Tips on minimizing withdrawal symptoms from Effexor (aka Venlafaxine)

@contentandwell
I have been reading your posts about your friend. I have had PLENTY OF FEELINGS about them. Its not what you are saying as much as what other people said to me that your words remind me of.
Things like..."why can't you get off the drugs...just be happy....oh you really don't want to hurt yourself, do you? Why can't you just get better?????????
The truth is: this is not for you to decide if your friend needs the drugs or not. This is their recovery and life...NOT YOURS.
I can feel you care about this person. That's why I am addressing this with you.
You can encourage them but that is it. Oh if I had a dollar for every time some one wanted me to change FOR THEM, NOT ME...I WOULD BE A RICH WOMAN...VERY VERY RICH.
THE truth is you can offer help but they have to decide. You can pray and ask others for prayers for them but they are the only one to make these decisions.
I purposely held back from responding to these posts. I would have ROARED at you before. Now I can say these things with out my personal feelings involved.
I am not upset with you now. Please respect that your friend is doing what is right for them even if you want things different. This is their life. They get to chose how they live it even if you don't approve.
How many times I felt I was not doing it right from people. Even if I wanted to be with them the unspoken disapproval drove me away. Just because some think us crazy we can still feel! It only hurt me, it never helped. I was peddling as fast as I could.
So many folks disapproved of my decisions. It made me feel not good about myself. I couldn't ever do anything right.
I hope you can hear me. Bright Wings
.
I know your desire is to help but you are NOT. Please just accept your friend. That is the greatest gift you can give.
I am doing my best to say this lovingly. I know you love your friend. No hard feelings?

@contentandwell
I have been reading your posts about your friend. I have had PLENTY OF FEELINGS about them. Its not what you are saying as much as what other people said to me that your words remind me of.
Things like..."why can't you get off the drugs...just be happy....oh you really don't want to hurt yourself, do you? Why can't you just get better?????????
The truth is: this is not for you to decide if your friend needs the drugs or not. This is their recovery and life...NOT YOURS.
I can feel you care about this person. That's why I am addressing this with you.
You can encourage them but that is it. Oh if I had a dollar for every time some one wanted me to change FOR THEM, NOT ME...I WOULD BE A RICH WOMAN...VERY VERY RICH.
THE truth is you can offer help but they have to decide. You can pray and ask others for prayers for them but they are the only one to make these decisions.
I purposely held back from responding to these posts. I would have ROARED at you before. Now I can say these things with out my personal feelings involved.
I am not upset with you now. Please respect that your friend is doing what is right for them even if you want things different. This is their life. They get to chose how they live it even if you don't approve.
How many times I felt I was not doing it right from people. Even if I wanted to be with them the unspoken disapproval drove me away. Just because some think us crazy we can still feel! It only hurt me, it never helped. I was peddling as fast as I could.
So many folks disapproved of my decisions. It made me feel not good about myself. I couldn't ever do anything right.
I hope you can hear me. Bright Wings
.
I know your desire is to help but you are NOT. Please just accept your friend. That is the greatest gift you can give.
I am doing my best to say this lovingly. I know you love your friend. No hard feelings?

@contentandwell
I have been reading your posts about your friend. I have had PLENTY OF FEELINGS about them. Its not what you are saying as much as what other people said to me that your words remind me of.
Things like..."why can't you get off the drugs...just be happy....oh you really don't want to hurt yourself, do you? Why can't you just get better?????????
The truth is: this is not for you to decide if your friend needs the drugs or not. This is their recovery and life...NOT YOURS.
I can feel you care about this person. That's why I am addressing this with you.
You can encourage them but that is it. Oh if I had a dollar for every time some one wanted me to change FOR THEM, NOT ME...I WOULD BE A RICH WOMAN...VERY VERY RICH.
THE truth is you can offer help but they have to decide. You can pray and ask others for prayers for them but they are the only one to make these decisions.
I purposely held back from responding to these posts. I would have ROARED at you before. Now I can say these things with out my personal feelings involved.
I am not upset with you now. Please respect that your friend is doing what is right for them even if you want things different. This is their life. They get to chose how they live it even if you don't approve.
How many times I felt I was not doing it right from people. Even if I wanted to be with them the unspoken disapproval drove me away. Just because some think us crazy we can still feel! It only hurt me, it never helped. I was peddling as fast as I could.
So many folks disapproved of my decisions. It made me feel not good about myself. I couldn't ever do anything right.
I hope you can hear me. Bright Wings
.
I know your desire is to help but you are NOT. Please just accept your friend. That is the greatest gift you can give.
I am doing my best to say this lovingly. I know you love your friend. No hard feelings?

@contentandwell
I have been reading your posts about your friend. I have had PLENTY OF FEELINGS about them. Its not what you are saying as much as what other people said to me that your words remind me of.
Things like..."why can't you get off the drugs...just be happy....oh you really don't want to hurt yourself, do you? Why can't you just get better?????????
The truth is: this is not for you to decide if your friend needs the drugs or not. This is their recovery and life...NOT YOURS.
I can feel you care about this person. That's why I am addressing this with you.
You can encourage them but that is it. Oh if I had a dollar for every time some one wanted me to change FOR THEM, NOT ME...I WOULD BE A RICH WOMAN...VERY VERY RICH.
THE truth is you can offer help but they have to decide. You can pray and ask others for prayers for them but they are the only one to make these decisions.
I purposely held back from responding to these posts. I would have ROARED at you before. Now I can say these things with out my personal feelings involved.
I am not upset with you now. Please respect that your friend is doing what is right for them even if you want things different. This is their life. They get to chose how they live it even if you don't approve.
How many times I felt I was not doing it right from people. Even if I wanted to be with them the unspoken disapproval drove me away. Just because some think us crazy we can still feel! It only hurt me, it never helped. I was peddling as fast as I could.
So many folks disapproved of my decisions. It made me feel not good about myself. I couldn't ever do anything right.
I hope you can hear me. Bright Wings
.
I know your desire is to help but you are NOT. Please just accept your friend. That is the greatest gift you can give.
I am doing my best to say this lovingly. I know you love your friend. No hard feelings?

