Meds for depression

[Les1154]

I am 58 year old female - been on cilift for about 5 yrs - weight gain.
Doc prescribed Aropax CR 25 (paxil) he said there was no need to wean off the cilift - weight steadily increased - Doc said impossible!!!??   I asked to change to Prozac (Nuzak - south africa)   Again he said I could go straight from the one to the other!    Been on Nuzak for about 10 days and not feeling nice.  Very emotional - dizzy - nightmares and un-necessary anger.  My question - do I stick it out on the Nuzak (for the weight issues) or go back to Paxil or in fact back to Cilift?   Help

[Les1154]

Thanks for the response.   I think you are right about the withdrawal symptoms from going from one med to the other without weaning off first.   Thanks for your advice.   Will look into going and seeing a psychiatrist for help with this!   Thanks so much!

[Paxiled]

Proper protocols call for weaning off a drug as slowly as you need before you start a new medication.  The reason is twofold:  first, it lets you know if you're suffering withdrawal and how severe it is, which affects the ease and speed of the taper off of it; the second is, if you switch immediately to a new medication, a different medication even in the same class of meds can't prevent withdrawal from the first med as they all work differently and you can't tell which problems are withdrawal from the first med and which are side effects of the new med.  By the way, Paxil is notorious for weight gain -- I gained a lot of weight on it.  What you need is a good psychiatrist, as it sounds like you're trying to do this with a general practitioner.  This isn't universally true, but generally general docs know virtually nothing about medication in general because they prescribe for so many different conditions and so get all their information from their pharmaceutical salespeople.  Psychiatrists can be pretty ignorant too, but at least you get a better chance since they presumable prescribe these specific meds regularly and only.  As to what's going on, you could be suffering withdrawal from the first med that wasn't at all addressed by just switching to Paxil, or from the Paxil, or new side effects from Prozac.  No way to tell because it doesn't sound like you ever tapered off the first med in the first place as should have happened.

[Les1154]

Thanks for your comments.   Will give the Prozac a little while longer.   What do you think of my doctors advice to switch from one drug to the other without weaning off the first one?

[remar]

I have to disagree with your Dr. I know many people, including myself, that gained weight on Paxil.
Prozac and Paxil are both antidepressants but they are different. I think you're most likely going through some withdrawal from the Paxil. You could also be having start up side effects from the Prozac. If we do get start up side effects it can be hard to say how long they'll last. I'm not sure what advice I can give you as far as what med to take. Maybe give the Prozac a little more time but if the side effects keep up or get worse then see your Dr.