Well I guess it is time to post an update on the my war against medicine.
For the many newcomers here a breif synopsis on my past with Cymbalta.
Had a nervous breakdown in 2002. From 2002 I have been on many different meds to try to get me back to 'normal'.
Was switched from effexor to cymbalta in Jan of 2009. Dr said it had less side effects. Now I must confess it did a very good job of controlling my anxiety.
In 2012 Cymbalta crashed by testosterone production. My free testosterone went from over 400 mg/dl to 63 in 6 months. I developed gynocomastia. I joined this site in very early 2013. With the help of several kind souls like Greenmachine and Lady Nancy I was introduced to the bead counting method.
It took 60 days to wean and I was very lucky. I had NO withdrawal symptoms until I got down to the last 10 beads. Then all hell broke loose. Digestive problems, dizziness, agitation, anger.....etc. Those symptoms Slowly faded from the 2nd week to the 4th week. By the end of hte 4th week all withdrawal symptoms gone EXCEPT an overwhelming fear of immediate death. I fought that for 3 months. I slept curled up in a corner with the lights on and many a nights it took 3 to 4 mg lorazepam just to get to sleep. I didn;t want to go back on an ssri/snri so the dr tried several different drugs that wound up having no effect on the fear. I couldn't handle the fear any longer and was put on zoloft.
The zoloft brought things under control so it was time to come off the earlier meds. As of this date only 2 meds left to come off of. First lorazepam. I am currently weaning of it. I have used lorazepam 3 times earlier in my life (about 4 to 5 months each time) and came off of it fairly easily with a slow wean of 5 to 10% every 14 days.
This time is different. First of all I have been on it over a year. Second, I took as much as 6 mg/day. I have finally got down 16% in dose, from 4 mg/day to 3.36 mg/day. Dropping 2 or 3 % every 3 to 5 weeks. This last drop was a 2% drop and I am on the 5th week of 'recovery' and things are the same or worse than last week. Now with these small drops I am making the symptoms tolerable so I continue to wait for things to clear before another drop.
I saw my pdoc yesterday and continue to be impressed with the man. He showed me some recent research from the last few years where in certain cases a small precentage of benzo addicts take 2 to 6 years to wean off. Benzos cause a change to your gaba receptors and once you start weaning those receptors are what causes the withdrawal BUT they DO eventually heal. Normal time span...around two years. A note. If you ever suffer from benzo addiction it is important to NOT take any benzos the first 2 years after coming off a benzo addiction. You are more likely to become addicted to the new benzo.
As I was saying I am 5 weeks since the last drop of 2%. He said just wait to you heal and then drop again. Don't rush it this may take a long time.The important thing is that it is only uncomfortable so I can deal with it til it passes. And before anyone asks about changing to diazepam...He did not want to change to a drug I have never been on and possible complicate the issue. We hope to be 50% off the drug by the first of the year. After the lorazepam the only drug left to try and come off of is the zoloft. But that is another story.
Sorry about being long winded.
