Hello everyone,

in 2019 I had a psychosomatic anxiety episode which put me to Mirtazapine 15 mg and Clonazepam 0.5-1 mg for about a month, then I stopped both cold turkey and had absolutely no problems until now.

In November I got through a stressful period which destroyed my digestion, caused me to stop sleeping well and wake up in the middle of the night with terror and left me with hardly describable bodily sensations. To be honest I still think some part of me is irreversibly broken and I'm afraid I'll never recover.

That, again, put me on Mirtazapine 15 mg and Clonazepam 0.5 mg since December. First it helped a bit with sleeping mostly, but then it wasn't enough, so at the end of January my doc increased dose of Mirt to 30 mg. Few days after that I started feeling off-balance, like walking on a boat, and had weird physical anxiety waves, which unsuprisingly made the whole thing worse (I believed Mirtazapine can't possibly cause this as I've been on it before). So they put me on Sertraline 50 mg, which got me completely high after three hours, so I decreased my dosage to just 25 mg (according to my doc it has no meaningful effect) and it still left me completely useless, shaking on a couch for two weeks straight, with terrible waves of heat spreading mostly over my arms, unability to think clearly and feeling of dread. Then my doc put me on Escitalopram 5 mg, which was a bit better, but I still wasn't able to live in a meaningful way, and also some depersonalization and uncomfortable trouble with urination appeared. That convinced me to stop it again after two weeks and halved my dosage of Mirtazapine back to 15 mg. Meanwhile, my sleep pattern improved somehow, but the other symptoms not so much, so I continued with halving Mirtazapine to 7.5 mg after three weeks and then stopped completely. Which was a mistake, as after four days of being clear my sleep is terrible again, I wake up at 4AM with fever-like symptoms, chills, nauseous, sweating and feeling like dying. So my next step is to reintroduce Mirtazapine and try to stabilize on a low dosage and then taper properly.

After last five months I'm both scared and tired of all of this. I'm a husband and father of three and apart from currently being terrible at both, I really need to keep my job which I'm currently terrible at as well. Probably the worst part is that I don't even know what is the initial condition I wanted to cure and what are the side/withdrawal effects of the medication, as the symptoms just stack together. I may be better on some meds or completely without them, and every decision I make can have pretty bad consequences. I can't imagine how some of you people are fighting with this for years. Hats off.

Hi @CzechOut

Welcome to the forum!

 

This is a volunteer-run, community forum aimed at helping those who are tapering and/or experiencing difficulties with psychiatric medications and withdrawl syndrome. We are not medical professionals and cannot offer medical advice. We simply offer support and opinions which you could use as talking points with a medical provider knowledgeable in withdrawing off psychiatric medications.

 

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I'm so sorry to read about the tough time you've had recently you will find plenty of support here for sure.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

in 2019 I had a psychosomatic anxiety episode which put me to Mirtazapine 15 mg and Clonazepam 0.5-1 mg for about a month, then I stopped both cold turkey and had absolutely no problems until now.

This is VERY common, it seems very often, our nervous systems can handle some exposure to these drugs, followed by again often, too quick a taper.

I strongly believe this primes us for future harm.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

In November I got through a stressful period which destroyed my digestion, caused me to stop sleeping well and wake up in the middle of the night with terror and left me with hardly describable bodily sensations. To be honest I still think some part of me is irreversibly broken and I'm afraid I'll never recover.

It is likley this was your body just reacting to a stressful period in your life. This is normal, sometimes we have hard times, it is ok to feel this way, you were NOT broken and just needed some time, possibly some alterations to your life circumstances, and maybe some therapy/councelling to help you through this difficult period.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

That, again, put me on Mirtazapine 15 mg and Clonazepam 0.5 mg since December. First it helped a bit with sleeping mostly, but then it wasn't enough, so at the end of January my doc increased dose of Mirt to 30 mg. Few days after that I started feeling off-balance, like walking on a boat, and had weird physical anxiety waves, which unsuprisingly made the whole thing worse (I believed Mirtazapine can't possibly cause this as I've been on it before).

