I have been on 60 mg. of cymbalta for about 2 years, I also take 300 mg. of Lamictal, 2.25 klonopin and 25 mg of seroquel.
About a year ago my DR wanted me to go up to 90 mg of the cymbalta. I tried it a few times but just couldnt do it because of the side effects. I felt more anxiety, memory and speech patterns changed (I felt drunk). I decided to not do it and stay with the 60, which seemed much better.

Lately i've been having more anger, aggitation, crying spells, feeling really mad for no reason. She wants me to go back up to 90 (which i never really did for more than a week) Last night i took 30 mg. extra at night. I was sitting here in front of my CP experiencing things like my vision changing (i couldn't read a bottle held out in front of me). I once again, felt drunk. I was going to practice my typing, i stared through the cp screen like a zombie. I became more aggitated, didn't sleep and ground my teeth so bad I woke up with a headache. All after I took this. I did nothing different in my nightly routine.

I am being treated mostly for extreme anxiety disorder, and bipolar 2 with some depression. I'm wondering if the cymbalta could be 'changing' in my system and causing some of these anger , etc issues. Has anyone else every delt with cymbalta in a bad way?

The more I think about it, it seems to me like my moods are not stable at all, and that makes me depressed, not the other way around.

I'm going to try to call her again tomorow and tell her this.

Hi LadyinWaiting,

You'll open up a can of worms if you ask people if they've had negative side effects from Cymbalta. There are plenty of bad things people say about it in the withdrawal threads, and if you focus on these, you'll never take it-ha!

I upped my dosage from 60 to 90 about 10 months ago. Initially, I had some start up side effects again, mainly increased anxiety and agitation, but it did subside in about a week or so. It's not unusual to experience start up side effects again when increasing the dosage (at least from what I've heard).

Cymbalta can be activating for me, so I take the entire 90 mg. in the morning. When I tried taking it at night, like you, I couldn't sleep, and had a rough night. For some people it is relaxing and it makes them sleepy. I'd recommend taking it all in the morning and drink lots of water during the day (since it's time released).

As for vision, I believe one of the potential side effects is blurred vision. I felt "drunk" or "high" at times when I first started it as well. It was more a feeling of being lightheaded, no appetite, anxiety, just felt lousy. However, it all passed and I feel great now, or "normal". To expect these medications to make us feel euphoric is unrealistic. Normalcy was always my goal.

I hope you feel better soon and let us know how it goes.

Sincerely,

Maddie

Hi in the last 6 months ive gone from 60mg to 90mg then to 120mg each time ive increase ive has some of the initial side effects like night sweating, tiriedness but these have eased after a few days or so. If you can hold out it will be worth ago to see if it can help in the long run.

Good luck

Interesting that the manufacturers dont recommend that there is any benefit to taking over 60Mg

I guess some people have been helped by the increased dose but I was wondering if theres any reasearch to back this up....

Actually if you look on Cymbalta's website under Prescribing Information (bottom left), they talk about there being no benefit shown to taking more than 60 mg. I'm not sure if they talk about studies or not. I can't remember at this moment, but I guess they did look into it.

Yes, but dont some people take more than 60Mg? People on this forum?

And, I assume feel some extra benefit from the extra dose?

Yes and Yes. It's probably just another of those vagaries of how our brains all differ.

I'm very interested in why Eli Lilly would say, that "there is no evidence to show that doses greater than 60mg/day confer any additional benefit". It's in the package insert too. I presume they were obliged to report it, based on the clinical trials done, because it sure wouldn't help their sales.

If you go to the health professionals section of the Cymbalta website and look in the scientific papers section, you'll find:

For depression:
"The approved dose range for CYMBALTA in the treatment of MDD is 40-60 mg/day. The paper describes two studies that utilized doses outside this range (80 mg/day and 120 mg/day). In clinical trials for registration, CYMBALTA was studied at a dose range of 40-120 mg/day. There is no evidence that doses greater than 60 mg/day confer any additional benefit."

and for GAD:
"The three clinical trials discussed utilized Cymbalta doses ranging from 60-120 mg/day. The FDA-approved dose range for Cymbalta for the treatment of GAD is 60-120 mg/day. There is no evidence that doses above 60 mg/day confer additional benefit. The safety of doses above 120 mg once daily has not been adequately evaluated."

Talk about doublespeak! I'm confused.

The information does seem to conflict. There are definitely people who have posted on these boards who have benefitted from taking more than 60 mg. I take 90 mg. and have benefitted greatly.

Does sound like maybe a legal issue or something with Lily...

I was on 120mg during the two weeks I was in hospital earlier this year. I didn't notice anything different. But ultimately Cymbalta didn't work for me at ANY dose, so that doesn't help much.