Bad withdrawal

[juanna]

Oh My god am having the most horrible with drawal symptoms; brain shocks; sickness ; diarrhoea and irriatability. How long does this last cos right now feel like i'm gonna die !! Please tell me this doesn't last for long !! Yesterday i was sooo bad i had to chop one of my tablets into quarters and reluctantly took one of the bits; but just hate this drug so much for what it has done to me...

[steveh31]

What are you taking?

[juanna]

Was on venlafaxine 225mg daily; took 150mg in the morning & 75mg at night.

[kibbutz83]

Hi juanna, I know what you're going through :( Been there too... am actually in withdrawal from the demon venlafaxine right now. I wasn't on such a high dose though! You must have pretty bad anxiety to be taking so much? Was it your gp's decision for you to withdraw, or your own? I think it's possibly one of the hardest "legal" drugs to come off.. I feel like I'm dying and going mad too... this will be my fourth attempt at coming off them :( I feel like a "venlafaxine prisoner"... there was another post regarding this.. from brit.. he came off them successfully by using prozac. I wish you luck

[juanna]

Oh dear sounds like you're having a bad time as well !! At the moment I am still having the brain shocks although they are becoming more bearable thank god. I think my anxiety became worse because of the venlafaxine so thats why the dose was high; but thankfully My new GP is supportive and is happy for me to come off it. It's an evil drug & even if i'm desperate it's not one i will ever go back on !! Good luck with you're withdrawal & maybe you would like to become anti- venlafaxine buddies lol !! Juanna

[kibbutz83]

Hi again juanna, yes anti-venlafaxine buddies! Sounds good Maybe we can support eachother through the bad times x

[juanna]

Hey yep that would be good !! compare notes & stuff. Am going to see my psychiatrist this afternoon; so will keep you posted. I feel a bit better today but still getting some brain shocks & this is day five of withdrawal so am really hoping this all stops soon .... How are you getting on today ?

[brit]

HI Juanna, i know what you are going through as i came off Venlafaxine a few weeks ago.
What helped me was taking 20mg of Fluoxetine daily for a week, then stop.
It works in a very similar way to Venlafaxine, but (and this is the key bit) it has a much longer half life, meaning it leaves the body more slowly, in turn creating less horrible withdrawal symptoms.

My doc was sceptical ( i read about it on the net) but it really really helped me.
Also Benadryl helped with the brain zaps.
I feel your pain, but it doesent have to be as bad as it is.
Hope that helps.

[deepreason]

Don't forget the tablets go right down to 37.5 mg in size so you can gradually taper your dose down. Just reduce it a small amount and wait until you feel stable at the new dose ( even if that takes some months) then make another small reduction.

Personally I found both exercise and essential oils helped. Burning a mix of tea tree, lavender, rosemary and eucalyptus in one of those vaporiser things really helped with the withdrawal effects for me.

I got from 300 mg to zero in about 4 weeks but I wanted to rush it to get onto a new med. Not that I'd reccomend doing it that quick but I also needed to get rid of 30 mg of Mirtazapine and have a further 2 weeks cold turkey before I could start my MAOI. Because I did it all so fast I had to use a bit of codeine and some valium. The codeine was no problem but the valium can be a bit addictive afterwards.

[lleksam]

Withdrawal effects lasted about 3-4 weeks for me.