Sertraline Concerns (4 weeks on 50 mg)

Treatment and medication
1

I have been prescribed Sertraline for anxiety (health anxiety in particular). I took the first pill on December 1st (25mg) and after a week I started taking 50 mg. I noticed a tiny improvement in anxiety, but for most of the days I have been feeling extremely tired, something I cannot control by drinking coffee for example.

I am leaning towards weaning off and quitting altogether, but I am not sure. My main concerns are that I am due to travel a lot in January and February and I cannot afford being this tired, as I have to pack a lot and wake up early and stand in airports.

Does anybody know if the fatigue goes away or if this is just something that most of the people on Sertraline have to live with? Can people affected by fatigue wake up really early if they need to? I don’t want to end up sleeping 12 hours every day, I think I would prefer living with that awful anxiety.

Also, if I take it for 8 weeks to see how I feel, how long will it take to taper off it? 8 weeks would be on January 26th and I need to move continents on February 15th.

2

I forgot to mention I am 30yo female and I work, so staying home because of tiredness is not an option.

3

its very common and for some people it goes away, others it lingers. i was on sert for 13 weeks 50mg similiar age to you. i had awful fatigue. like you i work and am also sporty so i couldnt deal with the tiredness. i would say leave it a while and see. it will improve for sure but it may not go entirely. i changed to lexapro (sert stopped working and couldnt face increasing due to fatigue) and only had the extreme fatigue when i upped dose but it went after a day. today also randomly i feel it. sorry this is not very helpful but i would say stick it out a while basically as the beginning is always the worst

4

Thanks a lot for the reply! I’ll try it some more, today I think it felt a little better. Did you switch to lexapro directly?