Posted by bleauberry on February 18, 2009, at 17:41:39
In reply to 2-1/2 years later have permanent withdrawal sympto, posted by chinaroses on February 16, 2009, at 11:57:23
I wonder if the symptoms are indeed related to effexor? It would be easy to test, just so you can be sure you are pointing the finger at the right thing. I mean, I agree it looks obvious, but...it could be something else, it could be coincidental timing of something else. Every so often things that look obvious trick us in the wrong direction.
To rule that out and be 100% sure, you could try a challenge experiment. That is, get some effexor and take some for, I don't know, a day, a week, two weeks. Feel it out. Just see if those symptoms go away when you give your body the effexor molecule. If they don't, then you have to reconsider the diagnosis maybe?
On any topic I like to study the pro side and the skeptic side, so I can see the whole picture. I am on the pro side of psych drugs mostly. On the skeptic side would be Breggin. He claims ADs do permanent damage in a way that we require the drug for life, kind of like a permanent addiction, even long past the point of the drug doing us any good, even after it has pooped out. Somehow our biochemistries become dependent on that molecule and cannot regain normal chemistry without it, he claims.
It might be so, I dunno. I mean, we do know that ADs reduce or increase the numbers of receptors depending on the drug, they make receptors more sensitive or less sensitive, they change the way the body decides to convert tryptophan to serotonin, they turn the volume of certain genes up, some down or off. How are we to know that any of these changes aren't permanent? I do believe in the resiliency of the human body, but I'm not sure it was built to take on the power of these drugs? Dunno, just a thought.
I wish I had some ideas to help you. My gut instinct tells me the problem is likely in the opioid circuitry. Serotonin and NE circuitries just don't cause those kinds of symptoms. Other symptoms yes. It just feels more like an opioid thing. Effexor does have some unknown opioid effects, and it is similar to its cousin the opioid painkiller Tramadol. I have always felt that the difficulties of Effexor withdrawal were somehow tied into some unknown opioid connection. That would explain it a lot more the serotonin or NE.
Anyway, if you are brave enough to endure the startup and another short withdrawal, you could always test the theory just to be sure.
poster:bleauberry
thread:880481
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090213/msgs/880958.html