hi,my name is clare and i started effexor almost 3 weeks ago for PND.i was on prozac before that but it stopped working and a dose increase didnt help.

i have come to this forum mainly looking for reliable info on effexor,as i have read alot of horror stories,but i have felt better on it sofar.

this whole site is huge!i have suffered depression on and off since my late teens so i will be intereted in reading the other forums over the coming weeks as well.

thanks for reading.

Hello Clare!



So happy you found us!

If you're looking for reliable info on meds (Effexor included), you've come to the right place. Please take a minute a read the FAQ page about Effexor. There's a lot of knowledge to be gained from just that page alone.

I've been taking Effexor, along w/ 5 other meds, for over 7 years now. I've suffered most of the nasty SEs associated with Effexor and have made it through. Effexor is one of the 2 meds I credit for my recovery.

What were the reasons for your switch from Prozac to Effexor? How's the Effexor working so far? Any bad SEs?

I know this site is huge. If you have any navigational problems, just ask. I'm only a PM away.

Please keep us posted.



-Bean

thank you for the welcome.

i am going to see my gp this afternoon as for some reason i just feel 'flat' now,even though i felt great for the first 2 weeks.i am a bit scared she will tell me this isnt the right medication for me in that case though...it was the last option for me as i have tried almost everything else,and it was great at first.maybe that was just a side effect?

i have noticed that i am on a fairly low dose compared to alot of other people(75mg a day).

also i need to speak to her about the constipation.i was given lactulose to help with it but its not doing anything.

i dont want to have to stop this med without giving it a fair go though.the only SE i cant put up with atall is drowsiness as i have 5 children ,and this is one of the few medications ive tried that hasnt made me drowsy.

Clare:

I wouldn't worry just yet that Effexor isn't the answer. You are one a very low dose (I take 450 mgs). Perhaps you just need a dosage increase.

Please let us know how the doc appt goes.



-Bean

well,apparently my doctor has never heard of people feeling better the first couple of weeks then not feeling very good on effexor.in fact she basically said that i will probably always suffer some sort of depression on and off as i have been and that medication won't 'cure' me.

she said i have to give it more time,anyway,as it's only been 4 weeks.

i did explain to her that i am aware there is no miricle cure,but what i'm hoping for is to get well enough to be able to deal with the issues that contribute to my depression in the first place.i am waiting for an appointment for CBT,and all im am hoping for is to be able to feel ok enough to be able to learn to change my way of thinking.but as it's a hormone-related depression this time,i know(from experience)that i need medication at this time to get me back on track.

if she had said 'if you still feel like this after X amount of time then we can try increasing the dose' then i would have left there feeling hopeful,but i left the surgery feeling awful,and like an attention seeking,never-satisfied,impatient idiot.

the doc i saw used to be my usual gp,but i started seeing the nurse practitioner instead as i found her easy to talk to,and felt like i was being taken seriously.the nurse p is on holiday though.

Divastrop:

Many meds, Effexor included, have a "honeymoon" period where the med will work wonders right off the bat than taper off some. It takes a few weeks for the med to have any real effect, as the honeymoon period burns out quickly.

As you yourself have said, it's only been 4 weeks. Give it another few weeks, then see the nurse practitioner again and reevaluate the effect the Effexor is having on you. You made the dose tweaked or another med added in.

Please keep us posted.

-Bean

i am currenty in the middle of dosing down on my effexor xr and then switching to cymbalta. my dr started the titration on thurs. i was taking 225 mg on wed. then 187.5 thurs, 150 fri then 87.5 sat and sun, then 75 today and tom, then 37.5 wed and thurs then start with 30 mg of cymbalta. if anyone has any experience with this. please let me know. i have had the usually "body shocks" that my girlfriend and i call them. but along with that mood swings, anxiety and extreme irritability. i am going to try to talk to my dr tomorrow about just starting the cymbalta. i haven't had to work, due to the long holiday wkend and don't know how the next few days at work will be. thanks for listening.

Hello Little Daisy!



Effexor withdrawal can be a nightmare. Switching right away to Cymbalta will probably help reduce these terrible SEs.

