View Full Version : Cipralex 10mg to 20mg - increased anxiety?
Hi,
I had been on Cipralex 10mg for quite a while (although I was supposed to be on 20mg) for anxiety/depression. My doctor asked me to go up to 20mg which I have been on for about a week. I am finding my anxiety and depression to be the same or worse - is this usual and just a side-effect? When can I expect to start seeing a decrease in these symptoms? Any help appreciated, thanks!!
Nixe:
When I first went on Cipralex i went through a week to 20 days where my anxiety symptoms got worse. Increased anxiety is a known side effect of your body adjusting to the medication. It should mellow out soon.
Mike
Thanks Mike, I didn't realise that increasing the dosage would have the same side effects as when starting the medication for the first time :/
Thumbelina
02-12-12, 12:55
Hi nixe,
That what was with me 6 years ago. I started cipralex and i gpt worse - i was so upset, as i thought it was supposed to make you feel better. Doctor was insisting on me continuing and promised it will get better later. I followed his advise and it did get better.
Hi,
I had been on Cipralex 10mg for quite a while (although I was supposed to be on 20mg) for anxiety/depression. My doctor asked me to go up to 20mg which I have been on for about a week. I am finding my anxiety and depression to be the same or worse - is this usual and just a side-effect? When can I expect to start seeing a decrease in these symptoms? Any help appreciated, thanks!!
Hi Nixe,
I'm in the same boat as you - I was just starting to feel better from being on 15mg dose, but dr insisted I up to 20mg.
3days later my panic/anxiety came back almost worse than in the beginning and side effects like burning hands, hot flushes and no appetite(to name a few...).
Hope to hear that it will pass soon and that we will feel some real benefits.
Good luck to you and please keep posting if you feel better.
Hi Nixe, I was supposed to up to 10mg's yesterday but have had increased anxiety the last few days on 5mg's but have a really bad cold so I don't know if that's effecting me. I've been on Cipralex 28 days but the first week I only took half a pill so also suspect I might have reached the peaking period where the 5mg's has now totally gone into my blood stream and just needs to get used to being there. If it's any consolation I am super sensitive to SSSRI's and always get heightened anxiety with the, whether it be starting them off or increasing a dose but things always do ease off if you can just stick it out and as I was on normal Citalopram 3 times and this is much newer form, I have every faith in it getting me back to how I was this time last year: PERFECT!!!!! Hope you will be ok (: I absolutely hate feeling like this, all nervy but hopefully it will all soon be a bad memory again really soon. Keep in touch won't you x
Cocomademoiselle
05-12-12, 11:47
Hi, the first time I took Cipralex I had no start up effects so was very encouraged by this. Started at 10mg and had to go up to 20mg 2 years down the line, again fine. I trusted it and new it worked so had every faith in it. This time im back on it I expected everything to be the same easy start up etc quick results, what I found was I felt worse ?! I panicked OMG its not going to work this time around, im going to be stuck in anxiety forever and also depression, I thought I was going mad, horrible thoughts, wanting to die. Anyway, went back on 10mg for one week, I thought eff it Im gonna go up to 20mg quickly mainly because I Wanted to get it in my system as quickly as possible. I did feel worse for about 2 weeks was confused as the first time I remember it working very, very quickly. I had a horrible weekend awful, but Monday I was at work and I felt "ok" ?! I didnt want to hope but I actually felt ok. The next day was ok and today is ok so far apart from being late for work due to snow but what can you do. My doc said it takes 4-6 weeks to feel better and get full benefit. When people say "you will feel worse before you get better" you just hear the feel worse and think it wont go away, but it can and will.
So encouraging, thank you so much. And so so glad you are feeling so much better xxx
How are you today Nixe??? I hope your side effects of increasing are dying down a little now (: I'm supposed to due an increase but want to give it another couple of days until I am over a cold and I have stocked up on sedatives (wimp, ha ha)
It's been exactly one week now since I upped my escitalopram dose from 15mg to 20mg - it's been a bit of a nightmare so far and no end in sight yet...
