Posted by simon levane on February 26, 2006, at 16:43:41
In reply to Re: Suicide on Effexor, posted by dancingstar on February 26, 2006, at 14:51:29
Thanks for your post Dancingstar. This is very valuable information. There may be an age related context in that young people can be more impulsive than adults - and less understanding of the finality of suicide as distorted thinking.
The big problem with these drugs is that doctors just do not take them seriously enough in how they advise patients and family members of risks.. if at all.. For both Devastated Mother's son and my daughter, doctors just did not tell us in spite of there being a warning going back to 1999.. They are just so out of touch with reality, and then they rationalize that the death was not caused by the drug's effect on mind... in spite of the fact that these are mind altering drugs.
You are so right about how these drugs can be poisonous for some people. I made sure that this was reported to the proper authorities in my country.
Stats mean nothing until the person in the statistic is a loved one. Then that number becomes a horror just the way that 38,000 deaths on the highway sound small compared to the number of miles travelled, unless, it is someone in your own family.
Simon> I am one that was prescribed Effexor for back pain and fatigue and became quite depressed while taking it. This was in part because it was making me so very tired that I couldn't stay awake more than a few hours a day. This happens very slowly. At first it gives you almost too much energy, but within a matter of months, I was so tired that I thought I was dying cause I was unable to stay awake and my blood pressure dropped to a pretty constant 90/60. I had become weak, weepy, and in constant pain. I had no idea it was because of the Effexor until after I stopped taking it and was no longer soooo very sleepy. In fact, as sick as I was from the withdrawal, I really wasn't able to sleep for months.
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> I realized that Effexor caused depression as well before I stopped taking it, when I told my internist that I was feeling extremely weepy and asked if I could raise the dosage of Effexor from 75 mg. to 150. Within a week of the increase I was feeling severely depressed and knew it was from the Effexor. I finally realized that I needed to get rid of the drug.
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> This happened to me as a grown-up. I don't think that it is as age related as they are trying to imply. For a good number of people, these drugs are truly poisonous.
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> By the way, have you all reported problems with Effexor to the FDA? It is very important that a record is made of all the problems so that people can be warned before taking these drugs.
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> Here's the link:
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> https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/medwatch/
poster:simon levane
thread:601406
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060219/msgs/613546.html