Withdrawal of SSRI's

[DWhyte]

Dear doctor and fellow forum users,

Since January 2009 I have come completely off various SSRI's to deal with my OCD and depression. Since 2005 I have been taking the following medications: Fluoxetine, Seroquel, Benzapine, Zoloft & Geoden among others. As stated since January 2009 I have come off the SSRI's and have experienced some extremely horrid and disgusting withdrawal affects as well as side affects during the period I took them. To this day I still experience extreme body pains all over, hunger, agitation, irritability, worse OCD symptoms, constant thoughts and talking in my head and weird feelings in my hand palms and in the bottom of my feet when I sweat or a specific type of soap etc touches it!! I came off of the SSRI's in the first place due to worse and similar symptoms I experience now. It has been 6 months and counting and their is NO CHANGE!

My questions to you are:

1 Does the withdrawal phase TAKE THIS LONG????
2 What can i do if these are withdrawal symptoms; to ease the symptoms or end it completely????
3 If it isnt Withdrawal symptoms WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME AND WHAT CAN I DO ABOUT IT [I AM GOING INSANE!!]


PLZ PLZ HELP ME!!!!!!!

[Paxiled]

I can only tell you that Dr. Gould gave me the same answer, and he's wrong.  People do not all suffer the same results.  I have been suffering Paxil withdrawal for three years now; they tried Lexapro on me, but it didn't work.  I went on Paxil for panic attacks, and after coming off it I suffer morbid depression, 24/7 anxiety, and worse phobias.  So yes, you could be suffering still from withdrawal, and if nothing happened in the meantime, and you have different problems now than you had before, you probably are.  The problem is, psychiatrists will not admit that such cases exist and always attribute it to something else.  I can't tell you what to do, but I know what my psychiatrist should have done for me:  put me back on Paxil, and if I still wanted to come off it, taper off more slowly.  But he never mentioned withdrawal to me, so I had no idea what was going on until I learned about it on the internet, and by then some months had passed and I thought I could wait it out.  Most people do, but for some of us, we don't.  

[Jaquta]

I have no idea about doctor's or T's.  Or not much of one.  Sometimes certain treatments are recommended for certain disorders, etc but often it is what is available or what they are prepared to give us.  I don't trust treatment guidelines.  For my issues I am suppose to be receiving dbt but that in my opinion is **** (or the way our service delivers it is ****, or quite possibly both -excuse my language) and I have found psychoanalysis to be much more effective.  When clinicians talk about best practice or treatment guidelines I just cringe.  We are all different and what works for one may not work for another.

Because anxiety is a psych issue you should be talking to a psychiatrist.  Some doctors do the therapy stuff but you may be better served by seeing a psychotherapist (possibly one that is well qualified and has experience in treating people with ocd).
Any doctor can order blood tests.  You could try either depending on where you thought or felt the problem lay.  A normal one (not meaning a psychiatrist can't be normal) may just refer you to a psychiatrist anyway.

A good place to start could be with how you feel.  Describe your symptoms as you did to us.  How these are affecting you, what your current concerns are.  You need to use your own judgment about what to ask/ say.

Doctors usually start with a physical exam before they start throwing around psych diagnoses.  Eliminating other medical causes first is important.

Also, my interpretation of what Dr Gould was saying is that the medication doesn't fix the problem (whatever is causing the anxiety, ocd), it only makes it more manageable.  To some people, this may feel like fixed but it's not.
He suggested if they were symptoms of anxiety and ocd to work on trying to understand them instead of medicating (masking) them.  I guess that's what you've been trying to do with your ocd doctor.

If you want to talk about the ocd behavior you could try posting a question on the compulsive behaviors expert forum.  I've found this expert to be knowledgeable and helpful.  He seems to have an uncanny ability to understand and highlight what may or may not be causing the problem.  This probably requires disclosing a bit about the behavior though.  I guess many of us have put stuff out there that we may initially have felt a little embarrassed about.  Most people on the forums are non-judgmental though.

Good luck with everything.
J

[DWhyte]

I honestly do not remember the dosage however, I mainly took the Fluoxetine for about 3 years and 9 Months, Seroquel for about 2 years along with the Benzo. I took the Zoloft after stopping the Fluoxetine that would be for about 3 1/2 months and the geodon was for about 3 months as well. Well the taper for the geodon was under a doctor's supervision, the Zoloft i tapered off for about 2 weeks. What type of doctor do you think i should see, my current OCD doctor is completely useless he didnt even mention or do CBT or ERP with me... which OCD doctor doesnt do that?????????? Anyways what type of doctor a normal one or what, should I get blood tests what should I mention to them so I could possibly get the best results and be over this?

Dr. Gould what alternate explanation for my symptoms, and what corresponding course of action would you suggest please doctor I need any suggestions, then I will make a doctor's appointment..

Thank you all in advance

[Jaquta]

In my experience, no, withdrawal from an ssri doesn't take that long.  I know that other members will disagree with me though.  Some say they are still experiencing symptoms many months and years after stopping.
I would be asking how much you took, for how long and for how long was the taper.

If they are withdrawal symptoms, you have several options available to you.

My thoughts are that the symptoms may be more a result of how the medications interacted with each other.  For example, the ssri increasing the effectiveness of the antipsychotic and the benzodiazepine prolonging the effect of the ssri.

I think you definitely need a doctors opinion on this one.
Medication changes really need to be done in consultation with a doctor and in some cases under medical supervision.

I would strongly advise seeing a doctor.

J

[Roger Gould, M.D.]

The withdrawal effects should long be over and you might consider an alternate explanation for your symptoms, and a corresponding course of action.  The medications does not cure the underlying anxiety, it only contains it.  If these are symptoms of anxiet and ocd, then you might try a good course of psychotherapy and get to the source of your anxiety rather than look for a new form of suppressant..