Duloxetine (Cymbalta) Withdrawal Bad News!

Posted , 5 users are following.

Wow, this is really really hard to get off of. I have taken 60mg for 2 years for nerve damage to my left leg. It worked fairly well up till recently when the pain started creeping back and my Doctor prescribed Lyrica, which worked great for the pain. He never said to stop the Duloxetine but I did not want to take it anymore since it seemed to me that Lyrica was all I needed. I began to taper off...1st I went to 30mg and was just fine, a month later I decided to go down to 20mg. Than after 2 days it started. Felt like the Flu was coming on, cold sweats, nausea, diarrhea, and the worse insomnia in my life, when I did get some sleep it was terrible and filled with nightmares...really bad ones! I went on like this for 26 days...finally I decided to see if it was a sickness or if it was the lower dosage. I went back up to the 30 mg and within a day I was back to normal. I am afraid to go back to the 20 and they do not have a lower dose and you can't open the capsule. What can I do...just keep on taking the 30 forever or is there some way I could decrease it by 5 mg instead of the 10? Do I need to go to compound pharmacy and spend a fortune or can I just cut open capsule and weigh the powder on scale?

0 likes, 21 replies

21 Replies

Prev
  • Posted

    Well, got the digital scale and weighed the powder out on the 20 mg pill and divided it into 4 portions of 5mg. Was easier than I thought. Thank you all for your advice!
  • Posted

    Get a prescription for fluoxtine (prozac 10mg or 20mg)

    Get the duloxetine dosage down to 30 mg or as low as you can go without symptoms stay on this for a week stop and then switch immediately next day (24hours) onto low dose Fluox for a week minimum.

    If you experience little or no withdrawal then slowly come off for fluoxetine taking every other day, then every 2 days, then 3 days etc then off.

    If you still experience some withdrawals stay on the fluox for longer or increase the dosage until you feel better. and reduce later.

    This bridge method is a much easier way to cushion the withdrawals from SNRIs.

Report or request deletion

Thanks for your help!

We want the community to be a useful resource for our users but it is important to remember that the community are not moderated or reviewed by doctors and so you should not rely on opinions or advice given by other users in respect of any healthcare matters. Always speak to your doctor before acting and in cases of emergency seek appropriate medical assistance immediately. Use of the community is subject to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and steps will be taken to remove posts identified as being in breach of those terms.