Vision symptoms: floaters, snow, blurred/dimmed vision, twitching, dry eyes and pain

[Ahms]

On 8/6/2018 at 7:03 PM, welshtyrant said:

It started when I first came off duloxetine at the end of 2016. It's just slowly started getting better. I have to sleep with an eye mask on and always wear dark glasses outside. I just hope it goes completely with time.

 

Mine started when I came off Venlafaxine - another SNRI. Venlafaxine should outright be illegal. It literally brought me down to my knees. 

[bhasski]

How long will this snow last ? 

 

I am almost 3 years off these drugs.

[Altostrata]

This is a symptom that's a mystery. We can only hope it resolves with time.

[Junglechicken]

I see "weird stuff" after I have turned the lights out (gone to bed).

 

Sometimes a kind of grid pattern all over the room, sometimes weird moving shapes in pinks or white.

 

Don't know whether its my eyes trying to adjust or not.

 

In daylight, my vision is very blurred (I wear glasses), and I have double vision.  I am due another eye test either this year or next year.

[Ahms]

I withdrew from Venlafaxine around about in March 2018. I was already on 50mg amitriptyline at that time and my dose was increased from 50mg to 150mg in April 2018 over 2 weeks. I couldn't tolerate the side effects so I quit cold turkey and didn't take any amitriptyline for 5 days. I developed severe withdrawal symptoms which I think was because of Venlafaxine withdrawal rather than the amitriptyline. I reinstated back to 50mg amitriptyline. It took me 3 months to stabilise. My biggest problem now is visual snow. I tried reinstating low dose vanlafaxine to see if it will help my visual snow/static but it didn't. I am already taking omega 3 and magnesium. Can anyone suggest anything else? Should I increase my dose of amitriptyline to see if my visual snow goes away? Please advise as I am suffering big time. 

[IrishMonkey92]

2 minutes ago, Ahms said:

I withdrew from Venlafaxine around about in March 2018. I was already on 50mg amitriptyline at that time and my dose was increased from 50mg to 150mg in April 2018 over 2 weeks. I couldn't tolerate the side effects so I quit cold turkey and didn't take any amitriptyline for 5 days. I developed severe withdrawal symptoms which I think was because of Venlafaxine withdrawal rather than the amitriptyline. I reinstated back to 50mg amitriptyline. It took me 3 months to stabilise. My biggest problem now is visual snow. I tried reinstating low dose vanlafaxine to see if it will help my visual snow/static but it didn't. I am already taking omega 3 and magnesium. Can anyone suggest anything else? Should I increase my dose of amitriptyline to see if my visual snow goes away? Please advise as I am suffering big time. 

Ahms, what was your total symptom list prior to stabilising after 3 months? 

[Ahms]

25 minutes ago, IrishMonkey92 said:

Ahms, what was your total symptom list prior to stabilising after 3 months? 

IrishMonkey92, those were the worst 3 months of my life. I could hardly walk. I had balance problems. I could hardly follow conversations, watch anything on TV because I couldn't follow it. I had cold sweats during the most intense hot weather. I couldn't sleep. My brain would become  active all of a sudden while I would try to sleep. Smallest of noises would wake me up and I would have cold seeats, shortness of breath and intense palpitations. My eye balls wouldn't relax, they would keep moving when I closed them to sleep. I was dizzy, had dimmed vision. My mouth was so dry all the time that I couldn't swallow a bite of food without water and I felt my teeth wearing away - i could feel the powederiness from enamel wear. I had times when i saw things move in slow motion and at times as if everything was moving really fast. I am a grown man and I cried infront of others like a 2 months old baby. It was as if I had a major stroke. Venlafaxine withdrawal will bring you down to your knees so much so that I had to be put on antipsychotics to stabilise. My biggest symptom now is visual snow. 

[Ahms]

Oh, forgot to mention the extreme shakiness as if I had Parkinsons's and upper body uncontrollable jerks of the arms as if I was having seizures. 

[Ahms]

Please help. I am desperate regarding my visual symptoms. I am seeing visual snow/static and everything is fuzzy also getting a lot of after images. It all started when I came off Venlafaxine. Should I try re-instating Venlafaxine again at a higher dose than what I tried? Considering it's been about 5 months since I stopped taking venlafaxine. 

[thecowisback]

does anyone ever recover from their visual problems? my husband is still having huge problems and he's so scared that this is permanent. i presume people who have recovered don't come back on here any more. 

[IrishMonkey92]

13 minutes ago, thecowisback said:

does anyone ever recover from their visual problems? my husband is still having huge problems and he's so scared that this is permanent. i presume people who have recovered don't come back on here any more. 