Once you make the switch, you may want to check out the Cymbalta room. There's a quite a bit invaluable info there.

Good luck with switch. Please let us know what your doc says.

-Bean

strange that my gp had never heard of the honeyloon period thing.still,not surprising as i had to point out the laxative she was precribing me was sold in most supermarkets very cheap,then she realised she'd put the wrong one down!

i still feel quite 'flat' and last month when i would have felt awful and been very paranoid(i always get paranoid at certain times in the month and think people are talkign about me or my partner is cheating on me online and stuff)i felt fine and got through what would have been the bad time.this month i have noticed the thoughts creeping into my head again,although i am able to control them rather than them controlling me.i feel as though i am getting better but have a very long journey ahead.the light at the end of the tunnel is there now but way off in the distance.

Divastrop:

Recovery is a long road, and you are well on your way. Perhaps the honeymoon period is over, but look at what this med is allowing you to accomplish. You may have a more difficult time this month than last...



...but you were able to work through it and cope better than ever before. That's a BIG deal! A HUGE difference and a major step forward.

It's hard to do, but try not to dwell on how far you have to go. Instead, look back and focus on how far you've come.



-Bean

just having a really heard time with my effexor withdrawals and attempts to contact my doctor. i have tried for several days to contact her regarding my withdrawals and no luck. so i started my cymbalta a day earlier. i have been able to take my anxiety meds to counteract some of the symptoms, but it is still yucky. wanted to see if there was anyone with experience with how long the withdrawals last. thanks.

i'm on 187.5mg , think it needs upping its not doing anything but worried bout the heart issues as have already had ecg.

Thats a pretty fast taper. Hell, I dont even know if I'd call that a taper. Effexor is one of the hardest to get off of anyway and if you are going down that fast then you are sure to get some bad withdrawals. Hopefully the cymbalta will alleviate or even totaly eliminate the effxor withdrawals once you start it.

Yeah, that is a very quick taper... I've heard of docs doing a quick taper only when they were also quickly ramping up another med in the same class of drugs, such as from one SSRI to another. I'm not as familiar with effexor or cymbalta, though, and I just did a quick read on the internet and it seems that docs will sometimes recommend a quick taper, but I'd question him/her about it, and DEFINITELY let your doc know how this is affecting you!

Take care,
Dewayne

Hello Fairy Dust!

I take 450 mgs of Effexor. Although there is the risk of heart problems, all has been well for me (knock on wood) for over 7 years now.

Talk to your doc. If this lower dose isn't working for you, than perhaps you should increase your dose, but not without the advice of you doc. Your doc can closely monitor you for any heart issues.

Another solution would be to add in a new med. Again, talk to your doc.

Please keep us posted.

-Bean

hi the withdrawals shouldn't last too long maybe a week or two.

Eileen

Sorry I didn't see this till today, but that tapering is far too fast unless there is an urgent medical reason for doing so. Is there?

When I stopped Efexor I was told to drop by 37.5mg every 2 to 4 weeks and that was from a dose of 225mg. And for the last 37.5mg take it for 2 weeks and then take 37.5 mg every alternate day for a further 2 weeks. So it took me 8 weeks to quit Efexor.

Eileen

thanks for your response. i am now on day two of my cymbalta and day two of no effexor. i am still having some "shocks" and irritability. most of the other replies that i received said the same. i still have not spoken w/ my psych., but i am hopeful that now that i have started the cymbalta that the wd's will lessen. i really have appreciated the support from you and others on this site. it has helped me out.

thanks for the experience. i now know that it was too fast. i had friends tell me the same thing or that they were tapered and ramped up at the same time since they are in the same class. i knew going into it that it was going to be difficult. i am glad that i have gotten this far without giving up. thanks again.

Little Daisy:

Just wondering what made you taper off of Effexor so quickly. Was there a reason for the rush?

-Bean

Hi, my name's Sophie. I've been on Effexor for almost 3 years now, and I'm still not feeling great. Well, I feel better, or I would have changed for another AD a long time ago, but I'm starting to wonder what I should do. It's so confusing to venture into the world of anti-depressants with no advice, and with the impression that even doctors don't know what they're doing...


