My friend is also on Lexapro and drinks and is fine and I have drank on Lexapro before but I experienced the second worst anxiety of my life today after going out drinking last night.

I had been on Lexapro (20mg) for about 3 years, and the last year I was taking 10mg. Two years ago I moved to a new country, and so I no longer have a regular psychiatrist, only basic ones that will just refill the prescription. It killed my libido, I had no energy, and generally didn’t feel like a productive person.

I saw a psychiatrist finally for an appointment about either lowering dose or switching to a new medication, and he just told me to quit my Lexapro cold turkey and begin taking Wellbutrin. Or not completely cold turkey, but 3 days of 5mg lexapro + 150mg Wellbutrin, then after those 3 days, no Lexapro and 300mg Wellbutrin. This was about 3 weeks ago and I feel truly horrible.

During the first week, I had minimal physical symptoms but I felt like I was going crazy. Crying nonstop, angry, aggressive. It was horrible. Now, I feel mentally balanced and productive, not depressed. But the physical symptoms (or what I think are the symptoms of withdrawal, unless I’m just dying) are unbearable. I have brain zaps but through my entire face, nausea, I feel weak and as if I’ll pass out at any moment. All I want to do is lie down. My last dose of Lexapro was about 2.5 weeks ago, is it possible that it is still so horrible?

Any advice or thoughts from others who have stopped Lexapro cold turkey is very very welcome and appreciated.

title.

the only side effect i had was tiredness but im now 2 weeks and 2/3 days in and at the 2 week mark that side effect is ended. i definitely feel calmer and i think i still worry a lot, more then the average person still, but it isn’t “affecting“ me. like its just a thought and like okay whatever. which is new for me!

cant wait for week 4-6,. apparently it’d be full therapeutic help and i hope it does because i already notice a huge improvement.

i was worried, but thought ill share with anxious folks or who wants to be on lexapro but hears the horror stories. its not always.

socially ive noticed the best improvement in, and thats where i was the worst with my anxiety disorder.

Reason: Lexapro/Escitalphram causes the intestinal muscles to be continuously stimulated. Adding coffee/black tea to this sensitivity causes the stomach and intestines to contract further which causes food to move to the lower intestines before it’s had the chance to fully digest = mass amounts of gas.

Tried and tested. No caffeine this week. No pressured farts. I am finally free from the Lexapro toots!

i (20 f) have no interest in anything that doesn't give me instant gratification. i only want to shop, play video games, eat, and do other high stimulation/high reward activities. i have no desire to see my friends, go to class, etc. i enjoy seeing my partner but i have 0 sex drive despite enjoying his presence. i am worried that my medication (20 mg only though?) is causing this. i feel so bad and trapped because i want to enjoy things but i simply have no energy nor motivation. i just do things because i have to. is this a side effect that i should talk with my psych about or am i overthinking?

So after a year of taking Lexapro 10mg, I wanted to get off of it, and see how my anxiety feels/if it got better. I looked up a few things about waning off it to reduce withdrawal symptoms. I had a whole plan of going from 10mg to 5mg to 2.5mg and then stop over months.

And so I met with my doctor to suggest the plan and how I wanted to stop taking Lexapro. She simply said, “just stop taking it then”. No need to slowly wane off it… I should have asked more questions possibly, but I guess in her eyes it’s just like get it over with faster?

I’m on day 5 and sleep is ROUGH/constantly waking up, as well as vertigo like I’ve never felt before. If I move my eyes too fast, it sends an immediate nausea wave from my head to my stomach, which feels like it’s my nervous system rather than just normal nausea.

