dreamspirit: my journey - it sucks

[brassmonkey]

Hi Dreamspirit-- the big factor is how sensitive you are to the drug.  Using the weight of 500mg tablet weigth for 40mgs active ingredient weight it works out that 1mg of tablet contains 0.08mgs (8/100) active ingredient.  That's not very much. So unless you are super sensitive to the drug the fluctuation between tablets should not cause any problems.  I've used 40mg paxil tablets my entire taper and use an average weight of 500mg for my calculations, and have had no problems.

 

Also subtracting 12.5 from the pill weight will only work for the first reduction.  The better way to figure it is Average pill weight X 0.975 = dose weight for your first reduction.  Then Current Dose Weight X 0.975 to get your subsequent Dose Weights.  That will maintain a constant 2.5% reduction for the entire taper, where as just subtracting 12.5 would slowly increase your dose size over time.

[dreamspirit]

Ok, thank you so much!Brass.. I started my taper a week ago. When I drop again I will do what you said. I'm not planning on dropping again until April or May.

I'm going extra slow this time around :-)

[dreamspirit]

It's been 3 weeks since I did my first drop. It's been going ok. Some days I feel like I have energy and other days I'm just blah and don't feel like doing anything.

The symptoms I get are achy joints, slight headaches, sometimes stomach issues, a little bit of lightheadness and weird vivid dreams.

I don't get these symptoms everyday but every once in awhile.

I won't drop again till May.

[Fresh]

Hi ds ,  good to hear your symptoms stayed manageable.

 

Have you seen Stuart Shipko's article " Playing the Odds Revisited" https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj-0N7oyt3KAhUkxqYKHXHUBpUQFgghMAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.madinamerica.com%2F2014%2F07%2Fshooting-odds-revisited%2F&usg=AFQjCNHlN4JOAsxVXUfcm_U00Klad3wvQA&sig2=Br4gsYpF9WnO58-SRNqetQ&bvm=bv.113370389,d.dGY

It seems the type of reaction you had after stopping is not unique.   

I'll be doing what you are , a long slow taper   .

[dreamspirit]

Starting another drop tonight.. From 39mg to 38mg.. Will hold for another 4 months.

 

Did my first drop Jan 10 so I held for awhile.. Didn't have any bad symptoms with first drop . Thank goodness! So on to the next!

[apace41]

Good to hear, DS.

 

Slow and steady.  Don't rock the boat.

 

Best,

 

Andy

[dreamspirit]

A little update, still on 38 mgs from 40. Only done 2 drops this past year. My last drop was June 1..

past couple of days I started to get more withdrawal symptoms.

Stomach problems, headaches, hot flashes, bathroom problems .

Had one adrenaline rush today... started having blurry vision off and on a month ago..

good thing I haven't dropped again.. went with my gut.. need to wait for all of this to pass..

[dreamspirit]

Ok well I feel a bit better .. the only thing that is driving me nuts is the blurred vision. Guess I might only be able to drop twice a year. Which would take many years to get off completely.

I'm currently on 38 mg from 40. First drop was Jan 10 2016 and second drop was June 1st. Just now getting withdrawal symptoms.. crazy!

I'm not planning on dropping again until Jan 2017 .. that will be a year that I've been tapering..

[dreamspirit]

Hello everyone, I haven't posted a update in awhile. 

Im still tapering . I'm currently on 37mgs from 40mgs. I started my taper in January 2016 and have been doing 1mg drops every 4-6 months. Mainly every 6.

 

I haven't really havent had any terrible withdrawal symptoms but I'm having some now. Just minor. I think it's from stress. I've had a very stressful July. First I had a Breast cancer scare cause they found a spot on my mammogram but when I had to go back to get a 3D mammogram the spot was gone. Thank god!

 

but now I have another stressor added. I may need neck surgery. I see a neurosurgeon on sept 13. So I have that stress now ugh! I'm a very nervous person and I've never have had any surgery before so this is scary for me. 