To make it short, I started taking 75 mg, prescribed by my GP, then after a year I went to see a psychiatrist, because I did not feel worse, but I did not feel really better either... In fact I was not feeling anything. She increased me to 150 mg, then after 6 months she wanted to dose it down and stop it. I tried to do that, even slower than she advised me, but the result was catastrophic. So a few months ago I saw another psychiatrist, I explained that dosing down was not good, so she put me back on 150 mg.

So basically, I've had a lot of ups and downs due to irregular dosage, but the treatment itself seems to be working, since everytime I increased it back to 150, I felt better. Except that I'm starting to wonder if it works that well... Even when I feel good, I still don't find the motivation to do things. I can't even force myself to do really important things, even if it puts me in danger (like paying bills or looking for a job, for example). So after a while I start to feel guilty or stupid, I'm mad at myself, and I go down again.

I'm really tired of these ups and down, tired of feeling stressed all the time because my material situation isn't improving, and I don't know what to do. Maybe the treatment is not right for me, or it's not strong enough and I should increase, I really don't know.

I wish life could get easier...

GinnyP

Hi and welcome to DF.

I know how frustrating it can be to feel bad and have the ups and downs. Its happened to me also. I was taken off Efexor sometime in 2006 (I think) but went back on it at 75 mg and have since been up to 150 and now am taking 225mg (since this week). 225 mg is the recommended dose, so perhaps you are not at the most effective dose. It may be worth asking to be upped to 225mg and giving that a go for a few months. If you don't start to feel better by then, then it may be time to request a change to another med. However, some people have dysthymia (which I have) and I think thats what you have. Dysthymia is depression which lasts a long time, at least 2 years and can last for a long time if untreated. I feel that sometimes folk with depression need talking therapies as well as or instead of medicine. Have you got a therapist or does your psychitrist do therapy? Psychotherapy can help get at the cause of the depression.

Take care.
Eileen

Hi Eileen, thanks for your reply. Why can't doctors tell you all this, or KNOW all this ? I'd never heard of dysthymia, which doesn't mean that I have it, but I feel like none of the doctors I've seen have tried to really understand the evolution of the illness. My GP just prescribed me the AD as a minor help, and the psychiatrist I saw after that just thought that I needed a little "up" before stopping everything. Maybe I wasn't very clear or honest with them about what I felt, but I didn't really know what my feelings were... well, you know that, I suppose.

Only the last psychiatrist I saw, the one I'm seeing now, used the word "depression" (none of the other two mentioned it, ever, and they never used "anti-depressant" either... which, thinking about it now, I find unbelievable). She also explained the chemical side of depression and the role of the AD, and added that she didn't like effexor. The thing is, she based her prescription on what I told her : that I felt better since I took 150 mg. So she assumed that it was the right molecule and the right dose for me. I think I can trust her (finally !) so I'll try to get an emergency apointment. I didn't know that 225 was supposed to be the right dose... it would explain why I still don't feel good. And I'd prefer that explanation, because if not, then I'd have to change. And I really, really don't want to experience the withdrawal SE again.

As for having a therapy, I did follow one with a psychologist, who I trusted and appreciated. But due to all this, I'm having real financial problems at the moment, and therapy's expensive, so I've stopped for now. That's also why I'm seeing this new psychiatrist, because she's in a free medical center, but she only treats me for the AD. She told me that it was better to put the chemical side right before upsetting myself with therapy ; and in that medical center, there are few therapists, so it takes a while to get an apointment anyway.

So thank God for the Internet and forums, where you can find support and swap advice and experiences.
thanks again, Eileen

This post has been edited by GinnyP: Sep 12 2007, 07:13 PM

No reason. Just what my doc suggested and since I am not a doctor, i chose to trust her. I talked to my primary a couple days ago, and she said that she normally overlaps a titration off and a ramp up. I am now on the other side of it and am waiting to go up on my cymbalta on fri. i hope that the side effects are what i was expecting. i do not want to ever have to go through that again.
thanks for all your support.
t

it is really hard when you don't get the info that you need from your dr. i know that most of the suggestions and advice that i received that was helpful has been from this forum and other people in my life that have gone through se and wd from effexor. i know that when i started on effexor last year i was on 75mg for awhile and then 150 for awhile then 225mg at the end. my dr wouldn't increase any more and i was having some similar symptoms that you expressed...long bouts of depression and apapthy for alot of things. so finally after putting it off for about three months, i decided to make the change. hope that you get what you need and that life starts to shine a little bit for you.

thanks for the advice...as for my doc, i never got ahold of her. oh well. thankfully i had this and other avenues to explore to know that i was gonna be okay.

