Posted by scruff on September 12, 2004, at 15:33:07
In reply to Effexor Withdrawal Highly Overrated, posted by juanantoniod on February 8, 2003, at 22:11:31
> I took Effexor for a while until it stopped working. Like a previous poster, I would accept the side effects for the benefit without question. Withdrawal occurs (mostly) when it is stopped abruptly. When ramped down slowly, there should be no problem.
>Sadly, this is just not true.
> FWIW YMMV
If it helps anyone, great. But it seems there will be withdrawal of some sort from this drug.
Well I had been on Effexor for nearly a year. It was completely unsuccessfully on its own and only marginally successful with the use of supplementals such as seroquel and ativan.
I have finally switched to Wellbutrin and have been very careful about 'ramping down carefully' form the effexor.
The above posting is just plain incorrect. My withdrawal from effexor has been worse than the depression itself. The symptoms of brain shivers, terrible sleep disturbances and extreme agitation have continued fully one week after I took my last tab of effexor.
This has not been an unmanaged withdrawal. I see a psychiatrist weekly.
The drug did next to nothing positive for me and now that I've finally stopped taking it, it persists in hounding me with 'withdrawal'.
I have a hard time finding any mention of ANY withdrawal effects in the pharmaceutical's paraphernalia.
It has been a an arduous journey to come OFF of a drug that is supposed to help depression.
I have had to switch form several other anti-depressants including Zoloft and Paxil. Not only did I NOT have any withdrawal form these medications, I have read/seen little information on anyone who has.
It is clear that the process of withdrawal from any psychotropic drug needs to be studied much more carefully. As for Effexor , perhaps removing it form the market until real study of its withdrawal effects have been made is in order.
I'm all for that.
poster:scruff
thread:13781
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040909/msgs/390022.html