@contentandwell

Hi JK,
Hope all is well with you.
I don't claim to be an expert.. My statements are nothing more than than my own opinins which we are all entitled.
I believe everyone wants to be happy.. I truly feel some people don't know how to be happy or are not willing to put forth the effort to be happy. No pill will solve that issue.
I said some people need alternative therapy, meaning Psychological help, Psychiatric care, Medication, Family Introvention etc.
Go to a good Endocrinologist or better yet a Neuroendocrinologist to chech for hormonal and chemical imbalances, don't just assume that's the problem.How many have been to one, few if any is my guess.Although I do believe strongly that at some point you have to make a choice, that's not to say someone doesn't need help for awhile. But a lot of people try to take the easy way out and just take a pill. Ultimately your going to have to solve your problems. Everyone has to make decisions in their live starting when quite young, some directly relate to a persons mood and I feel they depict being happy, loving, amused, optimistic or sad, mad, frustrated, depressed or whatever. But people have to take responsibility for their lives and that means in my opinion they need to recognise they have a problem and get appropriate treatment. However I don't believe it is reasonable for someone to be Depressed on Antidepressants for decades. Ive read story after story of people being on these meds for decades.. What do they all say "If I stop taking them for a couple days I'll be back where I don't want to be.Getting well doesn't always "Just Happen" sometimes it takes hard work.
It's not always easy to make choices and it's not always easy happy to be happy. Your only going to get out of life what your willing to put into it.
Jake

@contentandwell
I have been reading your posts about your friend. I have had PLENTY OF FEELINGS about them. Its not what you are saying as much as what other people said to me that your words remind me of.
Things like..."why can't you get off the drugs...just be happy....oh you really don't want to hurt yourself, do you? Why can't you just get better?????????
The truth is: this is not for you to decide if your friend needs the drugs or not. This is their recovery and life...NOT YOURS.
I can feel you care about this person. That's why I am addressing this with you.
You can encourage them but that is it. Oh if I had a dollar for every time some one wanted me to change FOR THEM, NOT ME...I WOULD BE A RICH WOMAN...VERY VERY RICH.
THE truth is you can offer help but they have to decide. You can pray and ask others for prayers for them but they are the only one to make these decisions.
I purposely held back from responding to these posts. I would have ROARED at you before. Now I can say these things with out my personal feelings involved.
I am not upset with you now. Please respect that your friend is doing what is right for them even if you want things different. This is their life. They get to chose how they live it even if you don't approve.
How many times I felt I was not doing it right from people. Even if I wanted to be with them the unspoken disapproval drove me away. Just because some think us crazy we can still feel! It only hurt me, it never helped. I was peddling as fast as I could.
So many folks disapproved of my decisions. It made me feel not good about myself. I couldn't ever do anything right.
I hope you can hear me. Bright Wings
.
I know your desire is to help but you are NOT. Please just accept your friend. That is the greatest gift you can give.
I am doing my best to say this lovingly. I know you love your friend. No hard feelings?

So, I just finished this process with Zoloft (sertraline) and here are some things that worked for me. Your mileage may vary, but hopefully these are low risk for you to try.

1) You may need to ask your doctor for a slower tapering program than other patients. Some people are just more sensitive to dosage changes. Be aware that symptoms will get better, then may reappear each time you taper. AAFMA (practice group of family physicians) says that the symptoms typically last 1-2 weeks and as long as 4 weeks, so I just kept reminding myself that it was temporary.
2) Be watchful for things that make your symptoms worse. For example, caffeine seems to trigger the brain zaps for me (still, even after being off for several weeks), so I cut back my caffeine intake. I didn't give it up completely (because I still need to function), but cut back on how much real coffee I was drinking, mixed decaf with regular, and switched to tea sometimes. In the end, I probably cut my daily caffeine intake in half, and it did help quite a lot.
3) Ibuprofen or other pain reliever can help with the flu-like body aches.
4) Benadryl helped with the brain zaps.
5) Exercise helped with both. Even if I wasn't up to a run, a few blocks of walking would settle down the symptoms for a while at least. (Then, when they come back, just take another walk. We took a lot of walks for a while there).
6) Get enough sleep. As I came down off the meds, my normal sleeping patterns returned, which was great, but it did mean that I needed to plan time to let my body rest.
7) Pay attention to your diet. Your brain uses carbs to make seratonin, so now is not the time to go on the Atkins diet. Eat well and make sure you're getting enough healthy carbs. You may crave sweets; I certainly did. I tried to counteract this by having bananas, graham crackers, and other healthy things I could snack on instead of sticking my head in a birthday cake like I seemed to want.

No lie - it's a painful process, but this did really help make it easier. Also, at a certain point, when I was down the below the normal starter dose, I just ripped off the bandaid and went to zero. At that point, it felt like each taper was just prolonging the suffering. Don't just go cold turkey from your current dose, though, as that can be dangerous. Also, don't add any supplements or substitutes for the SSRI without talking to your doctor first (also dangerous).

And of course, watch for the return of depression / anxiety type symptoms. For a while it was hard to tell whether I was tired because of the change in meds or because my depression was returning. I figured as long as I felt okay enough to function and wasn't thinking about being harmful to myself or anyone else, I could play it out and see. It turned out to be the meds and on the other side, I can see that I was more worried about it than I needed to be.

I wish you the best of luck and a healthy life.

Mardee