I have posted extensively about titrating off of several medications. Unfortunately despite my best efforts, daily vigorous exercise, and a very clean diet, I can not shake the discontinuation effects of venlafaxine. About a month after stopping venlafaxine I stopped sleeping more than two hours at a time. I fell into a suicidal depression that no amount of less dreadful medication would lift me out of. On Friday my provider put me back on venlafaxine.

I was on 450mg daily for fifteen years and I believe it is accountable for a lot of the issues I had over that time. My provider just started me at 75mg to be increased to 150mg this week. I am hoping the discontinuation effects will subside without having to go back to 450mg. Right now the situation is bad. I am still not sleeping despite my provider having tried all the usual suspects. Worst of all I am profoundly depressed and hanging on by my fingernails.

Had I done more research I would not have stopped this medication as fast as I did. It seems it can take people years to titrate venlafaxine. Given the length of time I was on it and the very high dose I took, four months was too fast. It is maddening that my provider still believes it was out of my system quickly.

It takes weeks to ramp up and changes the way the brain functions, but after fifteen years it was out of my system in a couple of days. That makes no sense. Maybe it was out of my system fast but the changes it made to my brain could be permanent.

I have talked to an attorney friend of mine about suing the doctor who put me on it. It is easier said than done. My current providers believe I was misdiagnosed and should never have been put on the drug to begin with. Proving that is another matter. The mental health industry is well protected. Every possible side effect including suicidal actions is disclaimed. That we take these medications anyway is an indication of how badly people with mental illness are suffering. What is lacking is informed consent. That is the avenue I am trying to take. It doesn't look promising.

Discontinuation effects are seldom studied; after all who is going to pay for a study of what happens when a patient stops taking a drug? Certainly not the drug companies. I did find an article on Psychiatrist.com about suicidality emerging as the result of rapid discontinuation of venlafaxine, but everything else I've found is anecdotal. It took a decade of patients reporting brain zaps for the mental health industry to acknowledge their existence. Hopefully, it won't take that long for the profession to realize how hard it is to get off this medication.

In the meantime, people suffer and sometimes worse.

I hope everyone lives in good health and peace.