Today marks seven weeks on antidepressants—five of which have been on 20mg of paroxetine. I still feel a sense of unreality in my head and body all day long, along with intense anxiety and panic. My doctor says I need to give it more time, but I’m afraid this medication isn't going to help me... Could someone give me a little boost of positivity? 😢😢😢
I’m sure this is regularly asked and I’ve browsed a few threads, the consensus seems to range from a hard no to a pretty hard no, but..
I’ve had depression 5 years and finally jumped to meds today been prescribed 50mg Sertraline (Zoloft)
I have cut down on my drinking massively, but it’s a big part of my life in sales, both with colleagues and clients
Am I going to have to cut alcohol out of my life completely? I’ve read about risks to the liver and terrible days after even 2 beers with anxiety and worse depression
Hi everyone, I love this community and could really use some advice.
I recently increased my Fluoxetine to 40mg after 6 weeks on 30mg where I was having an improvement but not quite to the level I was needing, so me and my GP decided to increase again. It’s been 7 days now on my increase, and I am really, really struggling. I am having extreme anxiety/distress/dizziness/paranoia/shakes and I feel extra emotional, crying daily whereas I never find myself crying.
I just feel in such distress, I had this same thing when I upped from 20mg to 30mg and it settled down. It‘s just this increase feels really hard. I have a benzo I take but it doesn’t seem to help my agitation/anxiety. It’s a double edged sword because I’m definitely better on Fluoxetine than without it, but the initial dose increase is really difficult to deal with. I’m hoping this will ease soon, it’s been 1 week on my increase. I have nausea and emetophobia as well, but I’ve had many tests and my nausea is purely a byproduct of my anxiety.
Fluoxetine has been the most tolerable and effective antidepressant after trialling nearly 10 over the years, so I really don’t want to stop yet and I want to see how a 40mg dose long term will benefit me. Is this to be expected? I’m just so frightened and on edge.
I have depression, OCD, social anxiety, and executive dysfunction (possibly caused by autism and its consequences on social life), combined with very low motivation for pretty much everything. My psychiatrist wants to prescribe me a very high dose of sertraline (200mg). However, I’m worried that it could make my already flattened emotional state even more numb and potentially reduce my motivation even further.
My biggest source of motivation right now is actually the anxiety and panic I have about my future. I’m constantly afraid of what will become of me if I don’t get my life together. I’m worried that if sertraline takes away this anxiety, I might lose the only thing that currently pushes me to do anything.
Has anyone experienced something similar? Especially people who already had low motivation and emotional blunting before taking sertraline?
I’ve already taken 150 mg of sertraline in the past, but I stopped taking it because I wasn't sure whether the emotional blunting and low motivation were actually caused by sertraline or whether they were mainly the result of my depression and social isolation at the time. Also this was a few years ago so I forgot the specific effects it had on me.
What sertraline definitely caused, though, was sexual dysfunction. This was very noticeable and one of the main reasons I eventually stopped taking it. However in my state rn I would prefer that over my negative emotions
So now I’m unsure whether I should be worried about the emotional blunting getting worse with a higher dose, or whether what I experienced back then was simply my depression and isolation.
I ve been on SSRIs for more than 10y (M39). I exercise a lot, my body is in a better shape than most of my friends and I have much greater strength (I can deadlift 400lbs). However I'm not lean and I have low libido. Thing is Im not sure if these problems come from the medication, bad sleep (not the best sleeper), sweet tooth or because Im getting older. What about you?
Spouse started Zoloft a few weeks ago at 25mg. Just recently started exhibiting severe OCD, insomnia, frequent urination and increased thirst. The urination and thirst isn't the problem. The OCD tendencies are going in/out the front door or bedroom all hours of day/night. Clinginess is new as they've never been clingy before. I'm mentally exhausted and don't get much sleep as a result. I get it's a new med. Prior they were on Lexapro but it was giving them heart issues. Right now I have to be at my parents house to sleep and I freaking hate it.
Has anyone else experienced this problem? If so, what's a generalized duration of these exhibiting behaviors?
Hey, any males happy or talk about more intimate side effects?
