Citalopram ruined my life

Carl

I can relate to many of your comments above though fortunately without some of the more dramatic episodes.

What needs to be understood by a lot of medics are the potentially sever side effects of the drug and these should be FULLY explained to the patient by the GP prior to commencement of use of the drug. It sound slike you nor I had the opportunity of this information and as a result like you i had slight anxiety and ended up on a 3 month treadmill of side effect then later withdrawal symptoms which has meant that i have lost most of the last 3 months.

Finally I now appear to be almost over the worse and getting back to  a normal life!!

Dave

Hi Carl,

I can totally relate to your post. I was prescribed 30 mg Citalopram in May last year, but for depression AND anxiety. I basically needed a mood stabiliser, and it seemed to be doing the business for the first few months.

I then made a stupid, rash decision to go cold turkey, and inadvertently lost my job as a result. I stopped taking it because I too was getting a bloated belly, was a mental zombie, and I just couldn't take the lack of sex drive on them. I figured I would take psychotherapy as my route to sanity (had a disturbed and turbulent childhood), but when I told my psychiatrist about the effects of coming off Cit cold turkey, he suggested I go back on them.

Once I did, I was a whole new person; and this is testatement to how pharma companies keep you addicted to the drug: by making withdrawal an intolerable, experience.

Anyway, as it stands now, I made the decision to taper off Citalopram slowly and come off it altogether. I am in the 3rd month of reducing doses, with the plan to stop Citalopram altogether in a month. I am taking Wellbutrin as a depression aid, and so far it seems to be working fine.

Can I suggest that since your issue is largely anxiety related that you consider doing some form of meditation or yoga? I too am a runner and nothing helps getting those dopamine levels up and giving you a calming effect after, but yoga would really help you in the long term. It would calmly help you root out the problem and let it go through the powers of meditation.

Anyway, good luck to you and hope you get back to your old self. Now that I am tapering off Citalopram, I'm starting to feel like my old self again.

I cant hlep but wonder if maybe you did not need the drug really in the first place. Not everyone I feel is bad enough to be medicated.  A similar thing happend to me yes I was moody and could be anxious now and then but I never felt anything was wrong with me I assued it was normal. I moved out to WAshington and had to get a new doctor and he started asking all these question which I was yes I can be snappy and yes more around my cycle. He took me off my normal birthcontrol and prescribed me the new one that came out that had a mood lifter in it Yaz. Ok I felt great fro the year I was on it , then I wanted to get pregnante and came off it...Bam only two weeks off and Panic attack. I never had them before. Then they got more intense as time went on. I now have panic disorder , generalized anxiety , vision problems from both of those. And now from it all gastritis because of the stress. My body was capable of dealing with my emotions till I removed myself from those emotions and then when they flooded back it was like shock to my body..after lots of research I am not the only one who this happend to with this birth control.  Of course I kept thinking I should just go back on but That would make me feel stuck on a drug and I dont want that. So since 2007 I have been managing so far without meds and other treatments like breathing excersies ect. Found a therapist that finally not trying to push anti meds at me. I got better for 5 years but I just had a relapse...I wish I could go back and not take that stupied stuff but I cant. So where from here? I will still consider anti meds a last resort for me. I am now researching natural herbs. I am sorry you are going through this but some doctors jump to meds first..I think if I would of started the thearpy and yoga before I would of been completely fine but no he pushed something new at me which by the way was taking off the market and now they have a new form of it out..surprise surprise.

Carl Hi!

Sounds to me from your comments that the GP is adopting a blinkered view and not listening to the patient!!

I what is being offered is not what you are happy to proceed with then do seek another opinion from a second GP . Whereas one doctor will not criticise another, they could adopt another remedy to your problem. In the past when i have suffered from nerves (anxiety) I have used beta blockers in an ad hoc way as and when required this has helped with the peak of the issues and then I have stopped when the problem is over this is what i will likely do in the future and never touch what for me is the evil drug Cit!!!

For what it is worth and under the circumstances I don't think that I would be happy with hte responce which you received from your GP:

Dave

Hi Carl, I've had such a rough time too, like you I only took for anxiety (mild in my opion) and within days had full blown akathisa, psychosis. I've not been the same since, I feel a shell of my former self, and have so many ongoing symptoms after only 5 weeks on it. It's been 5 months and no change.

Hi Carl, my dr gave the drug ford insomnia and it totally changed me too after 8 days. Can you confirm if you feel like you are back to your old self at all as I am still not and am starting to lose hope? Thanks jo 

Hi carl, I had similar effect after 8 days, has anything improved for you? I totally transformed me, I was a happy person and it has taken everything from me. I hope there is some hope 

☹☹ Same Here i lost my self until I stopped citalopram

Same same same!!!!!! I went in for super mild anxiety. Started meds. Went absolutely nuts. Never experienced anything like that before. Now, my treatment is just to fix all the issues ive had just from taking the meds. It took me a year to feel better and now Im tapering from 20 down to 15. Not really sure if what i feel is withdrawal or regression or if im just in my head. i wish id never taken that first dose two years ago. now i fear getting off will send me into a tailspin like getting on them did

Do not take this drug, I was prescribed this to cope with some anxiety with moving to a new city and starting a new job, moving away from my family etc., it was a little overwhelming for me. the first few days taking the drug i couldn't do anything but lay on the couch dead to the world, I had no energy at all but overall felt relatively well. After a few weeks it felt like it was working, everything had the volume turned down a little bit, I was getting along better at work and developing some new hobbies. But a few months in I started getting a very short temper, snapping at people for no reason, my fight or flight response was happening constantly and I became disengaged from my surroundings, basically any little stressors threw me right into a panic attack. I thought i could just control my emotions and i didnt want to admit that something was wrong, the final straw was when I was repeatedly screaming at myself throughout the day as if i was in a really intense argument, but i was all by myself. I immediately asked my doctor to be taken off of the medication but the damage was already done at that point, a few days later my wife told me she wanted a divorce. I wish i had recognized what the drug was doing to me, I thought it was helping me but its really impossible to tell whats going on when youre unable to think clearly. Now from what Im reading the withdrawl can be even worse, honestly im sick of being in hell. I took this drug to help me adjust to the new wonderful life that my wife and i had spent our whole 9 year marriage working towards, and 4 months later everything has fallen apart.