Beemool: Am I poly drugged????

[Beemool]

Hi, my name is Brianna. I’m 24 years old and a mom of 3. I have always suffered with anxiety. For many years I treated my anxiety with marijuana and that seemed to work although I would still have anxiety in certain situations. Mid/late last year I got fed up with the outside judgment of being a mother that smokes & being told I should be on medication so that’s what I did.

 

A “holistic doctor” prescribed me Effexor 37.5 for a week then up to 75 and I think I got to 100 and something mg. Then I started to feel terrible! So I decided to stop taking them, (big mistake, I know but I was new & naive) I went 3 days without anything and then reinstated at 37.5 after having unbearable withdrawals. It took me over 2 months to become stable on 37.5.

 

During those 2 months i was put on hydroxyzine at night to help me sleep & I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism and put on Methimozole as well as propranolol (beta blocker) to help with the hyperthyroid symptoms. Eventually I stabled out and joined the Effexor support group on facebook.

 

That’s when I realized I needed to get off Effexor safely and slowly. I then did my first 10% taper. It messed me up for 2 weeks. Symptoms included- constipation, diarrhea, loss of appetite, nausea, racing heart, muscle tremors, anxiety, etc.. It was awful and I was advised by the support group to try to taper less next time after I stable out since 10% may be too much for me.

 

But here I am about 4/5 months later and having those same withdrawal symptoms again and I have NOT done another taper. Some people have called it tolerance withdrawal, others have said it could be from my other medications I’m taking. 4 days ago I started magnesium glycinate supplements, & last night I added a omega 3 to that before bed. I’m not sure if the supplements are helping at all yet but I’m just looking for some kind of relief. That’s when I was advised to come here and for advice. I don’t know what to do and I’m extremely overwhelmed by all this. I’m praying somebody here can help me pin point the cause of my issues. 

 

Edited July 28, 2021 by manymoretodays
name to title, spacing

[DataGuy]

Hi @Beemool,

 

Welcome to SA. Sorry to hear about what happened to you and the terrible withdrawal symptoms. Sometimes it can take quite a long time to stabilize after a cold-turkey, and months is not abnormal at all. Unfortunately, once PAWS (post-acute withdrawal syndrome) sets in, it tends to recede only very slowly. Withdrawal can also result in nervous system sensitization, so you can develop problems with other drugs that you previously tolerated well. We should look into this as a possibility for why you are still having difficulties. 

 

For now, if you could fill out your drug history in your signature, that would help get us started. Some drugs and supplements can interfere with metabolism and can also have psychotropic effects (antibiotics, steroids, some supplements, coffee, nicotine etc.). Here are the instructions on how to create your drug signature. This link will take you directly to the signature. Signatures generally look like this: 

 

Example:

2001–2002 paroxetine 
2003  citalopram 
2004  paroxetine
2008  paroxetine slow taper down to 2016 Aug off paroxetine
2016  citalopram May 20mg  Oct slow taper down
2018  citalopram 13 Feb 4.6mg 15 Mar 4.4mg 29 Apr 4.2mg

 

This will allow any moderator or member to quickly see your history and where you are in your taper, and thus be able to help more easily without too much reading (most people here are volunteers and have other jobs).

 

One thing I might recommend is that if you are continuously having trouble, you may want to get a genetic test to see whether you have some problems metabolizing these drugs. You could metabolize them faster or slower than normal and this could be causing some problems. Just a possibility.

 

In the meantime, you might find some of these non drug coping techniques helpful to ease your symptoms. Hope you start feeling better soon : )

Edited July 29, 2021 by DataGuy