Posted by Donna Louise on November 24, 2002, at 21:32:48
In reply to Re: Side-effects - best data » Donna Louise, posted by ayuda on November 24, 2002, at 21:15:26
I also know what you mean about the dreams. It was really bad with the paxil. Sometimes I felt like the dream world was more real than than the waking world. I felt like I floated in and out of a dream state all day. That felt like what I call disassociation. I also had it on Effexor. I still am having vivid dreams with the Lexapro but they are not following me into waking life as with the paxil and effexor. I have heard that vivid dreams are a result to something the SRI does to REM sleep. Not sure what it is exactly. By the way, I was on the paxil and effexor at the same time and went off them both while starting the lexapro, doing both over a period of 2 weeks I think it was, and I had very little withdrawal symptoms. I have detoxed from paxil before, without simultaneously starting another SRI and thought I was going to die.
I do not take a mood stablizer, I am just a run of the mill depressive/anxiety type. When I say emotional numbing, I am talking about what may very well feel like what a mood stablizer does, I don't know. I just don't feel as sensitive or reactive. I am thinking that is what a mood stablizer must do, as I type this. hmmm.
Also, to let you know, I also took Celexa for a few months and d/c'd it due to an extreme amount of tension in the neck and shoulders. I am sure there is a word for this...anyway, I do not have that on the lex. So I am a pretty satisfied customer, if I could just get the sex thing settled...Donna Louise
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> Thank you so much for that info. You and JLM have given me the name for that -- depersonalization. It is so appropriate. It makes life feel like being at an IMAX movie, or like you said, like you are dreaming. I am really hoping that I don't experience it with the Lexapro -- and it is heartening to hear that you haven't had it with the Lex. But speaking of dreaming, are you having vivid dreams that feel real with the Lex? I'm having some really zany dreams, which is not like me, but they aren't unpleasant. Just vivid.
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> The emotional numbing, do you mean as if you were taking a mood-stabilizer? If you've never taken one, it pretty much puts you in one mood -- which was necessary for me when I had a tyrant of a supervisor at the time this depression started and I needed to not harm her -- for legal and ethical reasons -- before I could change jobs. I didn't get extremely anything, which I usually do.
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> And I understand your point about normal -- I actually was feeling "normal" for most of my 20s and into my early-30s, so I have this vague memory of what it felt like, which is how I know I'm not it. Then again, even that idea changes over time. The closest I ever came to putting a finger on it was when I started Zoloft the first time, my first SSRI. I was driving down the road and someone attempted to turn left from the right lane, and I was in the left lane, so they almost creamed me. I blew on my horn, pointed my finger at them, then went on, and 3 blocks later I realized that I wasn't still shaking and screaming about it, in fact, I was over it, and I thought, "so this is what it's like to be a normal person." So, as long as I'm not a raving maniac, I figure I, and the rest of the world, am lucky.
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> I'm not completely only on the Lexapro yet -- my doctor increased my Effexor to a slower taper because I was becoming an anxiety-ridden screaming maniac late last week. So I don't know what life will be like when I am only on the Lex.
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> Thanks again for the info and support where the depersonalization is concerned -- since you've experienced it, you know why I don't want to mess with it for a minute. Defeats the purpose of getting my life back from the depression and anxiety!
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poster:Donna Louise
thread:109458
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021122/msgs/129134.html