Those with experience of citalopram and escitalopram please help

[Unsurprisinglysurprising]

I've posted a few times about this.

I took citalopram for a month. Because of the side effects (nausea, although it did improve a little, and unbearable tiredness) I got switched to escitalopram, which I've been on for 3 weeks, so 7 weeks on ADs in total.

I still feel some nausea. I'm sleeping constantly. I have no motivation. I am someone who usually performs better when a deadline is looming. It has caused me huge anxiety in the past but now I feel I don't have anxiety but I also don't have motivation.

Before the ADs I would have moments of tearful joy at small things which was a kind of depressed joy but now I don't have that. I feel quite flat or I don't know how I feel really.

I'm going back to the GP but am really thinking I need to get off medication and deal with things differently.

Any advice?

I think a trip back to the docs is what you need. but in the meantime I can remember being on 40mg of citalopram along with a period of counselling for 12 weeks where I constantly spoke about not being able to feel anything emotionally and felt totally detached of any kind of empathy, if I showed empathy it was only through knowing the right thing to say, it was not sincere even though I really wanted it to be. looking back I now know that it was the medication, I have since reduced (over a 3 year period) down to 10mg per day which I describe as my maintenance dose. I feel nausea if I don't take my medication at a regular time every day - I take mine in the morning - maybe this is something you could be strict about, I have no experience of escitalopram so cannot vouch for that. it sounds to me that you are still relatively early in the adaption to the medication and could be why you are sleeping and lacking motivation although I would say the medication doesn't 'give' me motivation I would describe it more like it enables me to find the strength to motivate myself so maybe you need to be more realistic about what the medication will be able to do for you. I would also mention that I found mindfulness to be really helpful - much of the time we are so stressed that resting our brains is really really important, but again this is something you will need to percevere with. you will get there and you will feel better, at least you are addressing your symptoms and refusing to just put up with them. I hope you feel better soon.