pleasure being a sin etc. sometimes mess people up. Other times a physiological or physical problem may be blocking the pleasure mechanisms from working. I hope you are doing better. It does get better. hang in there.
Posted by Tennisplayer on September 26, 2007, at 10:00:38
In reply to questions for women re:antidepressant withdrawal, posted by Smittygirl on September 19, 2007, at 19:55:10
Smitty girl. Sorry to be so lengthy. I forgot to ask you--when you were on Cymbalta and never reached the REM stage of sleep-- did you yawn all day the next day and feel you had to take 3 or 4 naps to get through the day? It was not depression type (withdraw to a dark room and get away from everybody). It was actual physical sleepiness and yawning. I thought I did dream while sleeping while I was on Cymbalta but maybe I didn't. Maybe that is why when I went off it my dreams seemed like Broadway production films. also might be the reason my doctor put me on Ambien, because he too said he thought i wasn't getting enough "restful sleep" at night and that was why I was so sleepy during the day. But neither the day time or night time sleep left me feeling rested or refreshed. I woke up feeling as tired or tired than I did when I went to sleep. And certainly not refreshed. I would have just kept sleeping if I didn't have to get up for something. My doctor never once suspected it was the Cymbalta causing me problems. He thought it might be low thyroid, or whatever. To be fair, the drug literature doesn't warn you of anything like the true side effects you have on Cymbalta, especially the coma-like state it will put you in. In spite of the uppers being normall useful to wake you up in this case I thinkt they may be causing you to stay fatigued (if you can find how to safely taper off them I would do it, and off of whatever meds you are on, like sleeping meds or any kind of psychoactive med) They sometimes produce a direct opposite reaction than they are supposed to, once your nervous system gets completely screwed up. For instance Adderall and Ritalin are used to calm down and sedate so called "hyperactive" children, and have the opposite effect on some adults to what they have on the majority of adults. Just like Cymbalta was supposed to be fore depression, but instead it made me more depressed than I have ever been in my life. One control(normal) patient with no depression who took it in the clinical trials committed suicide by hanging herself. She had never been depressed before in her life or suicidal until she took Cymbalta as a part of that clinical trial. It does not help with depression. It makes you dead as a person, and it only helps with pain in the sense that you are asleep and don't feel the pain. A mega dose of Morphine would probably do the same thing. Sorry to be so angry. Are you sure that you have never had an orgasm? And are you married or sexually active or anything (as far as going thru the motions of copulation or whatever). I apologize for asking these personal questions and feel free not to answer them. I wish you would email me privately at lmagness@hotmail.com if you want to. thanks,
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