Some seem to! What issues is he having? 

[thecowisback]

he has eye pain, dry eyes, visual snow, a feeling as if there's vaseline smeared over his eyes, tunnel vision and sometimes sees dark shapes. he's got another check with the eye doctor at the hospital soon but this is another one of many - they all say there's nothing wrong with his vision or his eyes.  i wish i could find some posts from people who've recovered from these sort of problems. all the posts i keep finding are from people asking when it will end. he's only got 50% of his vision to start with so losing more of it is a huge problem for him. 

[Ahms]

On 8/29/2018 at 9:08 PM, thecowisback said:

he has eye pain, dry eyes, visual snow, a feeling as if there's vaseline smeared over his eyes, tunnel vision and sometimes sees dark shapes. he's got another check with the eye doctor at the hospital soon but this is another one of many - they all say there's nothing wrong with his vision or his eyes.  i wish i could find some posts from people who've recovered from these sort of problems. all the posts i keep finding are from people asking when it will end. he's only got 50% of his vision to start with so losing more of it is a huge problem for him. 

I too have visual snow, fuzzy vision, dimmed vision and a lot of afterimages. It's been about 4,5 months. I too am looking to see if people have recovered from these. I guess only time will tell. I have had my eyes checked and they are fine. 

[thecowisback]

my husband has had days when it has been less troublesome, sometimes just for a few minutes, sometimes for an hour or more. i'm trying to keep a record of when he gets these windows so that he can see his is slowly healing. good luck Ahms. 

[Ahms]

21 hours ago, thecowisback said:

my husband has had days when it has been less troublesome, sometimes just for a few minutes, sometimes for an hour or more. i'm trying to keep a record of when he gets these windows so that he can see his is slowly healing. good luck Ahms. 

Which antidepressants was he on? 

[thecowisback]

Lyrica and duloxetine

[manny03]

I posted in the weaning off thread might as well post here also.  

 

Over the last several months I've been having various anxiety symptoms such as heart palpitations, panic attacks, headaches which lead to me having shingles. I was having these symptoms while I was medicated with Trintellix that I was taking since 2015. I stopped taking the med in mid July of this year. During this period of withdrawal I've felt fatigued, loss of concentration, depressed, indigestion, ibs symptoms, muscle weakness, pimple breakouts, hives, crying spells, headaches, pronounced eye floaters, and blurred vision.

 

I read that coming from my medication can cause severe headaches. Though nothing regarding blurred vision. Now, just early this evening i had a bad headache then my vision on my right eye went blurry. This is the third time it has occured.  I'm fearing that I might have a deadly brain tumor.

 

I'm seeking some reassurance from anyone that this is not something serious but just in the middle of my medication withdrawal or an anxiety attack.

 

My primary did blood work last month due to the shingles and everything came out perfect. I fear that test didn't pick anything up.

[Junglechicken]

My vision seems worse these days.  I have to wear my glasses most of the time now.

[gn11]

It has been a while I have been here. I am now at 3.80 of Celexa. I have accelerated my tapering from 4 to 3 weeks. Still very small cuts at 5%. My vision has deteriorated : blurriness and light sensitivity increased. I have glaucoma and have been in different medications so I thought it was related to dry eye due to meds. it possibly contributed but I'm now thinking it has to do with the Celexa withdrawal. Anyhow, I read other peoples comments and I am also wondering if this improves after getting off meds permanently. Besides this sensitivity my other symptom is mild tinnitus. Any suggestions and thoughts for the management of this would be appreciated.

[gn11]

One more thing: Has anybody connected this symptom to cortisol dysfunction and/or  histamine sensitivity?

 

[Ahms]

Has anyone recovered from visual snow, afrer images and dimmed vision? 

[Ahms]

On 9/2/2017 at 4:57 PM, Oran said:

Hello again everyone

 

Am I the only one who is housebound by visual symtoms? My visual symtoms are so bad I cannot go outside anymore. I cannot determine depth, light, and everything looks disproportionate, much darker and distorted, too close or too far away. It's like my brain cannot process the input of my eyes and If I walk around outside for more than 5 minutes, all these visual symptoms gets much worse and by forcing myself to keep staying outside my other symtoms such as confusion and brain fog also gets much worse! No ophthalmologist has been able to find anything wrong and I am getting both extremely scared and really, really sick of this. Could this be something else than withdrawal? Some disease? I haven't been able to go or stay outside properly for several months now.. I am 9 months off Effexor..

How is your vision now? Do you have visual snow? 

[thecowisback]

On 9/3/2018 at 11:18 AM, manny03 said:

I posted in the weaning off thread might as well post here also.  

