Hi All,

Another Newbie but have been reading the NMP posts over the last 3 weeks since starting citalopram 10mg and found it a great help, so thanks to all other members who posted about citalopram.

I tapered off Mirtazapine as it seemed it was no longer working after 4 years on 45mg to 30mg for a week then 15mg for a week and started the 10mg of Citalopram 3 weeks ago. The first 10 days of Citalopram were hell, as alot of you can relate too! Only getting 1 hours sleep at the most per night even with temazapam as well. Also experienced a huge increase in suicidal thoughts (even though I feel I would not act upon them it was on my mind constantly) my anxiety was through the roof and depression through the floor but after about 10 days this all seemed to die down apart from the insomnia and I am getting about 3 hours a night now which is better than before.

Went to the Doctors today for a review and he is keeping me on 10mg of citalopram and changed my sleeping tablet to Zopiclone 7.5mg, so fingers crossed I will get a good nights sleep tonight!!

I have read on NMP that 20mg is considered the theraputic dose and 10mg of citalopram is just to get your system used to it. I am a bit more optomistic now and who would not be after going through hell for the first 10 days or so on Citalopram- I think my feeling now is just relieve that things have settled a bit.

After my rambling, my question would be, should my GP not have increased my dose to 20mg instead of keeping me on 10mg for at least another month. He said he did not want to rock the boat after I explained the side effects I encountered, however, now that I am 3 weeks on I would like my depression to be the priority and am worried that 10mg will not help my depression. I know I may experience the side effects again if I go up to 20mg (but should be reduced side effects), then 40mg in longer term.

I got a new 1 month supply of 10mg Citalopram today which means I could increase my dose myself to 20mg a day and then see my GP in 2 weeks, when that runs out or should I wait and allow 10mg more time? I want to get the benifits of Citalopram sooner rather than later and dont know if 10mg will help with the depression, as it is a low dose.

Any views on this would be appreciated?

Thanks

Jeff