When will venlafaxine start to work?

[Frazzledwife38]

My husband has been through 18 months of hell with severe depression which was basically fixed by taking sertraline . Due to medical reasons they have swapped him over to venlafaxine and I can't see that it is working?
He's on 112mg at the moment so not that high, it's slowly being increased every 2 weeks but he's just like a shell? He's very sleepy, says he can't concentrate or focus, he's tired all the time. There has been no positive improvement to his mood, he is very low.
The sertraline was like a wonder drug that changed him into a happy person. This one seems to be making him worse.
When you speak to the mental health nurse about it she just says it's early days and the dose needs to increase but she isn't the one living like this day in day out.
I'm scared he's going to end up losing his job because he's hardly working. Luckily he works from home which allows him to rest but he's literally sending one or two emails a day when he should be doing 8 hours work

Hello I’m on Venlafaxine. Started at 75 and 150 then 300mg. I believe that maybe he’s on a very high dose and to lower it and stick to that for a while and see if it helps. It’s normal to feel sleepy the first couple of days but it does go away and works for me. Hope this helps x

Another Venlafaxine user here. It does take time to settle unfortunately, like all antidepressants, especially when you are trying to find the right dose for you. Just make sure he’s on a modified release or is taking his dose split throughout the day otherwise it can cause headaches and other withdrawal symptoms - I found this out the hard way!

I'm sorry to hear about the difficulties your husband is experiencing with the new medication; it's important to communicate your concerns to the mental health nurse and consider seeking a second opinion from a healthcare professional to explore alternative options for managing his symptoms effectively.

When he started the sertraline the side effects wore off quickly and then he was fine. This is something else. He's going to bed at 7pm at night and just sitting on the sofa all day. He does not move.
The nurse is coming tomorrow but whenever I express my concerns she just says we need to give it time. It's very frustrating

When did he start OP? It is frustrating but it does take a while for these things to work and it’s important to give them a proper try before changing to something else. Since sertraline is no longer suitable, it’s worth giving this a proper go. Sometimes it does get worse before better, especially when changing meds but it will hopefully work out in the end. Good luck for your appt tomorrow, make sure you tell the nurse everything that you’re worried about :)

I hope things have improved OP. You description of your DH sounds very like me when starting an AD.
Do you mind if I ask why he had to come off sertraline?

Unfortunately the vast majority of antidepressants take a minimum of two weeks to do anything and upto 6 weeks to be fully effective, side affects apart it’s not really ideal to change them before 6 weeks as it’s not possible to say if they are effective, no one antidepressant is better than any other it’s often trial and error to find the specific one that works, though appreciate that doesn’t seem great from a user perspective