Oh yeah, it's hard... My last dr even told me that there was no addiction to effexor ! and no se from withdrawal ! That's the moment when I stopped trusting her, because I'd already experienced very unpleasant se when I forgot the ad just for a day.

I hope the switching goes ok for you... it's really hard, when you'd like to worry only about the effects on your mood, to have to worry also about se from the withdrawal AND se from the new ad. You know, 2 days ago on a French forum (I'm French, by the way), there was a girl whose doctor wanted to put her on effexor, just to help her be more self-confident, even though she was not depressive. I made me really mad to think that he wanted her to get addicted to a drug as if it was vitamine or something.

You're right, little daisy, it really helps to have the support of forums and other people who know what if feels like. And you seem confident, and it seems to be going ok. I wish you good luck with all that.

hi - new to here and would like like some advise. 13 years ago I suffered my first episode of depression and Anixety, followed 2 years late by severe post natal depresion and aniexty since then I have been on and off tabelts - mostly feeling fine and Ok, 3 years ago i split with my ex causing extreme depression and aniexty I have suffered badly since then and have been on Zispin my Psychiatrist now wants me on Zispin as well as Efexor XL 75 mg - she says if I wasn't on Zispn my dep would be much worse and I could end up having ECT therapy - want fun!!

I am so scared of taking efexor - keep reading all these scare stories - i have never had any really bad problems with coming off anti Dep before or whilst on them - but efexor seems to be really bad for side effects - why am i so scared or is it my illness that is making anxious that is what my doctor thinks any postive advise would be really helpful - no scare stores please.

Hi apple99

Not everyone has bad experiences with Efexor or any other anti-Depressant. Do you generally tolerate meds ok? If yes then you should have no problems, but I can't be 100% certain.

You will probably hear lots of bad stories about awful side effects from Efexor XL. I had initially, a dry mouth, some constipation, feeling high, problems sleeping, vivid dreams, some twitching, some bad night sweats, but MOST of these go within a week. The only ones that lasted a long time for me were the vivid dreams (which I enjoy) and the sweating (which I didn't but they did stop). When the meds were increased I got some additional side effects such as twitching but that lasted only a few days.

You will hear horror stories because of the nature of the internet. How many people who take Efexor will come online and tell their good stories. You won't get many. But people who have had a bad time will come on and tell their horror stories, but we are all different and people react differently to the meds.

Don't worry too much about the talk about withdrawal side effects. Yes you do get some side effects when coming off, but if you withdraw slowly (in drops of 37.5mg in 2 or 4 week steps) then the side effects will be minimal (or should be). Don't worry about that at the moment. What you need just now is to get help for your current problems.

It can be very anxiety provoking to start new meds. How much of this is due to your anxiety problem?

Give Efexor a chance, it has worked fine for me, although it did take longer to kick in than it does usually for other people. I started out on 75mg and then after a month went to 150mg and I'm now back on 225mg. 225mg is the recommended dose for depression. Although for general anxiety disorder I think the dose could remain at 75mg.

It could take about 4 to 6 weeks for the meds to start helping, but many people have noticed a difference in the first month.

I hope things work out for you.

Eileen

Hi All!

I apologize if this is the wrong place for this post (this is my first post), but after 3 nights of sheer terror (no exaggeration) . . . and going on about 30 hours w/o sleep now . . . I just had to post something.

I guess my history is this . . . I have a history of issues with anxiety, but not with depression. I have periodic panic attacks, but an anxiolytic such as alprazolam or diazepam has always done the job for me perfectly well.