Mirtazapine at 15mg is somewhat sedating, the higher the dose, the less this effect is. You clearly started to experience adverse effects of taking the drugs, your body let you know, it wasn't happy. Unfortunately increasing the dose, as doctors often do thinking it is a 'mental health condition worsening, just increased your adverse reaction, its kind of obvious if you think about it, but doctors somehow struggle to notice!

I understand why you thought this couldn't be, but hopefully now you understand better.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

So they put me on Sertraline 50 mg, which got me completely high after three hours, so I decreased my dosage to just 25 mg (according to my doc it has no meaningful effect) and it still left me completely useless, shaking on a couch for two weeks straight, with terrible waves of heat spreading mostly over my arms, unability to think clearly and feeling of dread.

Again, the issue here, is the doctor was trying to treat a 'mental health' condition, and not seeing the fact your nervous system had become sensitised, adding more psycoactive drugs to this situation, is like trying to put out a fire with fuel!

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

hen my doc put me on Escitalopram 5 mg, which was a bit better, but I still wasn't able to live in a meaningful way, and also some depersonalization and uncomfortable trouble with urination appeared.

Often doctor resort to Escilatopram, as they know it is very strong and will likley numb the patient, this is probably what you experienced here, but again as your system is now very sensitive, you continued to have adverse effects.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

That convinced me to stop it again after two weeks and halved my dosage of Mirtazapine back to 15 mg. Meanwhile, my sleep pattern improved somehow, but the other symptoms not so much, so I continued with halving Mirtazapine to 7.5 mg after three weeks and then stopped completely.

Wow, so you were on Mirtazapine, and they put Escilatopram and Sertraline ontop of it?! That is a lot of ADs in a short time!

This taper was too fast, even though you had not been on Mirtazapine for very long, a much longer taper is likley needed at this point.

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

Which was a mistake, as after four days of being clear my sleep is terrible again, I wake up at 4AM with fever-like symptoms, chills, nauseous, sweating and feeling like dying. So my next step is to reintroduce Mirtazapine and try to stabilize on a low dosage and then taper properly.

These are very common WD symptoms from Mirtazapine, I have had them all myself. Awful Drug.

Can you confirm if you have reinstated Mirtazapine yet?

Reinstament may help resolve your WD symptoms, and we will be happy to help you do this and to suggest a dose to RI at, if that is what you want to do.

I think a big part of what you are experiencing, is symptoms of a bruised nervous system, that will take some time to settle down.

If you choose to stay off the drug, you will recover, and as you have had adverse reactions to the drug in the first place, that might be for the best, however this is your choice. A low dose RI is likley to not effect you as much, in terms of adverse reactions, and it could be the crutch your nervous system needs to reduce the WD symptoms. The choice is yours to make. We support you either way.

Here is our guide on RI: Reinstating an Antidepressant

Also our Tapering guide: Tapering Information

And our guide on making up small doses: Preparing Doses for Tapering - Weighing & DIY Liquids

Are you still taking Clonazepam? Can you add it to your signature for me? If you have been taking this regularly you will need to taper this too, however I would leave it where it is for the minute. Do you take it twice or once a day?

15 hours ago, CzechOut said:

After last five months I'm both scared and tired of all of this. I'm a husband and father of three and apart from currently being terrible at both, I really need to keep my job which I'm currently terrible at as well. Probably the worst part is that I don't even know what is the initial condition I wanted to cure and what are the side/withdrawal effects of the medication, as the symptoms just stack together. I may be better on some meds or completely without them, and every decision I make can have pretty bad consequences. I can't imagine how some of you people are fighting with this for years. Hats off.

I am very very sorry to hear about all of this. 😔 I can see what a hard time you are having. Im glad you found us.

It can be hard to unpick what is WD and what is not, but I think you can see these drugs are not the answer. In WD we learn lots of very useful coping skills, we often say, that if we had these skills before we took the drugs, we wouldn't have needed them in the first place! I believe, and hope you will pick up the needed tool box of skills, to not only help you with the drug harm, but address the original issues that let you here.