Has anyone else just stopped cold turkey? How long did the withdrawal symptoms last for you? I’m hoping since it’s only been a year I’m not going to get much worse but I don’t know. I can’t really do anything all day 🤷🏼‍♂️

My boyfriend (39m) and I (44fm) have been together over a year officially. Unofficially it’s been like 3. Anyway. He’s had a really rough patch with his anxiety. After a lot of encouragement, he finally got back on lexapro. He also quit drinking at the same time. So I understand his body & brain are going through a lot of changes. But his libido has completely tanked. We’ve had sex maybe 6 times this year. He’s still extremely affectionate with me. Loves to snuggle & hold hands. But his sex drive is nonexistent. I’m extremely supportive of what he’s doing. And extremely understanding of the battle he’s going through. At the end of the day his mental health is more important to me. But it’s affecting my self esteem. He tells me all the time it’s not me. He’s still attracted to me. He just doesn’t think about sex. I need intimacy. I need to feel wanted & desired. I want him all the time. We’ve talked several times about it. And I don’t want to make him feel pressured to have sex with me. I want him to want me. I want to help him get through this. I want us to get through it. If any of you have had the same issue with your partner, how did you handle it? He reassures me all the time it’s not me. But it’s getting hard not to take it personally & internalize it.

I started Cipralex (in Canada) two weeks ago at 5mg for one week and then 10mg as of the second week. I take this on top of my 150mg Effexor. I didn’t feel any side effect the first week. Second week, about 4 days into I felt super super fatigued and then all of Saturday morning I had diarrhea and felt bloated. Yesterday I felt like my head was heavy and today I have major anxiety and still some weird bowel movement. Is this normal? I’ve never had side effects with other meds before so it’s new for me.

Hi guys so I've been on Lexapro since late March. I started with 5mg until June and since then have been on 2.5mg. The side effects were too much on 5mg. The main ones were brain fog, fatigue, sleep troubles, depressed and just feeling numb and unmotivated. Well I still feel those side effects on 2.5mg. I think in some ways my anxiety is better on Lexapro and it definitely helps my OCD but the trade offs are not worth it for me. But the idea of going back to nothing makes me a little nervous to think about. Can I just stop 2.5 or should I taper? Any advice is much appreciated :)

Hey everyone,

I’m diagnosed with OCD and currently on a pretty heavy med combo: Cipralex 10mg, Rexulti 1mg, Seroquel 25mg, Lamictal 75mg, and Mirtazapine 30mg.

Lately, I’ve been dealing with a weird symptom. Every single morning the second I open my eyes, my brain instantly goes into overdrive. It starts frantically "scanning" my internal state: "How am I feeling today? Is the anxiety there? Why is it there? How bad is it? + different intrusive thoughts" It feels like a massive mental obsession/fixation on my own well-being.

But here’s the kicker - I have absolutely zero physical symptoms. No racing heart, no shortness of breath, no shaking, and no full-blown panic attacks. My body feels completely calm (probably thanks to the meds keeping a lid on my nervous system), but my mind is just trapped in this looping, exhausting "mental check-up" for the first hour of the day.

It feels like my anxiety has been completely stripped of its physical form and turned into a purely intellectual trap.

Does anyone else experience this kind of "gutted" morning anxiety? Where your body is chilling, but your brain is aggressively overanalyzing your sanity the moment you wake up? How do you deal with it?

Has anyone been lazy taking their Lexapro and it’s suddenly caught up with you? I’ve been on 5mg for 18 months, it genuinely changed my life and I didn’t feel the need to up to 10mg. As I have to break the 10mg tablet in half, I tend to get lazy taking it (bad I know) and started unintentionally skipping days here and there. I’ve never had withdrawals doing this, and some times I’d go 5 days with no symptoms at all. Lately though I’ve been terrible taking it and all the sudden I feel awful. Started feeling teary for no reason, spikes of anxiety and overall feeling myself slip. I know I need to start taking the meds consistently. Has anyone experienced this? How long of taking your dose consistently did you feel better?

And I know how awful it is to skip and why I shouldn’t etc. it’s genuinely been pure laziness on my behalf and I’m very aware.

I haven't fallen asleep before 3 since before last Tuesday. How long do I wait before switching to taking it in the morning?

has anyone experienced a late period after starting lexapro?? last period was 9/6-9/10, started lex on 9/12 & i haven’t had a period since. absolutely no way i could be pregnant as my fiance is a female lol

i am nervous as hell, any recommendations or any worsening side effects i should expect. i’ve been on 10mg since day 1, about 5 weeks ago.