32F, 1.71-70 kgs here.
I live in a country that’s super sunny and i love my walks with iced latte.
However, since I started Fluoxetine 1 week ago (got to 40 mg now) - heat intolerance is driving me mad. I can’t stay under the sun for longer than 30 mins otherwise I feel dizzy - lightheaded - faint. It is scary.
Prior to this I used Cipralex, up to 20 mg and I never had this issue.
My psychiatrist told me I should stick out few more weeks and if it doesnt improve we’d change. I heard great things about Fluoxetine but this is way too scary.
Now what I want to ask is, did anyone have such an issue on fluoxetine that improved over time or it just sticks as long as we use it?
Thank you!
Doctor gave me 20mg fluoxetine and I had a breakup the minute I stepped out of appointment. I am really emotionally struggling and it’s only the first day. I will be taking it by tomorrow and I want to avoid the initial increase in anxiety. Please can someone guide me if they experienced it and how they managed it. (Also will it help with separation anxiety and abandonment issues?)
Hi all, I’ve been reading through all the threads on this sub and some are super reassuring.
Little back story: I’m 48 (F), since my teens I have been prescribed pretty much every single SSRI on the market. I’ve also gone many years with taking nothing also.
The past three years I’ve just relied on a backup of lorazepam for when I have really bad panic attacks.
( going through a bad betrayal and separation, so these were / are frequent).
I’ve always suffered from extreme anxiety and OCD and bouts of depression. The last time I took an antidepressant was seven years ago when I was pregnant with my son and at that time I was given Zoloft and I was taking a very small dose of 6.25 mg which I believe worked at the time and I don’t remember having any bad side effects but I’m really not sure.. I’m also perimenopause and in therapy for narcissistic abuse, and trauma. I am super medication sensitive so I started on 6.25 mg 10 days ago and I felt the effects pretty quickly.
My experience so far:
I take it at night because it does make me tired and I’ve actually been sleeping good at night but the last two nights I’ve woken up and not been able to go to sleep for about an hour. With random thought of stuff that stressing me out.
For a couple of days, my mood felt lighter, but I was having massive anxiety attacks when I first woke up, but then they would go away within a half hour and I would feel fine or hair a bit spacey .. on day four I got the dreaded diarrhea and I just felt muted and numb in my emotions.. day 5, 6 and seven I noticed things were not bothering me as much as they used to and I could think more clearly and be more present i’ve also been super motivated doing laundry, posting things online I need to sell, taking longer walks with my dog, cleaning up my son’s bedroom etc.. but I’ve also noticed I’m getting irritated in the evenings as the day goes on.
Day 10 I did wake up sad ( I also therapy this morning, which probably made things worse because we brought up a lot of trauma ) and I’ve just felt really low all day. I’m wondering if this is par for the course and if it will turn around, I’m fine staying at the dose for quite a while..
If anyone felt the same I’d love to hear, I’m trying to tough it out but today was rough, this is also a hard week for me as I’m dealing with some pretty crap stuff.
I get worried it will get worse and if i should just quit.
Have SSRIs helped anyone with “anticipatory grief” ?
Ever since starting Celexa I got the same wave of tiredness/dread/ craving for junk food around the same time every day around 3:30 -5pm I only took Celexa for 7 weeks then stopped. The same feeling is still there I have stopped taking it it’s been two weeks and I still have the same feeling. Will this goes away?
Occasionally I drink alcohol on Prozac, mostly I'm just fine as I only drink 1-2 drinks.. Just having fun and what not but when I over-do it like this weekend; it's living hell.
I had 5-6 stronger beers and while I had a lot of fun: The day after I felt so off, like medication wasn't there to aid me.
Racing heart, racing brain, stomach upset, anxiety.
Luckily I only over-do it let's say once a year, but even then I'm very rough on myself and blame it all on me.
Not really a discussion or rant, just a story of a person who takes his daily ssri and is só good on them but once a year I have a drink too much. Oops.
I was on Zoloft for 6 months two years ago. It wasn’t the first time, I had been on it for 7 months the year before that.
I noticed that I became much more irritable and my threshold for anger became very low, which was concerning because I had never had any anger issues. It was a rare occasion that I would get furious about something.
