I'm so excited to have a name for "brain zaps"! As others have said, they're not painful at all, just disconcerting. It's like swoosh inside my head that I can "hear." It goes from one side to the other and back. It is what reminds me that I have forgotten a dose of Lexapro. (I have no other side effects from Lexapro--it's been a very helpful drug.) As for Effexor...I tapered off about 10 years ago. It was really difficult. I was cutting tablets into quarters to get tiny doses at the end. Nevertheless, when I finally stopped, the vomiting was so bad that ended up in the ER for severe dehydration. A psychiatrist I saw later said he would have had me go onto another antidepressant during the Effexor taper, then taper off the second antidepressant, as Effexor seems to be more difficult to taper off of than other drugs.