Medication Switch

Hi all, I have been on 20 mg of Prozac for 4 weeks now, and I am seeing no improvement. As a matter of fact, I seem to be more depressed and anxious. I have an appointment with my psych for Monday. I am disappointed, as I don't like this trial and error with medication. I was on 15 mg of lexapro prior, but it seemed to stop working. I read that lexapro is about twice as strong as prozac, so maybe my dose of prozac is too low, I don't know. I seem to be exhausted all the time, taking a shower is a chore. I was exercising daily, but since I started prozac, I am not able to do that. I tried abilify, that gave me involuntary muscle jerks, even at 2.5 mg, so I discontinued that. I will see what the psych has to say, but my hopes are not very high right now.

Hi Casshless,

I agree with Mike. I tried five different things before I found out what worked. Maybe even more.

I started with buspar, then Zoloft, paxil, Prozac, Effexor, serzone, Pristiq. Actually that is six. Effexor I took twice. The second time I took it for over ten years. I am on Pristiq now and have been taking it since 2010. It takes awhile for the doc to figure out what is good for you. You could be right about the Prozac though, you may need a higher dose. And generally it takes six to eight weeks for a medication to reach it's full potential. So try to be patient. I know all you want is to feel better, but that takes time and patience. It is so frustrating. I would find a med that helped with my depression and then about two three months into it, I would get a bad side effect. I don't get them in the beginning usually. Tell me about frustrating.

So try not to lose hope. There are many meds out there to try. I am sorry about the abilify. I been taking it for a long time, but I am one of the lucky ones. Though my eye started twitching and I got scared. But it went away after about two weeks. It was strange.

I hope that you feel better soon Cashless. Keep on hanging in there, it will get better.

Hugs, Karen...

Prozac is stronger than Lexapro. its the strongest ssri. it took me 4 tries last time to find a med that o could tolerate and that worked. sometimes trial and error are the only way to find a med that works.