I decided to stop Zoloft after I once completely crashed out on my friends for fucking with me. I felt absolutely out of character, and even my friends were confused.
Fast forward to today, 2 years later, and the anger issues never went away.
Did the medicine somehow cause some irreversible change? Is that even possible?
PS: During those 2 years, I also went on Lexapro for a little less than a year, and I stopped it again about a month ago.
just over a year ago my depression was being managed very well on effexor (sorry i know, snri not ssri). i was on it for two years and it was like i was finally myself again, i didn't know i could experience that kind of joy in life after becoming so depressed in college. the only thing was that it made me sleep an insane amount so i needed to find a different medication or risk not being able to work full time.
basically i went off any medication for about two months, then couldn't get out of bed so was prescribed meds again. cymbalta, zoloft, pristiq ... but none of my depressive symptoms were really alleviated other than being able to function at a minimal level. i have experienced passive suicidal ideation for about a year now. i'm not sure what changed in my brain but no medication seems to work, i seem to have developed treatment resistant depression. i went back on effexor, it has been just over two months now and i don't feel any different. before it had basically lifted all my problems away, and now i don't even get the side effects i used to from it. i feel this is the worst my mental health has ever been, i don't know what to do.
around the time my mental health declined was when i started grad school and moved 40 min away to a local city. i don't feel like i belong at this school or city but it was the best financial option for me as they gave me funding. if this is the life circumstance that made my brain so depressed i feel a bit ridiculous, as obviously it is a good thing to be getting more education and getting on my feet.
i just don't know what happened to my brain, does anyone have any similar experiences or thoughts?
I’ve been on a variety of SSRIs since I was 8. I decided to go cold turkey on Prozac which I’ve been on since 18.
Why? Because I wanted to cry. I wanted to feel real emotions. As well, it made me feel exhausted constantly. I felt like I was far too reliant on my SSRI as I still had horrific OCD flares and the medication only lessened the intensity, it never actually stopped the thoughts.
However, months later I am now faced with constant crippling anxiety and extreme OCD flareups. I’ve been able to somehow power through but I hit maybe one of the deepest depressions I’ve ever been in last month. I still have my moments now.
Alongside this, I began experiencing flu-like symptoms such as body aches, headaches, and general malaise. These symptoms are still somewhat persistent.
Is there anything I can do (and no, I don’t want to try another SSRI)? Does this eventually fade? Is there a term for what I’m experiencing?
Ive been on SSRIs for almost 6 years now and ive faked so many orgasms with multiple partners. I kinda got used to faking it and I didn’t really care ab actually getting an orgasm.
But now everything’s different I’m seeing someone I really like and they went down on me for like 30 mins and I felt so bad because it literally did not feel like anything. I want to be able to get an orgasm from this person because I find them very attractive and I don’t want them to question that but stopping my SSRIs or lowering the dosage is not an option for me.
I’m also on bupropion to offset the sexual side effects but it does nothing. I think I’ve had like one orgasm in 6 years wtf do I do.
SSRIs - did starting with a low dose help avoid side effects for you?
Okay, so, a couple weeks ago, I had a severe anxiety attack and August 12th I had my doctors appointment.
I take Sertraline as well. He upped my dosage from 100mg to 150mg and also prescribed me Buspar 7.5mg HCL tablets..this is my first time taking Buspar and I took my first tablet yesterday morning and omg, I slept most of the day away. I got sooo tired. But, idk if it’s both meds making me tired, since he upped my sertraline or what. Also, my Buspar bottle says “take 1 tablet by mouth three times a day AS NEEDED for acute anxiety”…so, that means I take this medication 3 times a day or just AS NEEDED? Because I looked up the medication and it’s NOT a short term medication until my sertraline kicks in. I told my doctor I needed something for short term and he prescribes me Buspar…but the label, to me, is kinda confusing. 🫤 I know the Buspar needs to be taken every day, so it’ll start working. How do yall space out taking your Buspar? Just like, once in the morning, lunch, and dinner?
I’m completely new at taking Buspar. So bear with me lol.