So in July I've been on norco ( just took a few) for pain , steroid and a muscle relaxer. I'm not taking them at the moment. Then I had trigger point injections in my neck muscles and that had some steroids in it. Now not on anything but ibuprofen or aleve. 

 

I dropped down a mg on July 5 before this all happened but a week later when I found out about my spot on my breast I went back up a mg to 37mg. I'm not planning on doing anymore tapering anytime soon. Not until all this neck stuff is over. 

 

My symptoms are.. chills throughout body (Off and on) little bit of Adrenaline surges and couldn't sleep last night. That's it. I'm sure it is all the stress from this month that has triggered it. Hopefully it all goes away soon. 

 

Tom on here (Brassmonkey) taught me how to calculate my 1 mg drops from a 40mg tablet by Average pill weight X 0.975 = dose weight for your first reduction.  Then Current Dose Weight X 0.975 to get your subsequent Dose Weights.  That will maintain a constant 2.5% reduction for the entire taper.

 

what if I wanted to do 1/2mg drops then how do I calculate it? 

 

Im not dropping for awhile but want this info for later. 

 

Thanks 

[dreamspirit]

Ok so the last time I tapered was January from 38mg to 37mg. I then tapered again this past July to 36mg but went back up to 37 after a week because I had a bunch of very stressful things pop up. 

I’m having more withdrawal now then what I did when I just tapered in January. Is this delayed withdrawal? It’s been 10 months since I tapered.

 

The other times I’ve tapered which was every 4-6 weeks I didn’t get any withdrawal symptoms until almost a year and that’s when I crashed. 

[dreamspirit]

Seems it takes my body almost a year to get withdrawal symptoms from tapering.. 

has anyone else had long delayed withdrawal like that? 

[dreamspirit]

Currently on 37mg from 40mg. Been tapering for 2 years now . I’m currently in a wave. My last drop was July of last summer. So 7 months ago. 

 

These waves and windows are something else ugh! 

 

[MamaFlower]

I'm sorry nobody replied to your thread and questions. I am facing the same thing and wondering what is going on. 

I went down 6.5% ONCE and it's been 4 months and I am getting worse instead of better. It seems impossible that you'd be still so unstable after 7 months of going down just a tiny amount so long ago. This is so hard to figure out. 

[MamaFlower]

Has anyone replied to you other than me? Have you found answers in other threads?

[dreamspirit]

Hi mama flower, I’m stable now. I’m guessing that since I’ve been on Paxil for 21 years that the stuff is built up in my system and my system is not use to not having it so I think I will have lots of waves and windows. There are lots of people who have the waves Year’s after being off too so everyone is different I guess. 

 

How long have you been on paxil? Are you on the Facebook Paxil group ? 

 

Thanks for replying to my thread. You are the only person lately who has responded. I have had others but not in a long time. I get more replies on fb. 

[Carmie]

Hi DS, 

 

How are you doing?💚

[dreamspirit]

6 hours ago, Carmie said:

Hi DS, 

 

How are you doing?💚

Hi Carmie, Thanks for responding. I’m doing ok.. Still in my journey.. I’ve only dropped by 3mg in 3 years time... so I went from 40mg to 37mg and felt every bit of it. The last 1mg taper I did was two years ago and I still have waves and windows off and on....

 

I get very delayed withdrawals. I don’t feel any until almost 7-12 month mark. I’m very sensitive. 

 

I’m planning another 1mg taper very soon. Then I will hold for 6 months and then taper again for a 2mg drop in a years time.  I can’t go any faster. Wish I could but can’t. 

 

My first goal is to get to at least 30mg. I set small goals for myself. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to fully get off Paxil but I’m just going to keep going forward. That’s all I can do. 