I wonder if I should prepare myself for another 4weeks of this terrible anxiety before relief kicks in?
How are the rest of you doing wrt side effects/anxiety from upping your dosage?
(I guess it would help to know i'm not suffering alone:blush:)
I'm about to up to 10mg Daniel but not looking forward to it now and it's so near Christmas too. Has your doctor not given you anythign to help at all? At leats mine has and I keep just telling myself most people actualy start out on 10mg's so it can't be so bad, where a syou are upping to the biggest dose you can be on though when I did that on normal Citalopram and went from 20mg's to 40mg's I was 100% well after a fortnight of feeling a bit rough so I hope that's what you find happens for you (:
Hi Karen,
my doctor gave me Urbanol to cope with the anxiety and I do use it but don't want to overdo it, as I tapered myself off it about 3 weeks ago, so I felt like a failure for going back on it again, plus, it was hard to taper off it...
having said that, the urbanol does not really make me feel that much better:weep:
I wake up in panic in the mornings, take an urbanol, but by the time it kicks in the tone has already been set for my day. I usually start to feel a bit better towards the end of the day, but this week I just felt bad throughout the whole day.
I wanted to ask you: did your doctor prescribe you a specific dosage? the reason i'm asking is that i'm wondering if it is not prolonging the agony of slowly upping the dose if you are going to have side effects every time you go up?
He gave me 5mg's to start but I only took half for 9 days and to be fair haven't really had that many problems, I had a few worse days earlier on this week after I'd increased to the whole 5mg's for a couple of weeks but seen totally fine again now but not better obviously as I still very much wake up very anxious still but do go MANAGABLEY ok around 10am time which is brilliant really on only 5mg's. I'm so scared to just double up my pill but wonder if you are right, going up by halving might just draw out the side effects?????
my story in short on escitalopram:
my doctor prescribed 20mg to start off - he did not know i suffered from anxiety and the prescription was for depression beacause i had to cope with witnessing my father's death as well as struggling with giving care to my mother who has altzheimers.
well... i took that 1st 20mg pill, not knowing at all about the side effects. i ended up in ER...
after all that, i also started on 2.5mg for 8days, then 5mg for 7days, then 10mg for 7days.
at that stage i had weened myself off the urbanol and then I upped to 15 mg.
Going from 10mg to 15mg was the easiest and i didn't even take other calming medicine!
That's why it's so perplexing to me that going up to 20mg is so hard now.:shrug:
With any luck you should be over the worst soon though hey darl...so so sorry to hear about your Dad btw and Mum. Well done you too for being strong enough not to take nay calming meds increasing from 10 to 15. Really do hope you feel better soon.
thanks karen, I hope we can pull through this tough time together
Have you felt any calmer today Daniel? I really think you'll be ok in couple more days now the extra Cipralex should be settling down. I've still wimped out of increasing to 10mg's but I am going to do it on Monday when my little boy goes back to school and the house is nice and quiet if I do get more anxious, I'm usually very good during the day now but haven't come off Lorazepam/avtian yet. The 5mg's isn't quite doing it for me though so I do think I need to increase.
no, today still the same, apart from the fact that i now also have a tooth ache!:mad:
thanks for asking.
funny thing about these meds - my fiancee takes 10mg for mild depression and she did not have one single side effect from it, nor any anxiety....
you should ask your doctor to assist you with a plan for tapering off your calming meds when you are ready.
AW sorry to hear you are still getting side effects, they have to pass any day I am sure now so keep hanging on in there Daniel. You don't think the 20mg's is just too high for you do you though???
I'll be ok coming off Lorazepam, I've done it all before but though I am feeling much better I do feel I probs need at least 10mg's of Cipralex to fully stabalize (:
Hope the heightened anxiety is calming down :)
Nixe and Danniel how are you both now? Really hope things are calming down (:
---------- Post added at 13:06 ---------- Previous post was at 13:00 ----------
What was going up from 5mg to 10 like???? I didn't get much anxiety starting out on 5mg but did feel really aggitated whenever I first woke up but have had niggling nervousness a lot this week and I've ony upped to 7.50mg's for the last couple of nights, sleep back to been bad too and yesterday I had horrible flat mood
but thats fine today.
this is a test - i have problems logging on
---------- Post added at 15:20 ---------- Previous post was at 15:07 ----------
.....weird:)
anyway, i'm still feeling crap since upping to 20mg exactly 2weeks ago.
