citalopram & weight gain ( how long to lose it after coming off cit)

Major weight loss happened for me in the first six months of coming off Citalopram.   I did not chasnge any eating or exercise habits.  The weight still dropped off, although I felt less hungry off the tablets.  Also your libido returns off the tablets so that extra exercise also helps.

gymbunny help me out buddy!!! was 11 stone. could almost see my little six pack. now, after 4 months of cit i am way too fat. like its just horrifying.  i must have put on 11 or 12 pouns. am now sitting at 40 mg cit and worried about losing the weight. for 6 weeks i have been counteracting by walking 6 miles per day up and down steep hills. my leg muscles are like solid rocky balboa shaped rocks now, but my belly just wont shrink. i truly feel horrified and frustrated for all the people in this forum . we are striving for a  better life and yet our weightgain is further depressing for many of us. how can i reduce my porky belly?  when i excercise alot i either get headaches and feel pressure in my head or else i get shakey and feel faint. just dont understand what to do for the best. 

Hi,

I was on Citalopram for almost two years and I gradually came off it 5 weeks ago. In the past couple of years I put on three stones, as yourself. When I asked my doctor, he said there wasn't enough evidence to state Citalopram caused weight gain.

However, I have always eaten large amounts of whatever food I liked (pretty much healthy food but with my great great treats as often as I liked) and I used to manage to keep on a normal weight withouth being overly active.

Since taking my medication, I found I just kept on putting on weight. I started to feel desperate because I tried exercise programmes and diets and nothing kept me from putting on more and more weight so I gave up as I had more important things to worry about - my depression and anxiety issues.

In the past five weeks I have managed to lose almost a full stone and I haven't really done much. I am not eating much at breakfast because of lack of time, I am eating salads almost daily for lunch and having a proper and normally healthy meal for dinner. I usually snack once or maybe twice a day and it tends to be fruit or fruit yogurt that I go for. But I also treat myself to little things quite often, given that I just keep on losing weight regardless.

On the downside, I feel my stress levels have gone up a lot because of my job and I feel that might be one of the great factors in my weight loss. I was wondering if anyone felt a bit "abnormal" again in the first few months after stopping their meds? I don't really know whether raise my concerns to my doctor or just wait and see!

I'm checking in with this discussion as I've been off Citalopram for five months now, but haven't lost any of the 20 pounds I gained while on it.

If anyone's still following this thread, I'd love to know if you eventually lost your weight, and how long it took. Other than pregnancy, I've never gained weight like this in my life before. The citalopram helped me hugely, but undeniably it carries side effects!

Hello, if you're reading this and you are someone who is taking or maybe thinking about taking the anit-depressant 'citalopram', I completely urge you not to.

And I can tell you exactly why.

I have been on citalopram 20mg since September 2016 and have gained at least a stone and a half. It was really noticed, especially by people who didn't see me every day, I would go to family gatherings, and people would go up to my parents and say they were quite shocked. I put on a lot of weight round my face, arms, tummy and thighs.

I went to see my GP twice about why I was gaining weight and he said it wasn't the citalopram, but me simply over eating... I don't over eat. In fact I probably under eat most of the time so that was absolutely ridiculous.

I asked to come of the meds and they said it wasn't a good idea, but I was getting more and more unhappy with how I looked, and I started to make myself sick, which is not good at all.

About two weeks ago I was visiting my mum and my cousins had come to visit. My little 9 year old cousin is sweet as a pie but bless him he doesn't half just speak his mind, and he came up to me and said 'you're fat'.

I think that was just the final straw for me, and I took myself off of the medication. Yeah I relapsed, and when you've been taking medication like citalopram for a while, and suddenly come off, all your previous symptoms are heightened.. but how I'm feeling now, still in the withdrawal stage, I wouldn't go back on citalopram. Not ever.

I've been in a few recent consultations with my GP and he's finally admitted that it can make you put on weight, it can increase you appetite and lower your metabolism. He called it a 'DIRTY MEDICATION', meaning it has lots and lots of side effects. They said it's cheap meds and will put people on it because it's easy and less expensive. And that is what I heard from the GP.

I would not recommend this product, I wouldn't recommend any anti-depressants infact. CBT and therapy is the best and most effective way to help yourself.

I hope this helps answer a few questions about this medication.

Take care of yourselves and stay strong.

Hello everyone, it's so encouraging to read all your posts and it has made me feel that I've made the right decision to get back on track with my fitness & loosing weight to go back to how I was , 10 years I started taking fluoxetine 20mg and I hadn't had any weight problems but in the last year I had a huge relapse and I was given 40mg of Citalipram to help me calm down, in the past six months I've gained over a stone in weight, feel like I've had my "mojo" taken away from all aspects of my life, the weight thing was getting me down so much so I've decided to go back to fluoxetine, it's only been a week but I'm so looking forward to being myself again instead of a couch potato that has no interest in anything but sleeping !! I'd love to know how you've all got on and how long was it until you saw a reduction in weight ??? 

Decreasing citalopram is a serious business, with potentially horrific withdrawl side effects. I decided to come off my daily 30 in June 2018, it has been 4 years and decreased by 2.5 every two weeks. It is a slow process but much better emotionally and physically. Now about to drop to 7.5. Even at this slow decrease I can feel the tight headaches and slight palpitations in the evenings, please don't try to do it quickly! A slow withdrawal gives your brain time to adjust to the change in seratonin amount and behaviour, making it easier to adjust.

I've been taking Citalopram for 7 months. I've always tracked my weight and I can definitley see I've gained 9 pounds since starting Citalopram. I was on 40mg and have been reducing my dosage by 5mg every 3 weeks and am down to 25mg........everything feels ok at the moment......how long are people generally taking to come off the drug?