Effexor (venlafaxine) withdrawal

  has anyone successfully weaned themselves off effexor?  I've decreased my dosage from 300mg to 150mg and I can't stop sleeping. I'm so drowsy it's frustrating. I've noticed the sleepiness since I cut my dosage in half.  I can't wait to get off this drug. 

    There's ton of websites about people's complaints of effexor withdrawal symptoms (lots of brain zaps, etc).

  Any input?  thanks   yaaaawn

I successfully weaned myself off efexor, but went back on it after 6 weeks. Yep it is one of the tougher drugs to withdrawal from but it can be done. Hang in there and take it at the right pace for you. All the best, LW

quick effexor withdrawal update:

i'm having very vivid dreams full of detail and emotion. It's like being in a movie theater with feelings, thoughts, sights, people, memories. No nightmares yet. I can also feel my heart skipping some beats & beating harder at times. The brains shivers are really starting to get stronger now. No sense of impending doom, but I think I'm starting the full fledged withdrawal now.
I still have some effexor tabs left if this gets too intense to help bridge me through the worst of it. my vision is also getting a little blury. I'm not getting anxious b/c everything I've read says the symptoms do decrease over a couple days and finally disappear.
more to come . . . . . .

Now weaning SLOWLY off Venlafaxine / Effexor under my psychiatrist's care. I have (had) anxiety (along with depression, bipolar disorder II, borderline personality disorder, and have some ADHD traits) and told her a few months back about the GABA supplement - you can get it in pill form at Whole Foods (no, I'm not advertising for them) and I read you can get it in powder form, too. I did NOT hear about it from any medical professional, rather from a health food store clerk (God bless her!).

GABA is the 'little brother' to the bigger Serotonin, Dopamine, and Norepinephrine and it ONLY works on anxiety. Read this article: http://www.integrativepsychiatry.net/neurotransmitter.html. It's actually crucial to help the other neurotransmitters work, but psychiatrists and the overall medical establishment - from my recent experience -are unaware of how crucial it is.

I've found that taking one 750mg GABA pill before bed has helped mitigate the withdrawal side effects from Effexor Venlafaxine. Weaning off of Effexor-Venlafaxine, I was having rapid cycling and it took care of that, the same with the 'twitching neck' effects, and most of the high anxiety and increase in ruminating thoughts. If I found any of these increasing during the day, I took another 750mg GABA pill.

Had no side effects AT ALL with GABA, but that is MY BODY. Please check with your doctor before taking GABA as I know there can be side effects. It does have something to do with seizures and I am taking Topiramate, too, but have had no seizures or other ill affects.

As it turns out, because I was taking GABA regularly during my withdrawal, I began to find that I was more peaceful, my anxiety was disappearing, my ruminating thoughts were disappearing - and now, guess what? I am anxiety free - something I have never been since puberty and I'm now 48 years old! So, it turns out that I am genetically deficient in GABA. It can be found in certain foods, I like to eat those foods, but it appears either I do not eat enough of them or my body cannot absorb the nutrients. I have also found that GABA is helping with other bodily functions (it seems) like muscles, sugar levels, energy levels, and menopause side effects as well as 'getting older' side effects.

The thing to add here is that I told my psychiatrist, 2 neurologists, medical doctors, my couselors and others that GABA took care of my anxiety and all of them could not believe it, had never even thought of using it. But once they thought about it, it made total sense. In my opinion, I don't think they knew the positive effects GABA would have because most people with anxiety also suffer from depression so the medical community is focused on the depression side of things (just keeping people alive) and forget about the anxiety part or think the depression meds at higher levels will help with the anxiety. My depression went away about 11 months ago - through prayer and use of DBT - so only anxiety and fatigue were left. So when I started taking GABA, I was a 'clean slate' and it could do its work on my anxiety and it has been doing a wonderful job! I'm thinking that over the long run it may even help with my fatigue, but we will see.