Zoloft experience w/ weight and weaning

I wanted to post to another thread about Zoloft but, it was too long and was closed because of that.

I have had years of experience using Zoloft. I was very thin when I started Zoloft about 15 years ago. Right after I started taking it, I started gaining a lot of weight. It mostly goes to my mid-section which is the worst place to gain for health reasons. Maybe that is just me though. I could never loose the weight while on Zoloft and had never been that heavy before in my life. In all, I gained about 65 lbs.

All the doctors said it was not the Zoloft but, I know differently. about a year or two ago, I weaned myself off of the Zoloft and was losing 5 lbs/month easily. I was just eating small portions and exercising with hand weights for 10 minutes about 3 or 4 times / week. It was easy to lose the weight. Then I was under stress when my folks passed and I needed to go back on the Zoloft. I started back on 50 mg/day and the weight loss stopped. The weight went up five lbs and I couldn’t loose it. Recently, there was more stress in my life and had to increase the dosage to 100 mg/day. That was just a couple of weeks ago and I can feel my stomach getting bigger and the weight has increased slightly. I have a personal trainer now so I am exercising more than ever and still gaining.

How I weaned myself off Zoloft: I did it very slowly. I was on 200 mg/day at first. I tried going off cold turkey and I found myself extremely angry. So, I decided to cut down gradually. At first I went down 25 mg/day doing that for several weeks at a time. It was still too fast. Then I read to do is slower so, I went down 12 mg/day. So it was about ½ of a quarter tab that I was cutting off my 100 mg pill. That worked much better. I noticed the same symptoms every time I decreased the dosage. But at that rate it was manageable. I was also using acupressure for emotional healing at that time. about every 5 weeks I was able to lower the dosage another 12 mg until I was completely off the drug.

I will definitely get off of Zoloft when I get things under control. The weight is causing health concerns for me.

Good luck on your journey! I hope this can help someone.

Thanks for the suggestion. I have tried Paxil and it doesn’t work for me. Maybe the Lexapro will be worth at try.