Dazed

[frati]

Hello all, I hope I can get some support thru this forum. Here's my story. I've always suffered from anxiety from time to time growing up. Had my first encounter with anxiety when I was 18 and I'm now 29. I've tken antidepressants a couple of times during this time period. About early december 2009, I decided to try Pristiq for my anxiety since I had already taken effexor for 2 years few years ago and it supposed to be very similar. I took pristiq for almost 3 weeks and quicly stopped it due to a major panic episode one night where all of a sudden i had extreme anxiety and racing thoughts. Due to this episode my doctor told me that it didn;t feel that I was a right candidate for this medicine anyways and gave me xanaz for whenever needed. My problem started after i stopped the pristiq. Two days after I completely stopped i started to experience minor withdrawal symptoms, from nausea to lightheadness. Eventually things got worse to the point that I was experiencing major anxiety, fear, feeling hopeless etc.During this time I went on a trip as well to Europe which was pre arranged and it was horrible. Maybe due to the jetlag and change of environment. Ever since I came back and restarted working out and eating healty I do feel better with my anxiety but the main problem that I'm still experiencing is the dazed out of it feeling that has never gone away. You know the feeling when you wake up in the morning and then it goes away? Well, for me it doesn't really go away. Sometimes I have headached with it and a sense of foggyness that doesn;t allow me to concentrate, It has been almost 10 weeks now and I'm tired of this feeeling. The doc prescribed me effexor 4 weeks ago which I still haven't started because of my fear of unwanted side effects. I explained to him my symptoms and he wasn't able to pin point the cause and figures it's associated to anxiety with a little depression. I understand the whole concept of a tired mind due to excess worrying which i have done prior to starting the pristiq but I've only started to experience the daze and out of it after I quit taking it. I know I got extremely scared due to the episode i had with it which caused me to stop it, but was that really enough for me to feel this way, still?
Any support would be appreciated.
Thanks.

[boogieman]

Hi again. I meant antidepressants not antibiotics. Additionally, after doing a little research, withdrawal symptoms from some of these can actuall last 8 weeks or more, with effexor being one of the worst- GM

[boogieman]

Hi. The aftershocks from the cessation of antibiotics, and other drugs, can be quite intense- I just had an episode where I ran out of effexor for 4 days and I thought I was losing my mind. Antidepressants especially should never be stopped abruptly. However, if its been 10 weeks there's probably something else going on. Also, xanax will cause sedation, memory loss, and impaired thinking. Do you have any pre-existing conditions? Are you taking anything else-non prescription or otherwise? What is your current diagnosis? Please advise-GM