Weird and excessive sweating... HELP

[isthisevennormal]

So, I started taking Venlafaxine about a year ago to help with crippling depression and anxiety. Until starting venlafaxine I had started a number of different types of antidepressants (sertraline, citalopram, mirtazapine) before finally finding venlafaxine. Because of this frequent stopping and starting new ones and the fact that I react really badly to SSRIs once I found a new one that worked I was willing to shake off some of the side effects. One of which is excessive sweating.

Now when I say excessive I mean, the second I walk up stairs, despite not being out of breath or hot I will form rivulets of sweat that will get in my eyes. When I get ready in the morning, the action of drying my hair briefly with a towel will cause me to drip with sweat. If I get even slightly flustered or rushed I sweat so much it gets in my eyes. But weirder still this doesn’t happen all the time. In the same day I can do the same walk from my office chair to the toilets downstairs and I will sweat 3 out of the 5 times I make the journey, the other two times I’m as dry as a bone.

So a bit of forehead sweat might be normal, maybe even a little on the upper lip. But I sweat in the oddest of places. Sweaty chin, check! Sweaty forearms, check! Sweaty knees but ice cold and dry thighs and calves, check!

My body is really screwing with me. I’ll have hot flushes, normally when I’m in bed being cuddled by my partner. He can feel them, he can feel my body almost shiver and then suddenly radiate heat like god damn radiator kicking in!

So, essentially, I am asking, does anyone have any experience of this? I’m in my mid twenties so I don’t think I’ve hit menopause all of a sudden. I’m reducing the dose of venlafaxine but it’s an incredibly slow process and I don’t want to come off of it completely since the medicine really does help me. Can anyone make any recommendations on how to cope with the sweating or anything I can take that could reduce it?

I’m at my wits end and could really use some advice from real people

It’s a really common side effect of AD unfortunately.
I was once sweating so much on one AD that a customer, while I had my hands full, followed with her eyes as a drip rolled down the side of my face and dripped off my chin I do remember dripping with sweat when towel drying my hair fresh from the shower. I even spent several months wearing dress shields (sticky pads in the armpits of my uniform) in desperation to not smell because I sweated so much, I even started my shift with ice packs down my top!
The constant worry over sweating in front of people actually made me panic and sweat even more, the dr changed my AD, not as good but I don’t sweat as much. That’s my only recommendation sorry, try a different AD that works but doesn’t see you dripping in sweat.

What dosage are you on ? I too , had to try different ADs until I found one that suited me. My worst side effects are very graphic dreams. I have had to increase mine and find too , the sweating , almost like a hot flush .
It is a pain that you find something that helps but have these side effects. I have had these conversations with my GP . No wonder people are reluctant to seek help and take ADs .
Nothing useful to say but you are not alone.

I was on a relatively low dose of an AD for nerve pain and also had excessive sweating - i could be walking outside in freezing temperatures with no coat on and dripping in sweat! I'm a sweaty sort of person normally when I exercise but this was something else. I was having gynae issues at the same time so got checked for peri-menopause but that was negative and it's got better since i stopped taking the drugs.

I’ve been on 150mg of venlafaxine for the past 6 months or so since I increased my dose at the beginning of lockdown. Now things for me have settled down considerably so I’ve started tailoring it down, currently on 112.5. I only started this new dose on Monday and the change from the higher dose to this one has really set off the sweats hopefully when I settle on a lower dose the sweating will go down too.

I’ll be honest, I did worry about early menopause, after saying I didn’t think it could be that. I checked the symptoms and I tick all the boxes apart from periods since I’m on the mini-pill which has completely stopped my periods... got my head in a little tiz about it but I don’t think it’s likely. If the sweating continues after my ADs settle then I’ll probably speak to my GP and get some tests done.

I’m glad I’m not alone with this and I hope you all have found or will find ways to deal with the sweating or minimise it’s impact

The next time you are at the doctors, ask him to do a thyroid test. It may not be the tablets. I have an overactive thyroid and a symptom of that is sweating.

Thank you Princess, I will do that next time. I have worried about my thyroid for a while but have dismissed it as unlikely but more and more things keep cropping up

I was very sick last year, lost at least a stone and had been hospitalised twice before that but no one could figure out what it was. My doctor eventually done my bloods for thyroid and that’s what it was. Excessive sweating, none stop vomiting, pins and needles all over, horrendous pain in my stomach and running to the toilet constantly. It honestly was horrendous and I was so happy to be diagnosed.