Posted by ravenstorm on May 11, 2004, at 10:05:54
In reply to Re: I started Friday night, too » greywolf, posted by Sad Panda on May 10, 2004, at 23:41:01
Hi Greywolf and Racer--
Just wanted to let you know that I went through a bunch of weirdness when I started this drug and posted all sorts of queiries on this and especially another board I post on.
The first two days I was in a coma. My speech was even slurred. I had arranged to take a full week off of work, but that didn't end up beingg necessary. Some people, however, take two weeks for the grogginess to clear.
After coma-fest, came four to five days of awake-asleep-awake-asleep-awake-asleep all night long with incredibly vivid dreams. Since I had finally gottenn my sleep regulated before starting remeron, this freaked me out big time. It also passed.
Then, came the blood sugar swings. About two hours after a meal my blood sugar would drop and I would shake and get dizzy and have to eat. It also caused a lot of physical anxiety for me.
I posted several times on this board asking how long for the drug to help with anxiety. For me, it kicked in at four weeks.
So, why/how did I keep going? One, with the help of people on these boards encouraging me to tough it out. Two,the start ups listed above were nothing compared to the hell I went through trying to get back on an SSRI. Three,I didn't have a lot of options left either.
Oh, I forgot to mention the mood swings and extreme anger/irritability that occurred on and off the first three weeks. Can you say "bitch?"
Oh yeah, I was also really dizzy for a while.
My other suggestion, despite common wisdom of less side effects with higher doses, would be to drop to 15mg if you started at 30mg. From what I;ve read on other boards 15mg and 30mg often work pretty similarly, so with 30mg you might end up more sedated than 15mg, at least for the start up period. Doses of 45mg to 60mg seem to make you more acivated.
I bought a book on prescription meds and it specifically states to start at 15mg and titrate from there.
Just what worked for me, of course, YMMV.
Good Luck you guys. Really, don't give up until you giveit a full six eight weeks. That is what I promised myself (even though there were several days where I was ready to throw them in the garbage!)
And no, none of the side effects are
just in your head!
poster:ravenstorm
thread:344197
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040510/msgs/345684.html