propranolol withdrawal

I’m looking for any similar experiences or advice in regards to possible Propranolol withdrawal. I will start by saying the last 3 months have been a nightmare. In early November, practically overnight, I randomly started having chest tightness/pain around my heart, tachycardia, hot/cold sensations, cold hands and feet, sweaty hands and feet, occasional tingling/numbness in arms, muscle spasms, full body tremors/shaking,palpitations, extreme anxiety/uneasiness, dizziness and lightheaded, constant feeling that I might pass out, especially if I walked or exerted myself. If I even took a sip of something caffeinated my heart would race and I would feel faint. Had what felt like constant adrenaline surges. And another strange symptom was while eating my chest would tighten up even more and I’d have an adrenaline surge and get so dizzy I would just have to stop eating (this has improved the last few weeks). Up until this started I was lifting weights without issue, and running without issue. I had taken 10mg propranolol for several years just as needed for anxiety but never noticed much of an issue before but realized I had gone longer than normal without taking it. I may have only taken 1 that week vs typically taking 10-20 mg every other day on average. I would take them under my tongue at work when I got anxious, but hardly ever went over 20mg a day. I didn’t even realize beta blockers could cause a withdrawal, especially to this degree. My heart rate is 70-90 resting now but will jump to 100-130 when standing for a brief time and then settle back down to 80-90. I’m not sure if I’ve seen any improvement there as I didn’t monitor HR much in the beginning of the withdrawals. I do have far less palpitations vs 3 months ago. The worst part about it all is the constant chest tightness/heaviness over my heart. When I say constant, I mean almost every day since this began 3 months ago. I’ve been to the ER 3 times with no answers. Cardiologist flat out said he doesn’t know what it is and they all seem to brush off that it could be from Propranolol. Couldn’t do more than a few minutes on the stress test at a low speed. Currently on medical leave from work but I’m afraid of what will happen with my job if this doesn’t improve. If this truly is Propranolol withdrawals I may be an extreme case, but I would just like some hope that I may get over this.

Hello!

I’m 27 years old and Ive been quite healthy before all of this. I just had some health concerns that I wanted to follow up with my pcp. I just want to say that I went to see my pcp for what i thought were heart palpitations but in reality i was experiencing weird tight squeezes some times in my heart. No rapid heart beat was reported from me. It was just weird heart skipping that would wind me some times. My pcp then referred me to a cardiologist. This cardiologist did not run tests on me at all. He right away prescribed me propranolol at 10mg twice a day. Morning and at night. I wish I invested time into this drug with research. Long story short, I didnt pick up the medication right away, in which I wish I never did and just followed my gut feeling of this drug was just prescribed to me without tests and we didnt know exactly what was going on or if I even needed it. So I ended up going to my pharmacy like a week later to pick up the medication with my son. I took the medication at 7am. I ended up choosing to just take it once a day and reported that to my cardiologist that thats what I was doing. Things were going great for the first 4 days besides the occasional shortness of breath and dizzy spells that I got. Two days later, mind you I am still taking the medication at this point. It was 2am and I was getting rapid heart beat which spiked my anxiety so it went higher. I got to go to sleep after taking deep breathes and talking to an ER nurse until 4am. I went to bed right after. The next morning I felt like really bad until I took the medication. Same thing happened that night and then the morning until I took the pills again. At that time I decided to quit taking it cold. I was in the ER, urgent care and to my pcp this past week for all of the symptoms that this medication was causing me. All three doctors summed it up to anxiety. I havent had anxiety since I was a teenager, I can remember how it felt and it did not feel this way at all. My primary prescribed me Alprazolam, which I havent taken because now I’m paranoid of any drug right now. I had rapid heart rate at night and in the morning, this is where it would be the worst was morning and nights, throughout the day just walking around my home and taking a shower. I was dizzy, nauseous, cold and then I would get sweats. I’m now on day 6 of not taking the medication. I started to feel better last night and I woke up just fine today. I literally was unable to eat at all this whole week except for small snacking here and there. Today, I’m going to try and live my life as I did before this evil pill and see how I feel from there. If it helps at all for anyone. The only thing that helped me calm down was any type of rain sounds, deep breathing and ONLY thinking about breathing and the rain sounds to calm down. Any type of thought about whats happening made it all rise back up again. I had a blanket that i would also remind myself that its just for now. So my thoughts when this would happen would be " I’m okay, this is for now and this blanket is really soft", anything that can keep your mind off of it happening. I cant say it has past for me as of yet because it has only been almost a week of no palpitations. In all of this I ended up getting sick. But I am sure I’ll make it out of this and I really hope everyone else will too.

Hi Alison.

Not sure if my previous message sent as Internet went off.

I was put on propranolol for anxiety was reluctant to on as don't like taking medication.

But I have just getting over covid 13 days I had it...This made me very anxious. When to doc said it was anxiety put me on 40mg twice a day...Was on it 4 days felt poorly .Went docs and said put it down to 10mg upto 3 times a day...

so on my 5 day took 60mg then 10mg next day.

felt not right ill actually. So rang pharmacist who said as I have only been on it 6 days to come off.

so been off it 7 days but withdrawal awful.

very icy feet legs sometime body.Also can be hot and cold.dizzy, ear ringing,Aches and pains. Anxiety very bad wanting to cry. Also frightened to go out .But it's the icy feeling that's got me.....

Anybody else have any of these withdrawn symptoms.

At doc tomorrow.fingers crossed.

Just wanted to come back to this forum as it is still probably one of the most useful sources of information on the web for beta blocker withdrawal. I also notice Ive gotten a number of messages over the years which I completely missed, and am really sorry for that, because I know how hard this can be. As for myself Im mostly fine these days, my heart rate is still a little high when im on my feet etc. but compared to what it used to be, its tons better. Know that whatever you are experiencing it will likely come in waves, but over time those waves will get further and further apart. It really can take a while though, and while time frames may vary and some people may not experience any issue with coming off this medication. It took me over a year, cold turkey. That may seem daunting, I know, but it does get better. My experience with doctors, even at the most senior level is that they don't even believe this is a thing. They will assume its an actual condition coming back "anxiety" etc, due to not taking the medication. For me though, and what I assume is alot more people that go ignored, it was 100% a result from withdrawing from the medication, and I have personal data to prove it. They were never taught this is even a possibility. Its as simple as that. If you are coming here out of desperation and are scouring through all the old posts much like I did back then. I still believe my theories with beta blocker withdrawal simulating something similar to adrenergic POTS is accurate, and I would your try to live your lifestyle according to that. Eg. not spiking your blood sugar too much etc. etc. all this stuff is chronically under researched though, if you want answers from medical professionals you wont get them, the answers really arent there. If there are any actual researchers out there that finds interest in these conversations, and would like to further their understanding, I urge you to reach out to me on here. Like all the messages Ive received on here, I will see them eventually.