Re: 2 weeks off Duloxetine - now the tears are hitting hard
Hello Yvonne,
My hearts goes out to you, I mean that with 100% sincerity.
I am currently in withdrawal from Duloxetine (Cymbalta) as well, it has been about eight weeks since I took my last dose and I tapered down slowly. To be honest the tapering down seems to make no difference to me as I have quit meds cold turkery (I know that is unadvisable but it was years ago and I was much younger) before and this tapered off withdrawal from Duloxetine has just as severe side effects. Without the help of my Pyschotherapist and other alternative beliefs, then I wouldn't have made it this far.
The first four/ five weeks were the hardest, I won't lie to you. My digestive system took the brunt of the physical symptoms and I had everything imaginable - constant nausea, abdominal pains, diarrhroea, bloating and coulldn't keep any food at all down for the first three weeks. Thankfully the digestive probs have eased up now but I still get awful bloating and stick to eating plain food.
Do you get the feeling that your mind was torturing you? That you were being 'attacked' by your own thoughts? That was the worst withdrawal symptom for me, I really though I was losing my mind and would have a complete nervous breakdown.
As for the crying, I welcome those tears so much as I find they release a lot of tension. Having been on anti depressants and tranquillisers constantly all my adult life (since I was 16, I am 37 now), I didn't realise how much the meds suppressed my emotions. I literally had not cried in years and years and years. At first the crying terriefied me as it felt like I was losing control of myself but then I realised I felt better after a bout of crying so now I hope the tears will come. Tears are healing, I definitely believe that and crying is a natural human emotion that I was deprived of for most of my adult life.
Other symptoms are pressure on and around my head; utter exhaustion - I am literally dragging my body around but I was always tired on the meds anyway; lack of concentration; irrational fears; insomnia (which has eased up now); aches and pains all over my body and general mental distress.
The Duloxetine didn't benefit me in any sense so that is why I came off it. I tapered off an anti psychotic called Seroquel (Quetiapine) at around the same time so that probably increased my withdrawal symptoms.
It is good that your family know what you are going through, I always kept things to myself but my therapist encouraged me to tell my sister and mother what I was going through and they were surprisingly understanding and sympathetic. I live alone and the solitude was making me worse so now I sleep at my parents' home or my sister's home if I feel I can't be on my own. I am trying to be kind to myself, I have always been my own worst enemy.
I totally agree with you that it is very disheartening when you get a down day after having a few good days, it is discouraging and most days I don't feel I have the strength to carry on.
However what keeps me going is the knowledge that once the withdrawal symptoms have gone for good, I will experience what it is like to be 'Me' without anti depressants for the first time in my adult life. That excites me and scares me but is something I definitely want to experience. I am dying to know who I really am without the cloud of anti depressants masking my true self.
You are being really strong and positive and your determination to be med free is great. I am not 'against' all meds, just against taking meds that don't benefit us in any way. Why pickle our bodies with chemicals from meds that don't help us in any way? From a practical point of view, there are very few anti depressants left for me to try. I would estimate that I have been on 15 different anti depressants over the last 21 years. The only one that helped me was Prothiaden and I had a good 4/5 years on that, but then it stopped working for me (which I belive is a common enough occurence with longterm medication use) and nothing else worked. So I hope with all my heart that Duloxetine is the last one I ever take. Touch wood and fingers crossed.
I really, really wish you well Yvonne and I hope you and I both manage to achieve our goals of being med free.
I am also addicted to benzos so I still have to face withdrawal from them at some stage in my life. I just want to be in control of my own feelings, even the fearful ones. Yes, I may feel bloody awful without time but I have felt bloody awful on them as well. However I am not even thinking about the benzo withdrawal now, that is a long way off in the future when I hope to be strong enough to tackle it.
Best of luck Yvonne and you are in my thoughts. On a completely selfish note, it has reassured me to find someone who is experiencing as bad withdrawal symptoms as me in regards to the Duloxetine. It always helps to know we are not the only one.
Be kind to yourself Yvonne,
Love Ellen 
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'Come away o human child to the waters and the wild.' - Yeats
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I think the withdrawal from this anti-depressant is really the problem for a lot of people who have taken it, though some have been unwell whilst on it too. 