In the mean time this is what I would do if I were you:

 

-Stay Hydrated 

 

-Eat a good clean whole food diet, avoiding processed foods and sugars.

 

-Stay away from caffeine, alcohol and antihistamines and any other psychoactive substances.

 

Supplements are to be avoided initially, as they often irritate our nervous systems. Try to get your nutrition through food.

 

Down the line, you may wish to introduce Fish Oil and Magnesium. Those who can tolerate them have found them calming to the nervous system. Be careful try one at a time and start low and see how you get on should you choose to try them.

 

A daily walk is very important as much as you can manage, if you can manage it. Gets you your fresh air and Vitamin D does wonders for your mind!

 

You are very welcome here and I hope you find the site supportive.

Chippy

Thank you for your kind words.

5 hours ago, Chippy said:

Wow, so you were on Mirtazapine, and they put Escilatopram and Sertraline ontop of it?! That is a lot of ADs in a short time!

Yeah. Doc said it's pretty common and that the doses are low anyway. Silly me.

7 hours ago, Chippy said:

Can you confirm if you have reinstated Mirtazapine yet?

Yes, yesterday I took 7.5 mg which is a dose I had taken for only 4 days before stopping could turkey 9 days ago. I slept definitely much better, I feel better but my vestibular symptoms may have worsen a bit. I guess my journey now will be to stabilize and then find the smallest possible dose which will let me sleep without the sickness but keep my balance issues bearable.

7 hours ago, Chippy said:

Are you still taking Clonazepam? Can you add it to your signature for me?

I've used it regularly only the first couple of weeks of Mirtazapine and then week or so when increasing to 30 mg. After that I took it only occasionally and I haven't taken any for the last 6 weeks. I believe I can manage without it. I'll definitely add it to my signature.

I have to to stop now as my migraine aura begins and I'm barely able to read. It's not new for me but it seems that on meds it's much more frequent.

Cc: @Finni my introduction is complete now :)

23 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

Yeah. Doc said it's pretty common and that the doses are low anyway. Silly me.

No! Not silly you! You were not to know!

23 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

Yes, yesterday I took 7.5 mg which is a dose I had taken for only 4 days before stopping could turkey 9 days ago. I slept definitely much better, I feel better but my vestibular symptoms may have worsen a bit. I guess my journey now will be to stabilize and then find the smallest possible dose which will let me sleep without the sickness but keep my balance issues bearable.

Ok, 7.5mg is a very high RI dose. If you are already noticing issues with it, and as you only have taken one dose, I would reduce it to 1.5mg and hold it steady at that dose for 7-14 days and see how you are. I would not keep reducing it down to try to find the right level. This can cause kindling and make you worse.

25 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

I've used it regularly only the first couple of weeks of Mirtazapine and then week or so when increasing to 30 mg. After that I took it only occasionally and I haven't taken any for the last 6 weeks. I believe I can manage without it. I'll definitely add it to my signature.

Ok, good to know. Some can stop Benzos quickly. I would just not take anymore on this basis.

I totally understand, there is a 'dark mode' which may help, when you want/need to be on here 😀

Good to have you here. Chippy

1 hour ago, CzechOut said:

Cc: @Finni my introduction is complete now :)

I’m so sorry that you’re going through all of this!

To answer your question, mirtazapine never caused any vestibular issues until my dose was raised and then lowered and now I feel like I’m walking on a trampoline or walking in marshmallows. Lots of rocking and bobbing sensations.

Yuck

1 hour ago, Finni said:

mirtazapine never caused any vestibular issues until my dose was raised and then lowered

Interesting. I started having them about 9th day of being on 30 mg. Now they're lesser I believe, but definitely not gone even if I'm on lower than my starting dose. I regret that at that time I let myself gaslit into thinking it's another symptom of untreated anxiety and that I need more meds. Everything went downhill because of it.

