Hello, I have joined over from surviving antidepressants. I also joined Benzo buddies and made this same intro there however this forum seems to be a better continuation on from SA. Here is my story/summary:

Started sertraline 50mg early 2018 at 20 years old for anxiety which I have had since the age of 15 and had an immediate bad reaction (extreme anxiety, akathisia). Stopped after 2 weeks and immediately went on to escitalopram 10mg which worked very well. Quit cold turkey after 3 months due to feeling better and not wanting to be on meds long term with no withdrawal. Went back on the meds after a few months due to return of anxiety disorder (and in hindsight possibly delayed withdrawal?). Did a 3 month linear taper end of 2018/start of 2019 due to feeling better and not wanting to be on meds long term. This resulted in severe withdrawal (bed bound) a few weeks after finishing the taper. After panicked googling as to what could be wrong with me as this experience was 1000x worse than my original anxiety disorder I found surviving antidepressants and reinstated at 5 mg with massive improvement. Increased back to 10mg during 2020 covid lockdowns due to panic attacks. Stayed at this dose until Feb 2025. Always had some anxiety issues even whilst on the drug this is just likely how I am wired and I'm ok with that.  Managed to get my veterinary medicine degree, start a good career and have 2 kids (twins) before experiencing what I think is antidepressant poop out? May 2024 (return of panic attacks, generalised anxiety, obsessive thoughts, extreme crushing fatigue and brain fog, orthostatic intolerance). I now wonder if this was possibly due to a brand change of escitalopram that occurred in April 2024 (the brand I was on called Ethics escitalopram was discontinued and I started on the IPCA escitalopram). I also gained 20kg on this drug that is incrediblydifficult to lose and my blood sugar levels are not great. I started a hyperbolic taper from 10mg escitalopram Feb 2025 using the maudsley deprescibing guidelines moderate taper which was far too fast. See summary below:
- 9/Feb/25 25% drop 7.5mg for 6 weeks
- 23/March/25 16% drop 6.3mg for 8 weeks
- 19/May/25 20% drop 5mg for 2 weeks

This is where the bad withdrawal/crash started. Anxiety became gradually worse.
- 30/May/25 8% increase 5.4mg for 4 weeks
- 1/July/25 11% drop 4.8mg for 5.5 weeks

Huge crash began at the end of July I remember the first thing I noticed was much worse anxiety, low mood and I would go to bed and be shaking like a leaf before falling asleep for no reason. Then my appetite went away, muscle tremors and burning sensations of the skin of my arms/chest/legs began and an inner restlessness and despair/panic that I cant really fully describe. I wont go into the horrors of the months August to Nov but it was the worst time of my life and I'm lucky to be alive.
- 6/August/25 11% up dose to 5.4mg 3 weeks not much improvement
- 28/August/25 11% up dose to 6.1mg and still here as of 15 Jan 2026 back to my baseline/'withdrawal normal' since mid Dec 2025. Planning to begin a really slow taper in March if all goes well until then. I was thinking of starting with a 2.5% drop and holding for at least 8 weeks.

My SA thread:

https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/32928-molloi-escitalopram-taper-after-7-years-on-the-drug-and-poop-out/

 

Hey Molloi 

 

Welcome to forum!

 

It's great you joined over at Benzo Buddies! Im glad you have come here too and you are VERY welcome indeed. 🙂

 

Thank you for creating your introduction topic and updating your signature. Good work!

 

I can see from you post above that you actually had your first CNS irritation back in 2018 on Sertraline. I think you were very lucky to manage on the Escitalopram when you started. What I've seen and experienced myself is when our nervous systems get upset by the drugs that is often the start of further complications when additional meds are introduced. 

 

The CT after 3 months of use would have been a bit of hit to your system likely not happy from the ADR from sertraline. You seemed ok at first but I suspect you are right that what happened was a delay in onset of WD symtoms. 

You tried then to come off again more slowly but this was, as you know, too fast resulting in a severe WD syndrome. Reinstating after thankfully finding SA to 5mg settled this down.

 

You then up dosed in 2020 during Covid to 10mg. It was a tough time maybe you felt you needed it. Perhaps you were starting to get interdose WD it's hard to know.

 

In 2025 maybe the drug did 'poop' out on you as you said but you decided it was time to come off it. The switch from brands has been known to effect people so there's a few factors here isn't there. 

 

Either way you started a moderate speed taper plan from the maudsley deprescibing guidelines which was too fast for you. Im not surprised this was the case as you had already experienced a number of dis-regulating CNS events and with that history and time on the drug a slower plan would have been more appropriate I think.

