I weened off paxil over a years time and am now on day 49 paxil free. Not realizing the strange things that have happened to me over the past year was from the paxil withdrawal I didn't really investigate on line until I completely stopped on January 21, 2008 and by February 12, 2008 the proverbial s## hit the fan. I still can't trust that I won't have withdrawal symptons on a daily basis and the insomnia has been unrelenting even with sleeping aides.
Since you have been on Paxil for such a long time I would expect a long period with withdrawal symptoms. Expect nothing shorter than a couple of months. 1-2 months for sure if you quit cold turkey. Much more if you tapper off slowly.
My doc stated that I could switch over to Lexapro from Paxil so I took both for 2 weeks then dropped Paxil all together. Could I still be feeling the affects of Paxil withdrawal? I felt good after 2 weeks and even tried to come down on my Klonopin a couple of days after my paxil ended. Mistake! Just wanting to know if anybody had the same issues and how long do I need to plan on suffering? This is getting old and I'm ready to feel like my old self again.
ve tried getting off the Paxil, and I am determined to make it stick this time. My withdrawal symptoms have been debilitating. I haven't been to work in a week. I have constant dizziness/motion sickness, nausea, severe headaches, sensitivity to sound and flourescent lighting, and these tingling sensations in the back of my head.
You've been on the Paxil quite a long time and you need to understand that it's going to take you awhile to wean off safely and as comfortably as possible.
I am certainly no expert in withdrawing from these types of meds, but I think the way you attempted it before was far too drastic. To skip an entire day will throw your mind and body into chaos, that's putting yourself through "cold turkey" every other day.
I've been on Paxil for approximately seven years, starting at 60mg and tapering down to 30mg as of two years ago. I'm still on that dose. I've experienced the withdrawal symptoms before, when I've forgotten to take my medicine, as well as when I've been in the process of decreasing my dose, but lately, I've been feeling the withdrawal symptoms when I have been taking my medicine regularly.
mspaxil, thanks for sharing your valuable thoughts and experience with Paxil over a long time. I do agree of your opinion that all kinds of non-medication methods to treat insomnia are too difficult, as it requires strong determination to follow the tips versus simply taking a drug. Human body has capacity to get used to do without drugs if it is not absolutely required or due to bad side effects than its usefulness. Anyway it is up to the individual how to go about it.
I'm trying to get off Paxil by cross tapering with Prozac to minimize withdrawal symptoms. Right now I'm on 10mg paxil. but I'm not sure how to proceed? My doctor said to take 20mg prozac along with 10 paxil for a month which I don't agree with. Thats because I think if prozac stays that long in my system I will also have trouble getting off of it. So my plan is:
Week 1) 10mg paxil 10mg prozac.
Week 2) 5mg paxil 20mg prozac.
Week 3) 0mg paxil 20mg prozac. then stop.
What I know about Depakote you could fit on the head of a pin...........but I do know that you can develope a physical dependency after extended use, which I think three years qualifies you for. I also know that you cannot abruptly stop this medication. But you probably know all that and it wasn't your question. You wanted to know if there were any known w/d side effects from gradually being weaned off this med.
I, personally, don't know the answer to that.
Heroin in far worse physiologically, and Paxil far worse emotionally to withdraw from. And Paxil withdrawal can last a whole lot longer. But the reason it's not addictive is, to be technically considered addictive, you have to need to continually increase the dose to get the same effect. That's not true of ssris. But addiction is actually a medical term that has found it's way into our common lexicon in all kinds of erroneous ways.
I have been on Paxil CR for 2 years now, and my highest dosage was 37.5 mg about 5 or 6 months ago. Over the past 6 months I have SLOWLY been reducing my dosage as I feel Paxil CR has not been the right drug for me. I would reduce the dosage about every month and a half. About 1.5 months ago, I reduced my dosage from 12.5 mg to 6 mg. Around this time, I started having EXTREME fatigue and chronic, unbearable nausea. I have had a colonoscopy and endoscopy but both were completely normal.
The Zoloft, as you discovered, doesn't get rid of Paxil withdrawal, so you have no idea what's causing this -- the Paxil or the Zoloft. That's the downside of moving immediately from one med to another without completing a nice slow taper from the one first. Especially Paxil, which is known to have a strong withdrawal. If the Zoloft proves problematic, taper it down slowly; don't do this again.
My own advice is to taper down very slowly on the Paxil if you want to stop taking it before taking another med. Effexor will not necessarily substitute for Paxil, so you could find yourself suffering Paxil withdrawal and thinking it's a side effect of Effexor, nor should you be taking both at the same time since that could lead to an overload of serotonin. Do you have a psychiatrist or a regular doc?
s most likely withdrawal from Paxil, which is known to have strong withdrawal effects. Taking another med even in the same class won't necessarily, or even usually, do anything about withdrawal from a prior med. It's also very difficult to tell which effect is withdrawal and which is a side effect of a new med if you just switch from one to another without tapering off the first med before trying the second.
My doctor recently switched me from Paxil to Wellbutrin due to the decreased sex drive of Paxil. Otherwise Paxil was working well for me. Anyway, my issue is that it was a direct switch, no weaning off of Paxil and I think I'm having the withdrawal. I thought the Wellbutrin would just sort of take over, but I don't think that is the case. I didn't think to ask my doc, and the soonest I can get back to see him is Monday. It's been 5 days w/o Paxil and 4 with Wellbutrin.
First of all, I don't think Zoloft is approved for use in pregnancy either. Second, how quickly did you quit using Paxil? Switching to Zoloft won't help the withdrawal from Paxil, which is one of the most difficult medications to stop taking particularly after that long. It needs to be done very slowly -- after that long it might take months and months.
You can't generalize from your experience to everyone's experience, but telling everyone now is a little late. The Paxil withdrawal scandal hit over a decade ago, the company's already been sued and paid out its settlement, and any practicing doc that doesn't know the difficulties of this med by now is incompetent. Look, Paxil destroyed my life. I'm four years into my Paxil withdrawal and it doesn't look like I'll ever recover.
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