 

Over the last several months I've been having various anxiety symptoms such as heart palpitations, panic attacks, headaches which lead to me having shingles. I was having these symptoms while I was medicated with Trintellix that I was taking since 2015. I stopped taking the med in mid July of this year. During this period of withdrawal I've felt fatigued, loss of concentration, depressed, indigestion, ibs symptoms, muscle weakness, pimple breakouts, hives, crying spells, headaches, pronounced eye floaters, and blurred vision.

 

I read that coming from my medication can cause severe headaches. Though nothing regarding blurred vision. Now, just early this evening i had a bad headache then my vision on my right eye went blurry. This is the third time it has occured.  I'm fearing that I might have a deadly brain tumor.

 

I'm seeking some reassurance from anyone that this is not something serious but just in the middle of my medication withdrawal or an anxiety attack.

 

My primary did blood work last month due to the shingles and everything came out perfect. I fear that test didn't pick anything up.

i'm sure it's nothing more serious than withdrawal (although that is serious enough!). my husband has been through so many different changes to his eyes over the past year and a half and it's scared him too a lot of the time though repeated tests show nothing wrong. 

[thecowisback]

1 hour ago, Ahms said:

Has anyone recovered from visual snow, afrer images and dimmed vision? 

i'm waiting to hear this too - my husband is suffering terribly from visual problems and i would love to see him recover. 

[Ahms]

2 hours ago, thecowisback said:

i'm waiting to hear this too - my husband is suffering terribly from visual problems and i would love to see him recover. 

These meds destroy lives. I wish I had known beforehand. I would never had started them, would have used other methods first for my depression. 

[thecowisback]

my husband feels the same. no-one warned him of the horrible side effects before he took the pills. they just said they'd cure his pain, not wreck his life even more. 

[Ahms]

I am so angry at my psychiatrist. He took me off Venlafaxine because he said Amitriptyline would be the best drug for me. I developed visual snow/static, after images and dimmed vision after coming off Venlafaxine. Now he wants to add another antidepressants to amitriptyline so why on earth take me off Venlafaxine in the first place? If I was still on Venlafaxine maybe my vision would still have been perfect like it was when I was on Venlafaxine. I wish I had known about withdrawal and especially that I can develop visual snow beforehand. 

[thecowisback]

the doctors don't have a clue about what withdrawal does to people. every doctor i've seen (and my husband too for that matter) has said withdrawals only last 6 weeks or so. someone here must have recovered from these symptoms - i haven't found one person yet ☹️

[Ahms]

19 hours ago, thecowisback said:

the doctors don't have a clue about what withdrawal does to people. every doctor i've seen (and my husband too for that matter) has said withdrawals only last 6 weeks or so. someone here must have recovered from these symptoms - i haven't found one person yet ☹️

I too am looking for that person. I feel as if I'm stuck with visual snow, after images and dimmed vision permanently. 

[thecowisback]

come on people - someone must know of a success story about these symptoms? 

[Ahms]

6 hours ago, thecowisback said:

come on people - someone must know of a success story about these symptoms? 

If your husband has visual snow/sees static and has afterimages, some people on the internet suggest lamotrigine also known as Lamictal. For some it improves their visual snow for some it makes it worse. Do your own research on this. See a neuro-ophthalmologist or a neurologist who knows about it. 

[thecowisback]

he was prescribed this as he had a partial seizure 6 months ago. he's refused to take it as he's terrified of taking more drugs with more side effects 😥

[gn11]

I wonder if anyone has been diagnosed with cataracts. There appears to be a connection between SSRIs and the development of cataracts.

[thecowisback]

i saw someone on facebook who'd developed cataracts in their 40's because of ssri's. 

[jeremy1069]

My right eyelid began twitching and/or throbbinf nonstop this past Saturday. It’s only finally easing up today (Thursday)

 

 

[Ahms]

On 9/11/2018 at 7:42 PM, thecowisback said:

he was prescribed this as he had a partial seizure 6 months ago. he's refused to take it as he's terrified of taking more drugs with more side effects 😥

I have some information for you for visual problems and visual snow. I came across a poster by one of the neurologists based in London who recommends Riboflavin/Vitamin B2 400mg daily, magnesium citrate 600mg daily and coenzyme Q10 350mg daily. He has seen some improvement in visual snow in some of his patients by using these supplements. Of course, consult a doctor first before you take them. Also, look at visual snow initiative website - a group of researchers trying to find a cure for visual snow. Visual snow is a potential hyperexcitability of neurons in the visual cortex in the brain. There is nothing wrong with your husbands eyes. It's the brain/neurological problem. Very few doctors or even neurologists know about visual snow or even heard if it.