 

It took a couple of up doses to stabilise you but you got there and have been holding at 6.1mg since Aug 2025.

 

Im glad to hear you have reached your baseline. This is very good news.

 

I think 2.5% sounds reasonable to me. It's more conservative than the slow Maudsley plan which I think makes sense for your first drop. 

 

Escitalopram is a tricky drug to get off and those lower doses are a real challenge for folk so good to be careful.

 

Thanks again for joining the forum and we hope you find the support you are looking for here.

 

Speak soon

 

Chippy

Welcome to the forum @molloi,

 

I think that you're being sensible to give it some more time being stable, and then tapering more slowly.

 

My hope would be that in doing this, you can avoid any severe worsening of symptoms.

 

I hope that this place provides you with good support as you move forwards with your taper, and that ultimately you are able to write a success story here.

How are you feeling @molloi? Hope everything is going well for you. ❤️🙏

 

Hi @LostinCanada I am doing OK. Sadly my pregnancy has ended in an early miscarriage last week. I think I was only about 5 weeks along. I am having a setback currently. Not withdrawal symptoms but a lot of anxiety and a bit of low mood due to the stress of the past few weeks. Definitely holding for a bit longer I think. This year has been off to a rough start.

(Context for anyone reading this in the future: I had posted on my thread in benzo buddies in late Jan, before signing up here, that I was unexpectedly pregnant). 

Edited February 8Feb 8 by molloi

1 hour ago, molloi said:

Sadly my pregnancy has ended in an early miscarriage last week.

I am so sorry to hear this. Big hugs. 😞 My daughter miscarried a couple years ago….it’s heartbreaking. 💔

1 hour ago, molloi said:

am having a setback currently. Not withdrawal symptoms but a lot of anxiety and a bit of low mood due to the stress of the past few weeks.

This would be expected and is totally normal. So much stress along with hormone changes. I think holding is the right way to go. Your body needs to heal.
Give yourself lots of time to adjust and grieve. ❤️🙏

1 hour ago, molloi said:

Hi @LostinCanada I am doing OK. Sadly my pregnancy has ended in an early miscarriage last week. I think I was only about 5 weeks along. I am having a setback currently. Not withdrawal symptoms but a lot of anxiety and a bit of low mood due to the stress of the past few weeks. Definitely holding for a bit longer I think. This year has been off to a rough start.

(Context for anyone reading this in the future: I had posted on my thread in benzo buddies in late Jan, before signing up here, that I was unexpectedly pregnant). 

My heart goes out to you @molloi so sorry for what you are going through.

Very wise decision to hold, stability is so necessary, when I tried to rush it quickly turned into a disaster.

Wishing you the rest of this year to be better than its beginning, take good care.

Edited February 8Feb 8 by Fullhealing

2 hours ago, molloi said:

Hi @LostinCanada I am doing OK. Sadly my pregnancy has ended in an early miscarriage last week. I think I was only about 5 weeks along. I am having a setback currently. Not withdrawal symptoms but a lot of anxiety and a bit of low mood due to the stress of the past few weeks. Definitely holding for a bit longer I think. This year has been off to a rough start.

(Context for anyone reading this in the future: I had posted on my thread in benzo buddies in late Jan, before signing up here, that I was unexpectedly pregnant). 

I’m so sorry to read this. Hope a hold will give you time to settle and process it all. Chippy 

I'm sorry to hear this.

 

I hope that 2026 brings some stability for you.

This morning I went to draw up my dose. I use a 3ml syinge and a 1ml syringe to draw up 3.05ml of a 2mg/ml liquid to get 6.1mg dose. The numbers on the 1ml syringe had rubbed off so I could not see the 0.05ml increment and I need to buy more syringes. I had a thought what if I just took the 3ml. I calculated this would be a 1.7% drop in dose. So I've just taken that this morning and will see how I go. I feel that although I have had a stressful past month my actual withdrawal symptoms have been stable for about 2 months now. I hope I'm not being reckless here but I have been holding for 5.5months now. So current dose is now 6.0mg down from 6.1mg. 

Edited February 12Feb 12 by molloi

13 minutes ago, molloi said:

numbers on the 1ml syringe had rubbed off

Some use tape or clear nail polish to prevent this. Accuracy is important. ❤️🙏

I think I'm going to just buy a box of 100 1ml syringes through my work so I don't need to worry about this happening again 😅 

Well my body loudly and clearly said NO to that reduction. 2 days of 6.0mg and today, day 3, I have gone back to 6.1mg. I don't know if it's actually withdrawal or anticipatory anxiety about getting withdrawal symptoms again as I honestly feel traumatised from the end of last year. I've felt on edge and as if any small thing could tip me into a panic attack today and yesterday. I've been able to tolerate a cup of coffee in the morning for the past 6 weeks and after my cup this morning I just felt like I might panic at any moment. So I took the 0.1mg dose about an hour after my 6.0mg dose and will be staying here for a bit longer. 

