I am currently on day 3 of not taking Effexor anymore. I did a taper over 2 months. I wanted to stop because I did not think it was helping me at all and it was more harmful than anything. I had gone up to 75mg from 50mg in September. I adjusted to the 75mg fine until December when I had a full week of brain zaps and dizziness. The brain zaps would come and go but it was still awful and made it really hard to do my job. I was taking the 75mg pill at the same time every day because of I was even 5 minutes off my schedule I would start feeling the symptoms of withdrawal. My doctor suggested I go down to 50mg and that made things much better. Then I went down to 37.5mg, and again things were better. I went down to 1/2 a pill. Maybe I should have gone down to a quarter of a pill before I fully stopped, but honestly I just wanted to be off of Effexor. Regardless of the dose I was on I was starting to notice that even before I was supposed to take my pill I would feel symptoms of withdrawal. Especially with the 75mg! Day three of withdrawal feels worse than day 2. I haven't had full on brain zaps, but the sensations are pretty close to a brain zap. I have sensitivity to light. I wish I had never started this drug. I took it for about a year(?) when I was in my early 20's (I'm 42 now) and do not recall going through this when I got off of it. I don't think it ever really helped me and now I'm dealing with this b.s.
I have spent the last couple of nights reading through y'all's experiences and it really makes me mad! It's infuriating to know that this drug is so wildly prescribed and yet it's so dang difficult to get off of. The only reason my current Doctor suggested it a year ago was because I had taken it in my 20's. I wish I had said I wanted to explore other options! NEVER AGAIN will I take an SNRI or an SSRI for that matter. The one thing I can say is that my mood has been pretty stable despite it being a couple days before my period and going through withdrawal. I think that's primarily related to the fact that I stated taking a low dose of liquid ketamine 2 weeks ago. If nothing else I am not super depressed even though I typically suffer from PPMD. Now if only my brain could stop feeling weird every time I move! Here's to hoping the withdrawal symptoms subside sooner than later.