I cold turkeyed Lexapro 20 mg aug 3 (was on a little over a year and a half) the next month I cold turkeyed 200 mg lamotrigine. Developed akathisia. So I went back on the Lexapro 10 mg then to 20 mg. It’s been almost 4 weeks on the Lex. I’m also slowly titrating up the lamotrigine (just got to 100 mg now) thing is.. couple hours after taking Lex I feel like aka gets worse. After taking lam I almost feel a little better? Idk what to do. I feel like I need to stop the Lex but I went down to 10 for one day and felt bad again.

I was fine no anxiety or bad fatigue or headache.. Then after 2 weeks since tapering

The symptoms started slowly and getting abit intense

I dont know its relapse or this is me.. I feel alone

I was so happy even I posted here but I didnt know this will happen

Today I felt I started to feel anxious and irritable more with headache

Im sorry to keep posting here but Im alone.. And scared that I will be like this

Anyone felt like me and did u felt fine after??

What was ur timeline?symptoms?

PS

I was on medicine 10mg since 1 year and 3months..

I have been on 20mg for a while now and recently started concerta for my ADHD with plans to drop my lexapro down to 10mg in a month or so here is the issue , on both 10mg and 20mg I'm physically unable to cry , it's worse on 20mg with other emotions blunted but still bad on both , like I would be extremely sad/distraught and it would feel like my tears are stuck and won't come out making it difficult for me to let the emotions out , I've tried some insane things to break the barrier with the most insane one being, watching La La land while playing joji/Jeff Buckley in the background while looking at old messages and cutting onions somehow didn't work(before being medicated doing even one of those actions alone would cause me to tear up) and yes I did actually try that.

It's impacting me alot as I can't release my emotions or deal with them sometimes and sometimes causes awkward situations like a friend would be vonrable with me or tell me a story and get confused or think that I don't care because my face is 😐 , or at funerals hearing stories about the person who passed while looking uninterested/lack of empathy because I couldnt express it or feel it , and I feel horrible for it because I'm usually very emotional and empathetic and it hurts me and the people around me sometimes

The only thing that has kind of worked to remedy this is surprisingly to sing along/karaoke to songs which express a similar reason for my emotions or my situation.

I was curious if others are also experiencing this and if they sound some healthy coping mechanisms to deal with it . Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Hi all! Getting ready to switch from Viibryd to lexapro after being on it since about March. I noticed I’ve had headaches that haven’t gone away, I can hardly sleep, I have constant brain fog and although it’s made my anxiety better in ways I also have had a much harder time with obsessive thoughts. Any input on what to expect lol? I’ve never been on an ssri before - I went from Wellbutrin to cymbalta (which I mostly loved) to Viibryd. I tried Zoloft for a VERY short time in hs and it was not for me lol. I mostly struggle with anxiety and depression (that’s what I’m diagnosed with tho I suspect they’re mainly side effects of something else going on). Thanks for reading!!

To be clear I haven’t started lexapro yet

My wife takes Lexapro for anxiety and panic. After a couple months I’ve noticed she’s highly sensitive to temperature. It’s been getting cold at night but she seems to be hot all the time so she’s been leaving the windows open at night when it gets down to the 30s or 40s. Lastnight before I went to bed, I shut the windows. Indoor temp was around 68 degrees. I woke up at 5am freezing my butt off to find all the windows were open. The indoor temp was 50 degrees! The temp outside was 34. We’re married and have two children. This has been an ongoing battle since she switched from Zoloft. She’ll have the temp on her side in the car set to 60 while mine is at full blast heat. I always try and set an ambient comfortable temp in the car to 74 with the ac turned on thinking it’s comfortable for both of us. Nope. Turns out this is a known side effect. I had this problem with Strattera years ago so I know what she’s dealing with but she thinks we’re crazy. Is there any solution? Also, her (sorry ladies) sex drive is completely gone. I almost feel single. I’m glad her anxiety and panic is under control but everything has a price. Just venting here so any input is appreciated 😆