Edited February 15Feb 15 by molloi

45 minutes ago, molloi said:

my body loudly and clearly said NO to that reduction.

All we can do is keep listening. I suspect your body has had enough trauma and just needs a break. You will know when you are ready. Stability is more important than cessation at all costs. ❤️🙏

That is so true. There's no point rushing down the doses if I'm completely unstable as I need to be able to function for my kids, my job, etc.

Seem to be fairly stable at the moment in terms of withdrawal symptoms however having a lot of issues with fatigue which was one of the big reasons I started this tapering journey. If I suspect the escitalopram to be worsening/causing my fatigue (often feel the most foggy headed and sedated a few hours after my morning dose) should I switch to taking it at night time? I'm guessing I'll need to take say 1mg less in the morning then 1mg at night until it's all swapped over to night time. This will take about a week as am on 6.1mg. I'm.a bit scared to change anything as I've always taken it in the morning (8 years of use now).

2 hours ago, molloi said:

Seem to be fairly stable at the moment in terms of withdrawal symptoms however having a lot of issues with fatigue which was one of the big reasons I started this tapering journey. If I suspect the escitalopram to be worsening/causing my fatigue (often feel the most foggy headed and sedated a few hours after my morning dose) should I switch to taking it at night time? I'm guessing I'll need to take say 1mg less in the morning then 1mg at night until it's all swapped over to night time. This will take about a week as am on 6.1mg. I'm.a bit scared to change anything as I've always taken it in the morning (8 years of use now).

I’d not switch it that way. I’d either move the whole dose over slowly 1 hour at a time or split it in half and move half an hour at a time, leaving the other half at the original time. Could always start to bring the am half over slowly to the evening if it works out for you.

4 hours ago, molloi said:

Seem to be fairly stable at the moment in terms of withdrawal symHi, the medication can react differently during the day, it's tricky since throughout the day there is a different release of hormones that can cause a different reaction so it's not guaranteed that the fatigue will stay at night, at least that's how it was for me.

If it doesn't really interfere with your daily functioning, maybe it's an option to wait a while and see if it doesn't balance out on its own as there is less substance in the system and especially if you are relatively balanced in terms of the other symptoms? I was just suggesting it of courseptoms however having a lot of issues with fatigue which was one of the big reasons I started this tapering journey. If I suspect the escitalopram to be worsening/causing my fatigue (often feel the most foggy headed and sedated a few hours after my morning dose) should I switch to taking it at night time? I'm guessing I'll need to take say 1mg less in the morning then 1mg at night until it's all swapped over to night time. This will take about a week as am on 6.1mg. I'm.a bit scared to change anything as I've always taken it in the morning (8 years of use now).

Hi @molloi the medication can react differently during the day, it's tricky since throughout the day there is a different release of hormones that can cause a different reaction so it's not guaranteed that the fatigue will stay at night, at least that's how it was for me.

If it doesn't really interfere with your daily functioning, maybe it's an option to wait a while and see if it doesn't balance out on its own as there is less substance in the system and especially since you are relatively balanced in terms of the other symptoms? Just my two cents on it 🙏

Edited April 18Apr 18 by Fullhealing

@Fullhealing that's a good point to consider, may I ask what happened to you, did you switch time of day and find that it had no benefit or an adverse effect?

22 minutes ago, molloi said:

@Fullhealing that's a good point to consider, may I ask what happened to you, did you switch time of day and find that it had no benefit or an adverse effect?

@molloi yes it caused the opposite reaction, I was super alert and when finally fell asleep it also added extra vivid and bizarre dreams..

Considering that you're doing relatively well, I wouldn't rock the boat, but of course as for your decision, I hope the fatigue passes for you soon 🙏

Posting on my thread as well - initiallyposted in the symptoms and coping strategies forum

