Poll of the Day > I ran out of my citalopram and now I'm super irritable and dizzy

(+) Yeah! (+)

I didn't even know dizziness was a withdrawal effect, this isn't cool.

my mom has those

what are they used for

argonautweakend posted...

my mom has those

what are they used for

They're a SSRI / antidepressant

Dude get to the pharmacy and refill, you do not want to go off it for a few days abruptly
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i dont know why she has them but theyve been in a container for years, maybe missing a few.

argonautweakend posted...

i dont know why she has them but theyve been in a container for years, maybe missing a few.

She may have been on them for a while and got off the medication and didn't get rid of the remnants. You're not supposed to just throw out medication. I still have a few bottles of medication I'm not on any more.

You could always ask .
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Doctor Foxx posted...

Dude get to the pharmacy and refill, you do not want to go off it for a few days abruptly

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I stopped taking my antidepressants abruptly.

Everything was extremely bright and loud, like people talking was like screaming in my ears. It was actually oddly pleasant, like I was hyper sensitive to everything. Being irritable didn't really bother me, if that's not an oxymoron.
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Why do so many people abruptly stop taking antidepressants?

That is like the one thing they tell you not to do
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Mead posted...

That is like the one thing they tell you not to do

And they never tell you why.

I guess the end goal is to make you feel better and if you feel really sad at the end of it there was no point.

Anyways they didn't work for me because I actually felt much better coming off them.
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Yellow posted...

And they never tell you why.

That has not been my experience.
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Mead posted...

That has not been my experience.

I'm looking it up and it surmounts to "You'll feel sad".

Basically just all the withdrawal symptoms at once might make you mentally unstable if that's what you're prone to.
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Yellow posted...

Mead posted...

That has not been my experience.

I'm looking it up and it surmounts to "You'll feel sad".

Basically just all the withdrawal symptoms at once might make you mentally unstable if that's what you're prone to.

Hey you don't have to look it up (and what you're seeing is only a small part of the possibilities). Doctors explain the why to you. The pamphlets with the drugs explain the why to you. Many internet resources can explain the why. For fun I'll tell you from my own experience with this exact same thing that it's more than feeling sad.

You will have a destabilized mood. Dizziness, nausea, and headaches kick in. Then after a couple of days without it you will hit a wall. Mentally you're in a fog. Physically you will ache and have no energy.

Then the brain zaps start. You get these sharp, painful, disorienting jolts in your head. Forget being able to concentrate. They will come at you no matter what you're doing and stop you with the pain and confusion.

The mood situation is why these drugs have a black box warning. It's not just a bit sad. You can get full on suicidal. You can get extremely hostile. Or you may be a nonfunctional mess of feelings.

Do. Not. Stop. Cold. Turkey. These drugs take many weeks of regular dosing to reach effective levels and then just stopping abruptly absolutely fucks you up and throws you into a tailspin. You have to taper off.

Don't be dismissive of the withdrawal effects... They're real, they're intense, and coming off of it incorrectly can lead to people taking their own lives. It's not a joke.

@KevinceKostner get to the pharmacy and fill your prescription. If you don't have one explain to them that you're on an abrupt withdrawal if you don't have any prescription refills left. Then get to the doctor. Don't fuck around. It's not worth trying to tough it out.
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ive been stupid and forgot my medication going out of town before and it was hell because i kept getting these 'brain zap' things.
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the brain zaps are the worst
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You're probably right. Mental breakdowns can get really bad.
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helIy posted...

the brain zaps are the worst

Yep. I had bad ear ringing with the zaps.

DirtBasedSoap posted...

ive been stupid and forgot my medication going out of town before and it was hell because i kept getting these 'brain zap' things.

That would be awful to be stuck without medication. It's just a waiting game for shitty symptoms. But those zaps ><
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Yellow posted...

You're probably right. Mental breakdowns can get really bad.

Mental breakdowns are their own ornery thing. This is a pharmaceutical dependency that has been built up intentionally for a long time. It's physical symptoms. It's like your whole mental and sensory world goes to shit and you're left without emotional stability to cope with it. All of it together is horrible. It goes downhill fast.

I'm emotionally stable without the medication, was stable on it, and it still really messed me up to stop suddenly for just a few days.
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Doctor Foxx posted...

Yep. I had bad ear ringing with the zaps.

didn't have that, though i already have tinnitus.

mine came with the sounds of an explosion. it would be neat if it didn't suck so much. every time it happened i heard an explosion
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