Hi everyone. Any type of advice would be nice.
So I’ve been on Lexapro 20mg for 3+ years which has been amazing. Now where the problem comes in… a couple weeks ago, I missed 5-6 20mg doses of Lexapro. I was on vacation, having a good time and feeling good so I hadn’t noticed it until I got home and realized I was having a hard time sleeping, which is unusual for me and my anxiety returned. So once I realized I missed so many doses, I started my 20mg dose again hoping that I would feel better in a few hours. Turns out, that’s not the case. It feels like I’m taking these pills for the 1st time all over again, I have lost my appetite, morning anxiety has returned with a vengeance, I’m crying more than usual, and depending on Ativan daily just get some comfort. I can’t talk with my psychiatrist until Thursday so I’m hoping anyone has words of wisdom or went through this before. Thank you ❤️💙🖤

I’ve been having half a pill a day and I’m currently on day 5 of having it and i feel awful like i have so much brain fog and on days 1-3 i constantly felt like i wasn’t even real and the brain fog was so bad i could hardly think

I'm documenting this for hopefully my future self, and anyone else that may find it useful.

Disclaimer, I was on sertraline (zoloft) 50-100mg for 6 years, felt it wasnt working as well anymore, doctor advised me to quit cold turkey and switch to Mirtazapine 30mg the following day. Toughed that out for 3 months and I believe mentally I hit rock bottom. Went back, asked for a change and they cold turkey'd me off Mirtazapine and onto 10mg escitalopram (lexapro). So for the below I couldnt for sure say what is lexapro onboarding and what is mirtazapine offboarding, but can say feel mentally better on 3 weeks of lex than I did after 3 months on mirt. My depression and anxiety is genetic I believe, mother has been on SSRI's and SNRI's for 40 years.

The good: I am definitely calmer in general. Week two was tough and I had a 24hr freakout / overreaction after some bad news, but it passed and we are back to calm. I very much have a desire to be kind to myself and take better care of myself (see below).

The bad: Depression very much still front and centre, but I am taking it day by day. 3 weeks ago I was taking days of work because I just could not face the world, now I can but I still dont want to really. Appetite has completely disappeared. I am quite overweight, so not complaining, but I am eating so little it is almost a bit worrying.

The ugly: I have the shits a couple of times a day and am sweating (or just mostly skin tingling very easily as soon as I put a blanket over me, or a doggo). Hopefully these will pass as the body becomes accustomed to the meds. Sexual problems are real, but better than it was on sertraline I think.

Sidenote, stopping medical cannabis for a bit, sadly, whilst I very much enjoy the feeling it gives me, it definitely makes any negative and spiraling thoughts worse. I am not a heavy user at all, but taking a drag from my thc vape cart dials the brain noise and overthinking up to 10 for the rest of my evening. Will try again later once things have started stabilizing. Also, time spent on the internet (including this subreddit) seems to make me sadder / feel more hopeless, so I am going to do a bit less of that. Also drastically reducing caffeine intake and nicotine intake (halving vape nicotine strength) - based on what I have been reading in this subreddit. Less stimulants being the aim, my brain is busy enough just being alive.

That is all for now, will do an update on 4 weeks. Good luck to everyone on their journeys, I truly believe everyone deserves happiness and relief from these invisible monsters which destroy our mental health, and ruin our quality of life, and by extension the quality of life of those around us.

Hi All,

I was on buspar 7.5mg twice a day for a couple months but needed more....my panic attacks and anxiety was still incredibly high.

After years of fighting taking lexapro I gave in because my life was completely unmanageable and getting smaller by the day. Even leaving my apartment was anxiety inducing - forget driving or working.

Last week I felt really good but this week. .week 3 my anxiety seems to be spiking.....is this a normal experience?

Other than slight dizziness and nausea its been pretty smooth sailing but the last couple days...yikes...

Thank you