Effexor Diary

Figure I'll try to keep an update here, for myself and for anyone else reading. So I took my very first dose Tuesday and shortly after started feeling very sick, dizzy, generally out of it. I stayed in bed all day and was too scared to take it again, but last night I finally got the courage to try again (with the help of Ativan), because I'm frustrated at being so anxious and depressed all the time. Woke up today feeling surprisingly fine! I'm still anxious and constantly scanning my body and brain to see if I can "feel" it doing anything. Hopefully the day continues to go okay, and I'll take it again tonight. I'm on 37.5mg.

Took it again after dinner yesterday. Had a lot of trouble sleeping and felt more anxious and agitated today. Feeling a bit off. Not sure I want to continue on this one.

Hope you're doing better.
I started ven on 75mg in the mornings and had a similar experience. Not so much nausea, but definitely high anxiety and spaced out. Within 2 days I decided it was too much and dropped down to 37.5mg at night. After a couple of weeks, the change to 75mg was much less of an issue with only a little nausea for a week. Since then, and over a number of months, I've made my way up to 300mg/day with hardly any side effects and the anxiety is now better than before I started. Sleep isn't great but over the counter sleeping tablets do the trick.
I personally think the 'out of it' feeling is from being overwhelmed by the anxiety and, can only go by my own experience, but unfortunately it's always worse before it gets better. With ven, I think the spaced out feeling went after about a week and the anxiety and low mood went up and down for another week before I levelled off.