I feel terrible in the mornings, struggle through the day and have some relief inthe evenings.
i felt bad thoughout the whole process of upping from 2.5 , 5, 10, 15 so i guess that's just the way it is.
I saw a table somewhere on the internet that compared the side effect of 10mg dose vs 20mg dose and the bigger dosage had double the side effects in users.
just remember that although you may feel bad initially, the medicine is supposed to treat those bad feelings in the long run so it is better to just bite the bullet and get it done the sooner the better.
I know it's terrible. and it's annoying to read other threads where it seems that people just go on for months and months hoping to feel better but it never seem to happen.
I wonder if the people who eventually gets relief from escitalopram just stop posting because they feel better?
what do you think?
Aw so sorry to hear, you don't think 20mg's is too strong do you, how long did you give each dose to settle?
I'm still no better either really and stuck on 7.50mg's that's all....I'm hoping once I get to 10 I'll start feeling more relaxed after the first couple of weeks of upping it any hows.
I know it always takes me a good while on ssri's to feel fine again, I think it took 4 months last I was on one without needing Lorazepam/Ativan too but was hoping Cipralex would work much faster.
---------- Post added at 12:36 ---------- Previous post was at 11:47 ----------
Yes and I defo think people stop coming on here once they are better, I know I always do (;
Yes and I defo think people stop coming on here once they are better, I know I always do (;
I'm still here! :)
Mike
Thumbelina
14-12-12, 17:25
It did happen to me before from 10 to 20mg with cipralex, I was telling doc I thought I was getting worse than better. She was telling me just wait and see and be patient. It worked eventually. This episode 6 years after I just decided to take 5mg only though she put me on 10. 3 weeks after starting cipralex again after over a year break i don't think I need more than 5 mg so will stick to it for now.
It was absolutely terrible for 2 weeks since 1st attack this time - no sleep, all possible symptoms - in their worst way... Like never before - but it's getting better day by day - so whatever it is - self therapy, no choice, or anything else - its working...
My friend who know ab my relapse said today - you look so fresh, so much better than 3 weeks ago - what is it ..... I said - it's magic tablets "...:yesyes:
You have to believe that they will help you...
:) Thumbalina, it's good to hear you are starting to feel better day by day. I am in the rarly stages of a dose increase so feel a bit wobbly again and back to having the flushes etc, oh and bad heads. am just hoping might settle a little in time for Christmas, hope you continue to get better every day.
Any better Nixe and Daniel? I've had increased anxiety for the past 4 days or so but this afternoon I feel much better but have been out in town, started off very nervous but it totally wore off especially when I ende dup in the pet store cooing over little baby rabbits and guinea pigs, ha ha! William is asking for a rabbit for Christmas but I looked and thought nope, not yet anyhow!
My friend who know ab my relapse said today - you look so fresh, so much better than 3 weeks ago - what is it ..... I said - it's magic tablets "...:yesyes:
You have to believe that they will help you...
I agree Thumbalina. You have to believe the meds will work, its counterproductive to worry about every side effect you experience. I know its hard sometimes, but I think having a very positive outlook is a real key.
Take care,
Mike
I totally agree and every faith in Cipralex because Citalopram worked wonders for me 3 times and hat was the old type so I am hoping the new stuff is better, ha ha!
Having a good day so far after a rocky start. Just popping over onto your thread Mike for a chat xxx But my heightened anxiety seems to have calmed down (:
i have been on 10 mg for a few months now, got better but now getting worse (depression and anxiety) ... my counselor asked me to call my doctor for an increase. i did, left a message for her, haven't heard back yet but am a bit nervous about going up to 20 during the holidays.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.5 Copyright © 2024 vBulletin Solutions Inc. All rights reserved.