My HELLISH experience after stopping Metoprolol ER Succinate 100mg cold turkey

Boy do i have a story for you! I started taking Metoprolol ER Succinate 50mg in 2016 when I was 22 years old, for anxiety and hypertension. the hypertension is caused by my anxiety, so when i get anxious my adrenaline increases thus a racing heart and spike in blood pressure. This runs in my family and my mom has the exact same condition and is also on the same medication but a higher dose (100mg.) Metoprolol helped my anxiety, racing heart, panic attacks and blood pressure very well. I was happy with the medication overall but of course there are side effects just like any other drug. I gained a lot of weight, i was more fatigued, and sometimes my heart would skip a beat. But overall i was satisfied and i was able to function on a daily basis without the burden of having a panic attack. Fast forward to 2020. I turned 27 in September. Almost immediately after turning 27, my health took a turn for the worse. I began having extreme anxiety, almost on the verge of panic. This had not happened for years since i began Metoprolol. I wasn't able to leave my house or drive or go anywhere. Along with the extreme anxiety, I also had other symptoms which I won't address but basically i am undiagnosed as of yet. I still don't know exactly what brought on these horrific symptoms. But, unfortunately, since no one knows what's wrong with me, my doctor assumes its just anxiety. He tested my thyroid and it came back perfect. So in February i went in for a physical. And i am VERY nervous when it comes to going to the doctor. That gives me the most anxiety of all. So of course my anxiety was high and my blood pressure was high too. My doctor took note of how i was acting. I have a fear of blood tests too so that made my anxiety even worse. So my doctor was concerned about my high blood pressure and my anxiety so he prescribed me 100mg of the Metoprolol instead of the 50mg which i have been on since 2016. I was hesitant about taking it but my Mom was on the exact same dose so i felt more comfortable about it. About 3 weeks after starting the 100mg dose, I was walking in a nature reserve near my house. It was such a nice day that i laid out a blanket and sat on the grass under a large tree. i was having a great time until i started to feel heaviness and tightness in my chest. Alarmed, i rushed home and called my doctor who told me to come into his office ASAP. So i did and he proceeded to tell me that i have asthma and thus I can't be on Metoprolol anymore because it can cause an asthma attack. I was upset because i didn't want to change a medication I had been on for years that seemed to be helping me. The big mistake I made was taking the 100mg. All of my problems started because of that. My doctor refused to titrate me down off of the Metoprolol because he was scared I would end up in the ER with an asthma attack. Instead he told me to stop the Metoprolol COLD TURKEY and he gave me Lisinoprol 40 mg for high blood pressure. I was very hesitant to stop the Metoprolol and take the new medication because of all of the side effects i had read about.

So the next day, which was a Wednesday, i called the pharmacist who advised me to still take the 50 mg Metoprolol in the morning and then half of the Lisinoprol in the evening. So that day i did. I took the 50 mg in the morning around 11am. I felt fine until around 2pm i had a major panic attack. My heart was racing and it would not stop. I took my blood pressure and it was so high it was at stroke levels. I panicked and quickly took the Lisinoprol 40mg. I was in such a bad state that i had my mom call 911. The EMT came and we explained the medication switch and he took my blood pressure which at that point was like 155/90. My blood oxygen was good and all of my vitals were good as well so he gave me the option to go to the hospital which i then decided to turn down. Everyone attributed this incident to anxiety, including my doctor.

The next day (Thursday)I felt okay and so i followed my doctors instructions of not taking any Metoprolol and just taking the Lisinoprol 40mg. I immediately felt a shift in my body. Instead of my resting heart rate being 65 it jumped to 85/90 bpm. So the rest of the day when I would simply walk around my house, my bpm would get up to 130. I couldn't even stand and eat something without my heart pounding and my bpm getting up to 115/120. It was very uncomfortable and also my heart would race when i was laying down on my bed for no reason. One minute it would be 80 and then the next it would be 100 and increasing and increasing and i couldn't do anything to stop it.

I didn't take the metoprolol for two days so (Thursday and Friday). I suffered for those two days. I couldn't leave my bed because my heart rate was out of control. So by Saturday i had had enough. Mind you i had been calling my doctor all throughout those two days and complaining about my out of control heart rate and he blamed it on anxiety.

Friday night was the breaking point. I had fallen asleep from 8pm -10pm. i woke up startled out of my sleep at 10pm with my heart rate very high and a weird taste in my mouth. I almost called 911 again but my mom was fed up with me at this point so i went back to sleep.

The lisinoprol was also causing me major problems. it seemed every time i took it, almost 2 hours later I was violently throwing up. I told my doctor this as well and he said it was anxiety. I have never thrown up from anxiety before. So of course i didn't believe him.

So by Saturday I am a complete mess. I'm shaking uncontrollably, dizzy, fast heart rate, my heart pounds for no reason, I could barely sleep because my heart kept waking me up out of my sleep all throughout the night. my vision is severely blurred, and i'm not thinking clearly. I had had enough so I took the 50 mg metoprolol. i had a normal day as a result and then at night i took the 40 mg Lisinoprol. I felt fine for the most part.

Sunday: i felt ok so i tried to refrain from taking the Metoprolol 50mg. i didn't take it and then at night i took the Lisinoprol.

i did the same thing on Monday. and at this point i'm feeling worse and worse.

finally on Tuesday i really tried to explain to my doc that I was not doing well at all and i needed to take the Metoprolol. He told me to take the metoprolol but keep taking the Lisinoprol. So before i could take the Metoprolol for the day my heart rate was so high and would not go down. it went up to 145 while i was laying down. i could only get it down so far with deep breathing. this high bpm lasted for almost an hour and i took the metoprolol 50mg after. So today is Saturday. Ever since Tuesday i had been taking the Metoprolol 50mg. But to my dismay, i don't feel back to normal at all. I'm dizzy, off balance, feel faint, can't leave my house or bed, my heart rate has actually been feeling too low. I've been feeling weird for days now so i'm going to have to see another doctor or cardiologist because something isn't right.And i can't believe I had to go through this hell and wasn't titrated down safely like i should have been. This is not even the full story but it's all i have the energy to explain at this moment in time. Unfortunately i feel my doctor assumed i would be fine since i am so young and "healthy". If anyone has been through anything similar to me and got better please reply so I can figure out what to do.

thank you

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