One month into Effexor withdrawal symptoms- help!

Hello!

After 1.5 years of slowly tapering myself from 225 mg of Effexor XR to 37.5mg, I decided to take the plunge and stopped taking it completely a l

little over a month ago.

I knew it would be miserable, as I had felt the pain of each step of the taper, but a month in I had NO idea it would be this miserable for this long.

How long have these discontinuation or withdrawal symptoms lasted for other folks? The generic medical advice seems to be 1-2 weeks, which is obviously inaccurate. I've heard 6 months? Any advice/experience is helpful as I'm at wit's end and can't see the light at the end of the tunnel anymore. It feels like I will always feel this way.

For background- I was prescribed Effexor XR about 3 years ago after going through a few doctors and trying literally everything on the market for my anxiety and panic disorder.

Started off at a moderate dose, and it seemed at first for about a month or so that it was helping, but then stopped helping. My dose gradually increased, even though it was no longer helping. Then I was hospitalized, and my dose was rapidly increased to 225mg. At no time was I told that the discontinuation symptoms were so bad.

Turns out- it was ADHD all along, and receiving treatment for my ADHD has been a game changer. Along my way to my ADHD disgnosis and affer trying and ditching them all, I have successfully tapered off of every SSRI on the market (twice for Lexapro!), and off of taking Klonapin 2-3 times a day. Effexor is 100000000% worse, and I have never felt so sick and so unsupported by my doctors and by the medical community more generally for allowing this drug to be sold and for not warning people. And even worse- not believing people going through these terrible symptoms! Not to mention my ADHD going undiagnosed until I was 27 because doctors still suck at ID'ing ADHD in women and girls...

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