Posted by bluedog on November 28, 2002, at 8:53:54
In reply to Re: just starting, posted by Eve on November 28, 2002, at 8:24:21
Would be interested in hearing from anybody who gained or lost weight - as this scares me alot - wouldnt want to change my physical appearance too much as i am struggling with identifing the person inside me without having to deal with changes on the surface. Looking forward to hearing from you all.
> > Eve
> >
>
> sorry that was suppossed to be effexor!
>
>Hi Eve
I was on Effexor XR for over a year. It had absolutely no effect on my weight.
I had some side effects when I first started on Effexor XR for the first couple of weeks and thereafter whenever I upped my dose.
After the settling in period the only side effects I really had were sexual side effects. In the end I quit Effexor because I was abusing alcohol at the time and Effexor amplifies the effects of alcohol thereby causing me to lose control of my drinking much faster than was desirable (the drug causes a spike in your blood alcohol content because it competes for the same enzyme pathways in the liver as alcohol). If alcohol abuse is not a problem for you do not be too frightened of the drug because it can have very good antidepressant effects.
I would say that most complaints about Effexor are due to the side effects it causes when you stop taking the drug (or if you forget your morning dose). These effects can be pretty terrible and they were terrible for me but I was able to minimise the withdrawal effects by taking 10mg of Prozac and tapering the Effexor VERY VERY slowly. (when I say slowly I would decrease the dose by no more than a quarter and then remain at the reduced dose until the side effects stabilised and so on)
Good luck and I hope the drug helps your depression soon.
bluedog
poster:bluedog
thread:129698
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021127/msgs/129719.html