Posted 9/27/2016 5:57 PM (GMT 0)
Hey Lawchick,
I was on Celexa starting in 2006 at 20mg and going up to 40mg a couple of years later. All told, I took the medication for nearly ten years. I would say for the first three years it definitely helped me manage my generalized anxiety and I had a lot going on (college graduation coming up, job hunting, then new job, then mother got cancer for the second time), so my stress levels were definitely off the charts for a couple of years. Once I upped my dosage (partly as a result of my mother being diagnosed with cancer), and later when my stress levels went down, I can say that I really did not have any significant anxiety episodes for several years (from about mid-2009 to near mid-2015), and the episodes I did have were short. Before I was on medication I would be anxious and depressed for weeks at a time, feeling absolutely terrible for literally a month or more before things got back to semi-normal, then I'd go through the entire routine again a few months later. I recently made the decision to switch from Celexa to Prozac, not because of my dislike of the Celexa, but because I felt like I was starting to suffer from SSRI 'poop-out', not the official term, but basically just that my SSRI was no longer working as effectively as it had before. This can sometimes happen after many years of taking the same SSRI at the same dosage. So the long and the short of my 'review' of Celexa: it was a drug that definitely helped me for many, many years. The only significant side effects I noticed were when I was just starting the drug (some nausea and diarrhea, common because serotonin is also very present in the GI tract), but these went away relatively quickly. Celexa does have a fairly short half-life compared to some of the other SSRIs, so I would not recommend missing more than one dose if you can help it. I missed a couple of days in a row a few times over the years and I didn't have very bad withdrawal, just felt a bit under the weather and sluggish. Once I resumed my dose, this went away fast. I wish you luck on the med and yes, it's normal to be anxious about it. I was terrified when I took my first Celexa pill, thinking it was going to turn me into some emotionless zombie, but it really helped. With a combination of that and therapy I did very well for several years, and I hope it's the same for you.
Mama: Wow, it sounds like your daughter really went through the wringer. My sister, who suffers from OCD and anxiety, was on Paxil for several years back in the early 2000s and I can remember one weekend where she forgot to get her prescription refilled and was without the medication for three days. By day two she was shaking, crying, panicking, had diarrhea and kept wanting to hide in her bed. Worst withdrawal I've ever seen from anybody on an SSRI. On Monday when the pharmacy opened and she got her dose, she was back to normal within a few hours. Some people can have very sudden and severe withdrawal symptoms on SSRIs, particularly if they have faster metabolism.