Anyway, my general practitioner seemed to basically be "scared of" or "not comfortable with" prescribing anxiolytics. So, after a while, he shuffled me off to a psychiatrist who is of the mind of, "The much more 'conservative' and 'sensible' way to treat anxiety is with antidepressants, even if you do not suffer from depression and even if anxiolytics treat your problem perfectly well." (Somehow I suspect that the DEA scrutinizes the prescription of anxiolytics much more carefully than it does the prescription of antidepressants, but that's another issue for another time.)

As a result, I was prescribed Effexor. At first it seemed great, because for the first couple of weeks, all I really wanted to do was sleep. I just felt lazy and sleepy all the time. But then came the night sweats, inability to reach orgasm, etc.

I took Effexor for roughly 6 months (still *always* needing to have some alprazolam around for breakthrough anxiety) . . . going to a maximum dose of 300 mg per day. Then, on top of the Effexor, the psychiatrist started also prescribing Depakote . . . all of this w/o him *ever* saying, suggesting or hinting (in any way) that he believes me to suffer from depression, or bipolar disorder, or in fact anything other than the anxiety issues I initially presented with.

More recently, I had occasion to visit my general practitioner for another matter, and when I explained that the psychiatrist (to whom the general practitioner had sent me) had me on both Effexor and Depakote, my general practitioner's response was along the lines of, "Wow; he's got you on some serious psychiatric medication; what's up with that?" All I could really say was, "You tell me; you sent me there even though the prior therapy was working A-OK."

To (try to) make a long story short, it occurred to me that if I still need an anxiolytic as backup even *with* the Effexor, the Effexor hasn't done me much good. I tapered off and stopped the Depakote -- no issues whatsoever -- in fact, I noticed nothing even when I started it. With the Effexor, I tapered from 300 mg per day (going down by about 75 mg increments per week) until last week I was splitting 75 mg capsules and taking 37.5 mg per day. Then, 3 days ago, I stopped the Effexor altogether.

I've gotten the "brain zaps" and all that, but to me that's no big deal.

What I have found to really, truly be terrifying is that now, for 3 nights straight, I have had very, very *bizarre* episodes that feel very much like what I have read about the phenomenon called "sleep paralysis."

The best way I can describe it is that, in that "twilight zone" between being fully awake and fully asleep, I've had episodes since stopping the Effexor where I will see shadowy figures in the room (or have other types of visual disturbances) . . . but I can't move. It seems to pass after about 10-15 minutes, but it is one of the most terrifying things I have ever experienced -- and something I have *never* experienced in my life before recently stopping Effexor. I have also had other sleep-related abnormalities where I will have dreams so vivid that, upon waking, I'm not sure if I just dreamt it, or if it actually occurred.

I just hope it will cease before too long. Today is my 4th day off of Effexor completely.

(NOTE: I'd like to make clear that I am not some alarmist who thinks in simplistic terms such as, "Effexor is bad." If a medication genuinely works for someone and provides them with beneficial effects, I think that's fantastic and I am happy that they have found something that works for them. It just seems that, in my particular case, it did very little to help my anxiety issues (which was the entire initial problem, period), and it has been most unpleasant coming off of the stuff. In retrospect (hindsight always being 20/20), if I had known that the Effexor would not help my anxiety (or, if it did, the effect was negligible), and had known what I was going to experience in coming off the stuff, I would not have taken it.)

I have to admit that I am also more than a bit peeved with the "medical establishment" (or maybe it's the "governmental establishment" with which I should really find fault) . . . in that the anxiolytics such as Valium and Xanax were 100% effective for the anxiety I was experiencing periodically, but it's as if my physicians were so averse to / frightened of prescribing it to me (and I would note, parenthetically, that I have no history of addictive behavior) that they instead wanted to put me on a medication which clearly has a broader spectrum of action than to address only the issues I was actually having. I mean, what sort of sense does that make? To draw an analogy, I feel as though I presented with, say, a broken arm, but they decided instead to put me in a full body cast and traction to boot.

(Oh, and I should probably note in closing that, just the way my particular psychiatrist works . . . he is not one to want to "talk about" issues/concerns at all. His M.O. seems to just be sort of like, "Let's start prescribing you a string of medications (as long as they are not anxiolytics) and maybe we'll get a lucky spin and find one that helps." I'm not a medical professional (I'm an attorney), but to me the idea of "selecting medication by trial and error" seems a bit barbaric. And I'm still at something of a loss to understand why my physicians would quite deliberately steer me away from the one class of medications that has consistently worked for my anxiety.)

