Effexor withdrawal

[Dale Moss]

One of my clients, a young woman subject to panic attacks, came to me with a view to getting off Effexor. After five months on a single dose of Calc-c. 200c, she's had no more panic attacks and has matured considerably (or so I thought).
She was to enter a 10 day Vipassana meditation retreat this week. Those can get pretty intense, so I gave her a single 1M dose to hold in the event she needed it. She had researched withdrawing from Effexor and, after the retreat, planned to do a three-day rotation wherein the dose is gradually reduced on one day out of the three.
In the past, when she's forgotten to take her Effexor, the effect has been an immediate plummeting of mood. She just called to tell me she'd forgotten to take it again -- but that was three days ago! This time, having taken the remedy, she's not experiencing any emotional problems while withdrawing, though she does have some light-headedness and a fuzzy feeling in her tongue and lips.
While I'm delighted she's doing so well (even though she didn't follow the plan), I'm wondering if there's going to be a crash somewhere down the line. My understanding is that Effexor can produce some pretty nasty symptoms during withdrawal. One symptom is "brain shivers," which has been described as ranging from a fairly subtle sensation that the brain is not moving as fast as the head to painful lightning storms in the brain.
Does anyone have any experience taking clients off this drug? Any tips?
Peace,
Dale

[Jean Doherty]

Was going to tentatively suggest 5 in 1 Phosphorus cell salts.. I would think vitamin Bs and Omega 3s and anything to help gut health important. Jean
Gelsemium one time helped client of mine hanging out for Heroin

[Rochelle Marsden]

Re- patients off any drug with bad side effects I do it by 1/2 dose 1 day, full dose the next , alternating for a week or 2 until they feel stable. Next 1/2 dose every day for a couple of weeks. Then try cutting the half dose into 1/4's and alternating. You get the idea. The other way I use is with a metal file shaving off one shave of the tablet every day. If a capsule they have to open the capsule and spill out some of it every day.
Allopathic drugs must be withdrawn very slowly . I sometimes give Avena Sativa in a herbal solution 5-20 drops up to 3 x a day as this also helps with the withdrawal.
Hope useful
Rochelle
Registered Homeopath with The Society of Homeopaths
EFT (Advanced) Practitioner
www.southporthomeopathy.co.uk

[John Harvey]

Effexor comes in a range of dosages. It's difficult enough for somebody to experience the effects of reducing the dosage from 150 mg to 75 mg daily, and a careful physician will sometimes have the patient take a 75 mg and a 37.5 mg capsule daily for a few weeks as the first step in reducing from a full 150 mg; then a 75 mg capsule daily; then a 37.5 mg capsule daily. This process is undertaken slowly to ensure that it doesn't make the patient feel physically and emotionally dreadful. From 37.5 mg, the usual thing, I understand, is simply to stop it, rather than to attempt the D.I.Y. medical engineering of spilling the contents of capsules.

It may be that the vitamin, fatty-acid, and phosphorus supplements that Jean has suggested will smooth the path of withdrawal as well. It may not be the wisest idea, though, to be spilling powdered psychoactive drugs around the home, even with the intent of disposing of them somewhere. The great surface area of finely powdered substances obviously increases their potential to act even in small doses. (And, without guidance on disposal, many patients will believe that it's harmless to wash these drugs down the sink plughole into the stormwater system, or to flush them down the toilet. Such thinking has contributed substantially to antibiotic resistance in the environment through flushing antibiotics down the toilet rather than returning them to pharmacies.)

Cheers --

John

[Dale Moss]

Good suggestions, Jean. Many thanks. I wasn't expecting her to try withdrawing so soon. Ironically, I'd just recommended B vitamins to another client who's also on an SSRI.
Peace,
Dale

[Dale Moss]

Thanks, Rochelle. I'd already recommended Aveena Sativa to her. So far, there have been no side effects from the withdrawal, except for those I mentioned in my post.
I'm more interested in what experience others have had with this particular drug, esp. whether side effects are likely to manifest long after withdrawal -- or continue for years.
Peace,
Dale

[Dale Moss]

I agree with you, John, about the unwiseness of splitting psychoactive drug pills (or flushing them down the toilet)! This young woman just went cold turkey, however. If she stays off, I'll advise her to return any unused pills to the pharmacy for proper disposal.
Peace,
Dale

[John Harvey]

Hi, Dale --

I was thinking especially of the effect of opening capsules (which Effexor comes in), because the entire dose is in powder form. Cold turkey from the lowest dosage daily is the Done Thing, as I understand it, but with luck some of Jean's and Rochelle's supplementary suggestions may assist. Knowing what dosage she's ceased will help to predict the degree of difficulty, of course.

I wish your patient well with it. Cheers --

John

[Liz Brynin]

Quite a few of these drugs exist in liquid form - much easier to reduce dosage in this way - with their GPs help, get them onto a liquid prescription.
Liz