Hi,
I started venlafaxine 3 months ago and had been on 225mgs for 10 weeks. I noticed slight improvement but not enough to function normally. I lacked energy and motivation and still felt low. So pysch increased me to 300mgs a week ago. Since then I am totally exhausted, spaced out and really tensed. I feel like I’m really stressed physically like tense muscles in my neck/shoulders and feel irritable. Has anyone else felt worse on increasing or had any of these side effects? I’m worrying a lot. Thankyou
hello, i recently saw a pysc, and had my dose increased from 225mg to 300mg just over a week ago, after being on ven for almost 5 months. took higher dose for a couple of days, didnt like spaced out feeling, dropped to 262.5 mg. have felt better since. if i need to, i can go up to 300mg at a later date. with you being om ven for only 10 weeks, its not surprising you are more anxious. most people get more amxious for a few weeks after a dose increase. id always increased ven doses by 37.5mg since being on 150mg, and havent felt an increase in anxiety. if its unbearable, you could ask your pysc for a low level benzo to help, until the higher dose is working.
just to add, improvememts on ven didnt start for me until id been on it for approx 10 weeks, when id just increased to 225mg, so it took a long time to get going.
just to add. increases in ven of 75mg are a bit larger than going up a dose with other anti depressants. i think the spaced out feeling is the higher ben dose starting to work, in that it initially knumbs you. when it happens with me, usually leads to a positive result after a couple of weeks. a few weeks after going up to 225mg, for a whole week i felt rigid with tension, and thought id gone to high. lois on here said dont drop, as i was going to. i didnt, and after a week it passed and hasnt returned. both of your symptoms suggest the higher dose is starting to work, and shouldnt last more than a couple of weeks. if you are coming out of a deep depression, to come out of it fully, i think its inevitable that you have to go through these initial side effects.