Fluoxetine withdrawal

[Emily1998]

Hello, i took fluoxetine for suspected PND and anxiety about 5 days, a week at most and had the most extreme reaction, so my GP told me to stop straight away and take diazepam as needed for a few days, which i did, i stopped the fluoxetine around the 16th i believe and was told bad withdrawals should only last a week (im very med sensitive), im struggling to sleep at night keep waking, having extremely vivid nightmares and im EXHAUSTED 24/7, extreme brain god / short term memory issues, ive also found out my vitamin D levels are low at 30iu so have been prescribed 20,000iu to take 2x pills once a week, and iron, could what im experiencing still be withdrawal from the fluox? I didnt have nightmares beforehand and any symptoms i had before such as exhaustion and brain fog etc are magnified, i also have zero appetite but that was an issue before, i suspect my issues are mainly hormonal but how long will these nightmares and extreme fatigue last??

Bump

Anyone??

I haven't heard of such a bad withdrawal after so short a time taking the meds. Go see your GP.

I did snd they denied it was withdrawals but i never had nightmares before, so many in one night too its horrible

Didn’t want to leave this unanswered.

I’m not in any way medically trained, but my DS has taken fluoxetine and coming off it seems to be tricky. When he did, we had to taper down very slowly over several weeks - the dr was insistent that he must not just stop taking it suddenly.

I know that you had to due to adverse reactions, but it might explain the extreme symptoms you are getting, particularly if you are sensitive to meds generally.

Deficiencies in Vit D and iron can make you feel rough so that could also be making things worse

I took fluoxetine at a high dose for years. Stopped cold turkey when changing meds to escitalopram and had no withdrawal at all. Your reaction sounds extreme. You need to speak to your gp.

It seems on google that nightmares are quite a common symptom of withdrawal but i wouldnt have thought id have got that, i feel absolutely awful at the moment

Im about to taper down from 60mg to 20mg to start a new med and im absolutely petrified of withdrawals 😔

Hi I know this was a while ago but how long did this last? I’ve only taken Fluoxetine for 4 days then stopped because I couldn’t cope with the increased anxiety. I felt okay yesterday (the day I stopped) but have awful pins and needles sensations, exhaustion and anxiety today. I’m just getting over Covid too so it could be that but these feelings are really scaring me. I didn’t think I’d get any withdrawal symptoms after only taking them a few days!

Are you sure it wasn't the diazepam?

I’m on this too and my GP advised me that for the first two weeks my anxiety would be much worse + other bad symptoms until my brain adjusted itself. She prescribed me Propanolol along side it and it is keeping the anxiety very manageable. Did your GP not do similar?

No gp didn’t suggest propanalol. I’m too scared to take anything else now. I just want this out of my system!

Did this clear?

Have you been referred to a specialist perinatal team? This would be appropriate if your child is under 2. They generally also have a psychiatrist attached to the team who will be able to offer prescribing if needed. Withdrawals are unlikely if you only took the meds for a week.