[Carmie]

Hi dreamspirit, 

 

Thanks for letting us know how you’re doing. Even if we need to go slower than some others, I think all forward movement is great. Good on you for listening to your body. There’s someone on here that feels every tiny drop even though they are down to 000.something or it may even be 0.000 something. They have to go extremely slowly too.

 

I can only taper by around 4% or so now. When I do my next taper I will taper just over 3%. 

 

Keep us updated as to how your next drop goes. You sound like you have a good positive attitude.  Wishing you all the best with your continued tapering.💚

[dreamspirit]

Hi , just thought i would pop in and update.. I’ve been doing a very slow taper of Paxil since Jan 2016..

 

I’ve went down from 40mg to 37mg.  I have very delayed withdrawals. So I did 1mg drops every 6 months. In July it will be 2 years since I have tapered .. still having waves and windows . Currently in a wave.. how long do waves come and go? Years I’m assuming? 

 

At this rate I’ll never get off paxil but I would at lest like to get to 30mg for a first goal.. I can’t taper any faster as my withdrawals get too severe... 

 

The second time I tried to taper which was 2014 I did 1 mg drops every 4-6 weeks and got down to 30mgs and didn’t really have any symptoms for 8 months  then I crashed big time and had to reinstate my full 40mg dosage.. took me 6 months to fully feel 100% again... I stayed on my full dose for a year then that’s when I started this current taper... 

 

Do I wait till these waves end for good and then drop again or just drop again when I have another window? If I drop again when I’m still having waves will the symptoms double up on me? 

[dreamspirit]

Anyone?? 

[Gridley]

On 4/10/2019 at 2:44 PM, dreamspirit said:

 

Do I wait till these waves end for good and then drop again or just drop again when I have another window? If I drop again when I’m still having waves will the symptoms double up on me? 

 

Waves and windows are going to come and go throughout your taper.  What we're looking for in terms of when you drop again is a period (of a month or so) where you have stabilized, which means a general average feeling of feeling not great but not terrible with no wild swings in symptoms.  

[dreamspirit]

On 4/12/2019 at 1:49 PM, Gridley said:

 

Waves and windows are going to come and go throughout your taper.  What we're looking for in terms of when you drop again is a period (of a month or so) where you have stabilized, which means a general average feeling of feeling not great but not terrible with no wild swings in symptoms.  

 

Thanks for your reply!! I haven’t tapered in 18 months.. will I still get waves being this far out from the last time I tapered? 

Ive always had very delayed withdrawals.. 

[Gridley]

7 minutes ago, dreamspirit said:

 

Thanks for your reply!! I haven’t tapered in 18 months.. will I still get waves being this far out from the last time I tapered? 

Ive always had very delayed withdrawals.. 

 

The waves and windows, ups nd downs, are part of withdrawal, even after you're months beyond zero.  This explanation from Alto is helpful:

 

"Windows and waves occur in a stair-step pattern, with a general upwards trend.

 

                                        After a year, a little better.

Awful

 

Alto:  I've experienced waves. I'll have a window when I feel better, then a wave, which feels as bad as ever, except a little different. Over time, the windows have gotten more frequent and longer and the troughs not as deep, and shorter. So, on average, I've gotten slowly better. Kind of like 1 step forward and 5 steps back, then 2 steps forward and 5 steps back, then 3 steps forward and 4 steps back, then 2 steps forward and 3 steps back, then 3 steps forward and 3 steps back....uh, where was I?

 

Waves mean your nervous system is struggling to heal. It moves in the right direction for a bit then falls back a bit. This is normal. You can view the "better" part of the wave as when your nervous system is finding its balance. These periods will get longer and more frequent as time goes on.

 

Rather than damaged receptors, I've found it more accurate to visualize post-acute withdrawal syndrome as autonomic dysregulation. The effects are generalized and when the nervous system is under stress, symptoms can reappear -- and go away again, as is common with autonomic issues.

 

Our nervous systems are so complicated they repair themselves in patches. Some parts recover then the whole thing needs to re-balance again. Rinse and repeat."