Starriol: I lowered my desvenlafaxine dose a few days ago, it's an emotional rollercoaster all day long.

[starriol]

Hey guys, thanks for listening.

 

I lowered my desvenlafaxine dosage from 100 to 50 mgs. On one hand, I'm loving it.

I feel more energetic already (the med was making me tired like hell).

I love rollerblading and I never felt so energized doing it. The rush of sprinting forward, jumping, was exhilarating.

Also, I feel more determined to accomplish my goals, more alive.

On the other, I'm feeling like a pair of rose colored glasses I had covering my eyes were removed suddenly. Now I can't help but contemplate the fact that I'll be dead and rotting underground in X number of years, that the world ir randomly cruel and fucked up **** happens to good people every day.

I feel more raw, more in contact with reality, which is both a great and an awful thing.

I'm hoping all this will be tempered soon enough & that the urges to go back to 100 mgs will be gone. I know it's better for me to stick to a lower dose, the energy I feel is necessary to lead a good life, the drug helped me a lot through a pretty rough time, but now it's been holding me back.

 

Thanks again for listening.

[rosie281]

Hi starriol....I just wanted to say, I'm right there with you.

I lowered my dose from 100mg to 50mg a few weeks ago, and while I haven't run into too many issues, I have been having similar feelings to you.My little dog died a few months ago, and when it happened I was distraught the first day, but after a few days I just seemed to accept it for what it was and didn't think too much about it anymore. I  thought that I was doing this because I was trying to be strong, but now I realise it was just the pristiq.

Since lowering my dosage, at nighttime I find myself thinking constantly about my dog, how much I miss her, how awful the whole thing was, and just generally feeling like it happened yesterday, instead of months ago. 

It really is amazing how much your feelings come back, and while this is what we're aiming for in a way, I suppose its easy to forget that a lot of those feelings won't necessarily be good ones. 

 

I don't have much to offer you except my sympathy and support. I have been reading a lot of Louise Hay books, and listening to a lot of meditation tapes and such (there is a Louise Hay recording called 101 power thoughts that I find helps greatly)

 

I hope that you get through this - I hope we all get through it!

Good luck and hang in there.

[starriol]

Thanks a lot for your kind words, Rosie

Feels good to know we are not alone in this!

Now I'm feeling MUCH better, but I'm SO sensitive, everything affects me triple, good & bad things.

 

So, I was prescribed 1 mg clonazepam and 100 desvenlafaxine.

I'm at 0 mgs clonazepam for the last 4 months

Thinking about maybe going back to 0.25 for a month or so, to take the edge of the desven withdrawal.

What do you guys think? My goal is to be drug free as son as possible, but I don't wanna suffer like crazy in the process, and I feel I would be going 5 steps forward and just one back if I had to reinstate 0.25 clonazepam.

What do you think???

[Petunia]

Hi Starriol,

 

Welcome to our forum and thank you for posting an introduction.  I'm sorry you are having a rough time, but it sounds like you have experienced some positives too.

 

I'm at 0 mgs clonazepam for the last 4 months

Thinking about maybe going back to 0.25 for a month or so, to take the edge of the desven withdrawal.

What do you guys think?

 

This is my opinion - if you are finding your withdrawal symptoms too difficult to tolerate, it would be better to reinstate a small amount of desvenlafaxine rather than go back on clonazepam and then have two medications to withdraw from.

 

We recommend starting with a 10% cut every 4 weeks, but you cut by 50%, so its not surprising you have having some symptoms.  Perhaps you could go back up to 75mg, wait until your symptoms subside and then continue with a slower taper. Please slow down, there is a possibility that your symptoms will get even worse and last a long time if you withdraw too fast. Have a look at our pristiq (desvenlafaxine) tapering information here:

 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/876-tips-for-tapering-off-pristiq-desvenlafaxine/

 

How long have you been taking desvenlafaxine?

 

If you put your drug and withdrawal history in your signature, it helps us to offer more accurate suggestions and advice, instructions are here:

 

http://survivingantidepressants.org/index.php?/topic/893-please-put-your-withdrawal-history-in-your-signature/

 

Please keep us updated, you will find a lot of friendly, helpful support here.

 

Petu.

[starriol]

Hey Petu, thanks you!

I added the info to my signature.

Yes, I would agree with you, but the bastards that manufacture Pristiq make it in 50 and 100 mgs. It's desvenlafaxine, not regular venlafaxine.

If I cut it, it will lose it's time reléase properties. I also can't possibly cut the pill perfectly enough to dose, say, 40 mgs of a 50 mgs pill, to go down to 90 first, distribuited all day long. It's a very hard pill... I tried...

So, I'm basically stuck with 3 options, all of which suck for different reasons:

1) Bite the bullet and jump from 100 to 50 mgs. So far, so good. I'm feeling generally weird, would be the best way to describe it.... easy to anger, get sad, but also more alive. TOO sensitive. But, HEY, still alive, able to function, more or less... so, if this is the worse I can expect, it's not THAT bad

2) Cut a 50 mgs pill in 5 and shave 10 mgs off every 10 days or so. The problem with this is that it's IMPOSSIBLE to cut it decently, the pill it's very hard and breaks randomly

3) Go down to 50 mgs and add regular venlafaxine in a certain dose. Desvenlafaxine is about 3 times stronger, mg wise, than venlafaxine. I know they shouldn't be any weird interaction if I follow the dosage, but my psy said I should first, lower from 100 to 50 mgs desvenlafaxine. Wait a week or two... then, go to ZERO (gasp!), wait ANOTHER WEEK and then reinstate regular venlafaxine. Yeah, sure, if I could do that without going bat crazy I wouldn't need to do it, would I??? GRRRR!!!!

 

So... that's why I thought it would be a good alternative to add a bit clonazepam.

If someone can convince (due to having had experience) me to add venlafaxine or maybe crush a bit of a 50 pill and, don't know, take about half of it evenly distributed and know that it's not so terrible to take, say, 20 mgs more one day, 30 the other, since it's hard to properly divide, I could do that!

[magillrn]

I am not comfortable with dropping my dose from 100 to 50 mg. that is too drastic a change and I KNOW my body can't handle it. I don't want to end up feeling dangerously low. I am cutting my pills. They seem to cut easily for me (with a store bought pull cutter... Don't try a knife or scissors) I am taking one quarter of a 100 mg tablet three times daily. I set an alarm to make sure I take it at the same time every day. I'm doing ok. Yes having some symptoms but I'm going to stick this out and see it through until I stabilize at 75 mg dose. As a nurse I would not recommend a 50% reduction. I don't really like the 25% reduction but will have to deal for now until I see my dr and can get a different dose (50mg tablets twice daily) so I can taper in smaller increments.

 

Best of luck.

[mammaP]

Hi Starriol, I personally wouldn't introduce clonazepam and then have another drug to withdraw from. 

The pristique is sometimes crushed and taken at intervals through the day to avoid 'dumping' by

removing the slow release. Others have successfully switched to venlafaxine, but I don't think it would

be advisable to be without either for a week! Read through the thread on tapering desvenlafaxine, there 

is info in there that Alto has collected from the experts, it makes very interesting reading. You might have

read it already but if not it's worth a read. It's criminal that they made that drug with no way of tapering it!