No improvement!

[letitgo]

I swore to my psychiatrist I would not go on Anxiety boards again because it was making me even more neurotic. However, I need help.

I've been on Lexapro for about three weeks. However, for the first two weeks, I was on 5mg. My psych and I decided it was the best thing to do once I was scared of side effects. I didn't have any side effects at all.
5 days ago, I increased it to 10mg. No side effects either. The thing is, it's already been three weeks and I haven't gotten any better. Actually, I'm still neurotic. I've been worrying about this pressure I have been feeling in my head lately. I worry about this every now then, and I even told my psych about that.

Isn't Lexapro supposed to be working? IT'S BEEN THREE WEEKS! I know it was a very low dose, but ugh!!!

[blueangel]

Hi there

As far as I know, 10mg is a very low dose and if you're suffering from severe anxiety it probably won't have much effect on it. I think most people on it take a minimum of 20mg to get an effect, so it may well be that you have to increase the dose again before it has much of an effect on your anxiety.

Hope this helps.

[Tyke]

SSRIs do usually take a while to kick in and because you started with a low dose anyway, they will take a bit longer. I am on another SSRI (Sertraline) and it took about five weeks before I felt any benefit. I am now feeling very much better. I understand your frustration, I felt like that too, but stick with it, it is still far too early to judge whether or not the drug will work for you.

Tyke

[Laneybc]

I think you need to give it a little longer and possibly a higher dose. Talk to the doctor again to find out for sure but try to tough it out because they all take a bit of time to kick in.

[haz]

10mg is the recommended "maintainence dose" for escitalopram for anixety. It's meant to be the equivalent of 20mg citalopram. It took a good 8 weeks for me to feel any significant effect. I would stick with it just now before you consider asking your doctor to increase your dose.

Good Luck.