Morning anxiety during withdrawal

look at surviving anti depressants. lots there about cortisol spikes including shutting out the early morning light.

@sept76 thank you for the info. I checked and found useful information describing exactly my situation.

hello I wonder if there is anyone that can offer some sort of advice, I was taking mirtazapine for just under 8weeks and decided I wanted to come off them as I was only taking them due anxiety and panic over the virus but I felt I was in a much better head space about it and choose to come off, I was taking 15mg for the most part of the 8 weeks and then tapered to to 7.5mg, I did that for a week and half until my doctor advised me to just stop altogether, first few days I felt great but after about 4 days I started getting very anxious and panicky for no reason, im worried as I'm not sure if this is withdrawal or just me being anxious as my doctor has said but this is normal for me to feel anxious for no reason at all, its effecting my sleep alot and the in my opinion is useless, suggesting im just an anxious person and that maybe i should try going back on the meds, i really dont want to be on them as I didnt ever feel like i needed them before the pandemic and dont feel the need to take them just for the sake of it, please can someone give me some insight im desperate, I feel like im going mad , this anxiety is crippling

gem

I just decided to use this thread to make updates to my withdrawal journey as I keep going.

Now I am in the week 14 since stopping and things look like this:

1. generally feeling better than the weeks before but still stressing looking for a new job
2. constantly falling asleep around 10:30 pm much easier than last weeks
3. no more adrenaline rush at falling asleep
4. sleeping mainly 4:30 hours but also twice I slept 6 hours. Interesting that I sleep always complete cycles of 1:30 hours.
5. still having problems waking up at 3:00 or 4:30 due to cortisol raising without being able to sleep again
6. still cannot nap at all during day (it happened to drift for 1 or 2 minutes but I wake up immediately with kind of panic).
7. lower anxiety during morning but random episodes of deep fatigue during afternoon
8. decided for a while to replace the morning and afternoon sessions of running with fast walking in order not to add more cortisol
9. increased sessions of mindfulness, binaural beats, breathing exercises and cold showers with good results in BP (115/65 and under 60 heart rate).
10. this week no digestive issues as I also reduced supplements only to morning (Mg, Fish Oil reach in DHA, NAC and randomly B vitamin complex).

    I will update next weeks looking forward for improvement in insomnia and morning difficulties.

After a pretty bad week 15 with a zero hours sleep night and difficult mornings things went very well during week 16 as I finally managed to have at least 6 hours sleep each night. Looks like that as I am able to sleep more the body is recovering and both adrenaline rush and morning dreadful waking up are less present. I even had a nine hours sleep night (the first in 2 years) so looks like I needed 3 months and a half to see the signs of getting over the rebound insomnia generated by mirtazapine withdrawal.

Really happy to see that I can feel normal again after the weird and strange feelings I have experienced being on mirt. Also it is good that now I managed to fall asleep again after waking up around 3 am or 4:30 am which was impossible in the first three months. Still very interesting that I have only complete cycles of 1:30 hours sleep.

And one combination that works now to help me fall asleep in the evening if my first natural try fails : 1 mg natural source melatonin + 200 mg L-Theanine + 30 drops Lemon Balm tincture.

what can cause cortisol raising? and how did you managed to solve that problem so what you describe hre doesn't happen to you anymore, i think i have this, the only difference is that i'm still tapering, i'm at 1.6 mg and i really want to know what you have done to make all that hell go away! 😃

Actually it did not go away completely but it is less severe than it was during first weeks of withdrawal. I think that I had it also during tapering but probably it was hidden by the sedation given in the morning by mirtazapine.

You may look on surviving antidepressants forum where there is an extended topic on the cortisol morning reaction. Seems like our receptors being deregulated by mirtazapine have a overreaction to the morning cortisol curve. Cortisol spikes and generally any increase of cortisol is generated by stress both mental and physical.

Overall my sensation is that with time passing as the brain is healing and getting to work again without mirt things settle and the more we sleep the less cortisol we have as good and enough sleep is listed as a major cortisol reduction factor. Once rebound insomnia is going away probably also the mornings will be better.

Holy basil extract and phosphatidylserine are the supplements that are mentioned to reduce cortisol and I am taking them in the morning.

New updates for weeks 17 and 18 of withdrawal.

Unfortunately one step back regarding sleep as I had a lot of nights with 4.30 hours and only a few with 6 hours. I tend to fall asleep earlier (9:00 -9:30 pm) but I wake up around 2:00 am and cannot fall asleep back. I see that initial falling asleep was easier these weeks, also tried a few evenings to take 1 mg of melatonin with two hours before the desired hour for going to bed and it worked well becoming sleepy before passing two hours but not helping to maintain the duration. As I wake up in the middle of the night around 2:00 am the cortisol awakening response is not as severe like in the case of waking up after 4:30. I am still amazed by the exactitude of the sleep cycles as always waking up is at an end of 1:30 hours and always from REM phase as I remember what I was dreaming.

Occasionally a few adrenaline rushes during the day and still not feeling well during morning when cortisol is rising (the worst sensation peaks around 07:00 - 08: 00 am).

Also blood pressure goes lower but I think it is related to the supplements that I take.

Finally I also had a few days with energy crush in the afternoon just one hour after the lunch, but on a positive side I also had my first 10 minutes afternoon nap in the last two years 😃. I wish it was longer but otherwise I still cannot sleep during the day, having strange form of anxiety as soon as I lay my head on the pillow and close my eyes. The anxiety goes away immediately if I wake up and start doing something.

As you may see after 4 months of stopping the mirtazapine the insomnia is still present and I may say that it is the last obstacle in considering my experience a success story. I wait for future improvements hoping to get to at least constant six hours of sleep as I had in the previous windows.

Today I have five month of being mirtazapine free. A little update on current situation:

• sleep has generally improved as my average sleeping time for last month is getting to six hours after many months when I was dealing with constant 4.30 hours. Also lately I have nights with 7 and 8 hours but in two sessions with a wake up in between. The good news is that now I am able from time to time to fall again asleep in the morning hours, after 4:30 am if I wake up in the middle of the night. The dreadful anxiety I was speaking about in the previous posts is almost gone.
• no more energy crush during the day as I have made changes in my diet upping the protein intake during breakfast and addition of healthy fats (raw organic coconut oil)
• I noticed that now I see an immediate improvement in my mood after taking a small dose of 5htp. I have used 5htp in the past as a serotonin booster but it was not working. Now I take 80 mg around 7 pm and it probably helps with melatonin production as I fall asleep with no problem around 10 pm. I do not take melatonin anymore and also no other supplement in the evening.
• During last month I had a bad wave of around one week started by use of antihistamine. I have ragweed allergy and as it its season peaks now my reaction was severe. But taking one Benadryl first day and one doxylamine the next one in order to stop my nose running and my eyes tearing brought me back from 7 hours sleep to 4.30 hours for 7 days in a row and it was not good at all. So be careful with any antihistamine use during tapering and withdrawal as they will stop the progress of healing the sensitivity of antihistamine receptors damaged by prolonged use of mirtazapine.
• finally during last month I had no other symptom specific to withdrawal and I still feel confident about being my old self again after two years of medical trial and errors.

  I will be back with another update as soon as I will make eight hours the normal of sleep pattern. (Well I am more confident now that this is possible compared with the first months of withdrawal).