Posted 26 August 2007 - 05:18 PM
spacey--From the sound of it, there's probably a good likelihood that you might quit taking the Effexor. In case that's true, I want to share something about Effexor that I went through--and that my doctor never bothered to warn me about.
I took Effexor for a short time for mild depression about eight years ago. I gave it five months, but I found that the drug wasn't helping me. I was sluggish, depressed and gaining weight--so my doctor advised that I quit taking it and switch to Wellbutrin. I did so.
About the second day after the switch, I was startled from my sleep in the middle of the night because I "heard" something. After waking up and looking around, I realized that what I was "hearing" was the sound of my own eyes turning from side to side! It was a noise not unlike the sound that a Star Wars light sabre makes. I tried to ignore it and went back to sleep--hoping that maybe it was just a bad dream. But when I woke up in the morning, the eye problem was much worse. Not only did I hear the noise, but I was getting an electrical-shock sensation throughout my body whenever I moved my eyes even a little bit.
The only new change in my habits that I could think of was that I had started taking Wellbutrin. But I'd used Wellbutrin a few years earlier with no ill effects. So I was terrified. I thought I was dying and/or having a stroke. I called the after-hours nurse (it was Sunday) and recounted my symptoms, wondering if Wellbutrin ever had this kind of effect on people. I didn't even think to mention the Effexor, because I had quit taking it. While Effexor didn't work too well for my depression, it certainly didn't cause anything remotely like what I was now experiencing.
Lucky for me, the nurse was sharp enough to ask if I had recently stopped taking any medication. I thought that was a strange question, but I told her that I had indeed stopped taking Effexor. I was suprised when she told me that my symptoms were likely entirely due to stopping the Effexor. I almost didn't believe it, but after getting off the phone, I went online to see if there was any information about this curious effect. Was there ever! I found thousands upon thousands of hits on a google search of "effexor withdrawal". There are entire websites devoted to it. Some of the symptoms are much worse than mine. The common thread seems to be the "electrical shock" feeling, sometimes described as "brain shivers". I even found a few people who tied that feeling to eye movement, just like me. What scared me the most was that some people said the bad effects were continuing for weeks, months, even years.
At any rate, my symptoms slowly subsided over two weeks--not fast enough, but I lived through it. If you quit Effexor, you may not experience such ill effects--but if you do, be sure to discuss it with your doctor before panicking like I did.