Anyway, thank you for listening. I needed a place to "pour forth" what I was feeling right now.

This post has been edited by Desert_Penguin: Nov 10 2007, 09:50 AM

hi DP welcome to DF.

I too have suffered from sleep paralysis but I've suffered from it for years before I was on Efexor. It is a very scary feeling. I find that the episodes occur when I am particulary anxious about things. It might be that taking Efexor makes you more suscepitble to this. I was told that Efexor is an alerting drug and I think that this is true because the dreams are certainly more vivid and memorable. It seems as though we are more aware of our dreams. I certainly know that I am dreaming, whilst having the dream.

Sleep paralysis occurs when you partially wake up but the body is still paralysed, which is a saftey thing the body does to stop us moving about when we sleep.

Sometimes Drs may think you have depression even though you say you suffer anxiety, cos anxiety is a symptom of depression. In any case antidepressants can be prescribed for anxiety (certainly Efexor at the lower dose of 75mg is recommended for Generalised Anxiety Disorder).

You don't say how often you were taking diazepam, but not only is it addicting (you don't have to have an addictive personality to find out this) but you get used to the dose and have to keep upping it. If you were taking diazepam every day then I wouldn't be surprised that they want to take you off them.

ive been on citalopram for a year and a half and i just saw my doctor last week and right now he's gradually decreasing me off citalopram while i gradually increase on Effexor or as it says on my bottle Novo Venlafaxine XL. anyway the idea is to get me off citalopram and on effexor.
I'm also on welbutrin xl which my doctor is going to keep me on as well.

Hi all,

New to the Effexor forum. I have actually wanted to go on this drug for a long time because for a med it has by far the coolest name for an AD IMHO.

I had success with depression on Citalopram but developed horrendous muscular pains which turned out to be anxiety symptoms (it was actually making me double anxious). I also tried Sertraline which gave me the same symptoms after twenty minutes. I am wondering whether I have some adverse reaction to SSRI's, so Effexor seems like a more promising choice. I took this pill an hour ago and no problems yet!

I'm new to this board.I've been on Cymbalta for a year and it quit working plus I gaines 20 pounds while I was on it.My doctor is tapering me off of it and started me on Effexor .This is my 5th day on it but I don't feel any different but I have been having some withdrawal effects like the zaps and headache and dizziness.

I have alot of animals and I work with dogs at a pet resort.That's where I got my moniker.I've found that pets help alot with the depression too.

dogmom, you're a person after my own heart, I grew up on a ranch with lots of animals, from dogs to sheep, cows to horses and chickens, it was a good childhood. I use to work at a Marriott here in Southern Cal, we had flamigos from Argentina and other animals, we also had a lady who took care of them full time. When I'm off Paxil I get similar with-drawl effects, plus I get very irritable and I start to snap at my family. It usually takes a couple of weeks for the medication to kick in. When I first started taking meds I got a big boost two or three days after I started, than the effect lessened and stabled out in about two weeks. I think you should be ok. Thanks for getting back to me and if you need to converse please do not hesitate to leave a message and I promise to get back to you. Please have a pleasant Sunday and take good care of your self always, FV

I take 150 now after a couple of months on 75. I slid back int o my depression coupled with lots of anger/rageduring those 2 months on 75mg. My dose was upped to 150, but that was 2 weeks ago and I seem to feel even worse.
Looking for some answers.

Peace,
Darcy

Crazylife72
do go back to your dr and tell them you feel worse. Things can be done to make you feel better. It might be that efexor is not the right drug for you.

Take care.

Eileen

Hi, I'm Paul,

Been on Paroxetine for about 7 years, then recently Mitrazapine for the last 6 months.

Not sure if Mirtazapine is the answer (get agitated and edgy, difficulty getting motivated), and doc has suggested Effexor to try next. Not sure...

Paul

Efexor is supposed to be able to help people where other types of ADs haven't helpt, like SSRIS and Tricyclics.

Eileen