I've been wanting to make this post for about a month now. I'm still not sure how to convey this information without possibly really irritating and triggering a lot of people and coming off as an incoherent ramble. If I do I'm really sorry and just discard this information if it makes you feel worse because I think it would have pissed me off if I read it in acute withdrawal. I don't want to minimize the absolute horror that can be ssri (or any psychotropic) drug withdrawal. But this information has changed my life, massively improved my symptoms and finally after 9 months of holding allowed me to continue my taper. Please read my intro topic to get a better picture of my situation and give some context. I have suffered immensely with ssri withdrawal to the point where I know I am lucky to still be here. I had been holding my taper for 9 months this May 2026 and still experiencing bizarre, random and terrifying symptoms daily such as panic, anxiety, extreme fatigue, vertigo, dizziness, DPDR, depression, buzzing sensations in my head, joint pain, muscle pain, exercise intolerance, orthostatic intolerance and more when I came across some interesting information. I was listening to a podcast about chronic pain. The premise of this podcast is based on something called tension myoneural syndrome. An idea formulated by physician Dr Sarno and initially applied to chronic back pain but has since been used to improve many chronic conditions such as cfs, fibromyalgia, long covid, chronic migraine, etc. you get the idea. This theory (from my understanding) says that the brain and body can create a nasty array of horrifying and uncomfortable symptoms when it is feeling under threat and the nervous system is stuck in high alert/fight or flight whaever you want to call it. These symptoms manifest in a variety of ways in different people e.g the chronic conditions I listed above and for me my panic, anxiety, extreme fatigue, vertigo, dizziness, DPDR, depression, buzzing sensations in my head, joint pain, muscle pain, exercise intolerance, orthostatic intolerance and more .These symtoms are called neuroplastic symptoms because they are created by the brain and body due to the stressed state of the nervous system and not a physical abnormality. THIS DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE NOT REAL. Your symtoms ARE REAL but the cause of them is not a physical abbreation it is due to a brain and body that is trying to create symtoms that will get you to shut down/get away from stress and protect yourself. I personally don't think this applies to acute withdrawal. The withdrawal when you have no windows or waves and it's straight terror I believe has a physical abnormality component (in your brain and probably body) due to the disruption of removing a drug. However I believe once you start to have windows and waves it is POSSIBLE that your symptoms are moving away from a true physical abnormality cause and into a tension myonerural/learned state. Please please do not think that I believe the symptoms are not real. The symptoms are real, but they are being caused by your nervous system being left in a state of extreme fight or flight after going through acute withdrawal. What to do with this information? It means that you can teach your brain to ignore and then gradually let go of the horrible symptoms of withdrawal that you still have. I think for me this would not have worked for the first 4 - 5 months of my crash but once I started having windows and waves I think I could have done this work. There are a number of ways to 'retrain' your brain to drop down into a state of rest and repair and begin to stop giving you these symptoms of withdrawal. The method I used was called journal speak (search up journal speak and Nicole Sachs LCSW if interested) combined with radical acceptance and a mindset shift that my symptoms are just my brain and body's misguided way of protecting me after the hell I went through in acute withdrawal. I read Nicole Sach's book 'mind your body' to get started with this brain retraining. She is just one of the people out there who promote this tension myoneural stuff. It is simple but incredibly difficult to do. Essentially, when I have symptoms I first allow them to just be there like a ragdoll being blown in a gale of sensations. Then name it e.g I feel like I'm going to pass out or I feel disconnected from the world around me. Then I just say OK thats what I'm feeling but I'm going to carry on with life and let it be there. The symptom doesn't have to go away (it doesn't for me it usually dissaptes gradually over hours) it can hang out and I just carry on with my panic or my anxiety or my joint pain or my vertigo. It's bloody hard to do the first few times but the more you practice you gain the confidence that you can do the things you used to with the symptoms along for the ride AND THEN THEY START TO GRADUALLY GO AWAY. It took about 2 weeks of this radical acceptance combined with the journal speak for me to notice a difference but it was insane. My symptoms just started dropping off like flies. I still have them now but they are so much less disruptive and I'm so much more stress tolerant. I'm even tapering which a couple months ago I tried to do the same drop and was a complete mess. So please just give it a try - what do you have to lose. It has helped me immensely and if it can help even one other person that would be amazing. I hope this wasn't too rambly and doesn't piss too many people off but I had to get it out there. So what I'd reccommend as an action plan from here for those that are interested is listen to some of the episodes of the cure for chronic pain podcast, read the mind your body book and start journal speak and implement the mindset shift/different response to your symptoms as much as you can. Give it at least 2 weeks and see how you feel.

Edited June 7Jun 7 by molloi

20 minutes ago, molloi said:

It's bloody hard to do the first few times but the more you practice you gain the confidence that you can do the things you used to with the symptoms along for the ride AND THEN THEY START TO GRADUALLY GO AWAY.

It's taken me years, and I now do do things. It's not a confidence issue. I do the things, pushing through physical symptoms all the time. Please could you articulate how my symptoms are in any way likely to be caused by a lack of confidence that I can do things?

Do you have any evidence to share that you're not simply improving your anxiety, given that most of your improvements seem to hinge around being able to do things, but not having the confidence to do them?

We've been quite lenient in general, but I'll remind you of the forum guidelines, and that "brain retraining" was discussed at length, repeatedly on SA.

I'll leave this up, because you are talking about your own experiences, and I want to encourage discussion and not censor it, but part of that is also that other people can discuss and critique ideas, and I'm pointing out that you've provided no evidence.

I'm glad that you feel it has helped you.

22 minutes ago, molloi said:

An idea formulated by physician Dr Sarno and initially applied to chronic back pain but has since been used to improve many chronic conditions such as cfs, fibromyalgia, long covid, chronic migraine, etc. you get the idea.

It has also been tried and not done anything for a large range of these conditions. I have direct, personal experience of observing a family member try this stuff.

People always pick out CFS as a "you're causing this with your thoughts" syndrome, and it is often the target of miscellaneous "cures", when in reality severe CFS means being bedbound 24/7, unable to tolerate noise and light, and being extremely physically ill, sometimes for years, sometimes resulting in death.

It is NOT the result of learned coping mechanisms.

@Luke I understand that this theory does not apply to everyone and certainly am not suggesting that it is a cure all for ssri withdrawal, cfs etc. Maybe it has worked for me due to my symptoms being driven by anxiety and I was not in protracted or ssri withdrawal at all. Neither you nor I can be certain which is which. I cannot say for sure but that's certainly possible. Maybe it has not worked for others due to their symptoms not being neuroplastic and actually having biochemical/physical causes. I know when I had akathisia which I certainly don't belive is neuroplastic I would have been outraged to read stuff like this and I doubt it would have worked in that situation, but for those with symptoms like mine further along the track maybe it could help. I would never suggest in certainty to someone that their symptoms are neuroplastic as who the hell am I to know that. Just putting it out there for those to try who are desperate enough like I was.

I also have spent a lot of time pushing through symptoms and doing things anyway. It wasn't a confidence issue it was a mindset issue of being afraid of my symptoms just being there which created a feedback loop to more symptoms. I never stopped doing things I just did them scared and reactive to my symptoms. Now I do them with my symptoms but not scared or reactive despite them. I hope this makes sense and I understand that it is triggering to read. I will keep updating this thread with my progress and maybe it will go downhill again but I hope not!

@molloi How can you prove, that after a 9 month hold, you weren't turning a corner anyway? Maybe you were able to use strategies like this because your WD was healing. Not that the strategies helped your WD, but that WD eased enough to allow you to use strategies, if that makes sense. Correlation is not causation, that is the first rule of science.

Personally I think this is bollocks - just going to call it straight because I have no patience and no "F's to give" anymore after what has happened to me. I am a psychiatrist trained in Acceptance Commitment Therapy and Trauma Informed Stabilisation Therapy. I have also done workshops on Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and did Yoga teacher training some tears ago. If there was any strategy or approach that worked for the twisting, dark, evil, chemical thoughts, brain fog, joint pain etc, etc, you might think that I have the tool box. Guess what? Many, if not most days my brain and body are not capable of measured breathing (can't concentrate to count the breathes), observing my symptoms, thought challenging, 'floating above", calming my nervous system etc. And on days that I am, it doesn't make a jot of difference.

This is a brain injury that will heal in it's own time. As I said, I call bollocks here, big time.

1 minute ago, Sminismoni said:

@molloi How can you prove, that after a 9 month hold, you weren't turning a corner anyway? Maybe you were able to use strategies like this because your WD was healing. Not that the strategies helped your WD, but that WD eased enough to allow you to use strategies, if that makes sense. Correlation is not causation, that is the first rule of science.

Personally I think this is bollocks - just going to call it straight because I have no patience and no "F's to give" anymore after what has happened to me. I am a psychiatrist trained in Acceptance Commitment Therapy and Trauma Informed Stabilisation Therapy. I have also done workshops on Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and did Yoga teacher training some tears ago. If there was any strategy or approach that worked for the twisting, dark, evil, chemical thoughts, brain fog, joint pain etc, etc, you might think that I have the tool box. Guess what? Many, if not most days my brain and body are not capable of measured breathing (can't concentrate to count the breathes), observing my symptoms, thought challenging, 'floating above", calming my nervous system etc. And on days that I am, it doesn't make a jot of difference.

This is a brain injury that will heal in it's own time. As I said, I call bollocks here, big time.

I can't prove it and maybe it is all a coincidence but I hope not! I KNOW this would NOT have worked when I was acute with akathisia and suicidal. I 100% get where you are coming from because I have been there too.