2 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

Interesting. I started having them about 9th day of being on 30 mg. Now they're lesser I believe, but definitely not gone even if I'm on lower than my starting dose. I regret that at that time I let myself gaslit into thinking it's another symptom of untreated anxiety and that I need more meds. Everything went downhill because of it.

Same here! I let a psychiatrist increase my dose of mirtazapine and it was way too much for me.

Welcome to the forum.

Unfortunately, you'll find many who were repeatedly told things like "this dose has almost no effect", "this is harmless/cannot harm you", "you can just stop it" and so on. Many only found out by being repeatedly harmed by this advice that doctors tend to just say these things even if they don't know.

Hopefully you'll stabilise at least to a reasonable level following reinstatement. It can become very difficult to unpick when multiple drugs are involved with various changes.

6 hours ago, Luke said:

doctors tend to just say these things even if they don't know.

Exactly. I don't think they're evil, I don't even think they're stupid. It just feels that I'm merely a statistics for them. It's like that somehow helping two people with a bit bad mood, doing nothing for seven and wreaking complete havoc on one seems like a good tradeoff, dunno.

My doc just tried to switch my meds again. These will definitely help me. No, screw you! I'm hurt enough already.

Anyway, anything bad that happens more than three weeks after quitting meds apparently isn't connected to them at all, she said. 🫠

5 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

My doc just tried to switch my meds again. These will definitely help me. No, screw you! I'm hurt enough already.

Anyway, anything bad that happens more than three weeks after quitting meds apparently isn't connected to them at all, she said. 🫠

Well done. Stand your ground!

20 hours ago, CzechOut said:

My doc just tried to switch my meds again. These will definitely help me. No, screw you! I'm hurt enough already.

Anyway, anything bad that happens more than three weeks after quitting meds apparently isn't connected to them at all, she said. 🫠

💪🏻

How are you @CzechOut ?

7 hours ago, Finni said:

How are you @CzechOut ?

Very wobbly, but relatively well. Thanks for asking, @Finni .

I'm aware that I'm very lucky compared to a lot of you. I live with my family, I can work, meet friends... Basically I can live what may look like a pretty normal life. It's just like ten times harder than it should be and than it was before. To get out of bed, to keep concentration at work, to walk straight, not to break things because of terrible clumsiness... I feel inferior. But, reading lots of incredible stories here, I believe it will pass.

7 hours ago, CzechOut said:

But, reading lots of incredible stories here, I believe it will pass.

It will! You are doing great. I’m so happy to read you are functioning well. This is great news 😀

On 4/26/2026 at 10:12 PM, CzechOut said:

Very wobbly, but relatively well. Thanks for asking, @Finni .

I'm aware that I'm very lucky compared to a lot of you. I live with my family, I can work, meet friends... Basically I can live what may look like a pretty normal life. It's just like ten times harder than it should be and than it was before. To get out of bed, to keep concentration at work, to walk straight, not to break things because of terrible clumsiness... I feel inferior. But, reading lots of incredible stories here, I believe it will pass.

No level of harm is ok, but it's good that you can function "normally" to a degree.

The only way out of it, is through it, so it's good that you can push through in this way.

I hope that things get easier in time. Hopefully with some more stability for a while, we can then start to talk about next steps, but that's in the future, for now all you must do is take care of yourself.

Thank you for your kind words @Luke

Your strength to bear your burden encourages me to bear mine. We will heal.

I haven't posted any update for a while.

I managed to decrease my Mirt dose to 2.5 mg. It turned out that while I (quite expectedly) can't stop cold turkey, I'm able to decrease quicker than recommended without serious withdrawal symptoms.

About a week or so after every decrease I feel a bit worse, but then it stabilizes and starts to improve, and with every step it's more manageable.

I still feel off balance and a bit dumb and foggy sometimes, but it seems that bad days now are comparable to the best days three months ago or so.

I'm still afraid of the last step which inevitably awaits me, but now I think it's possible to get out of this.

I'm thinking of all of you who are fighting much harder than I am and I believe all of you will win in the end.

14 hours ago, CzechOut said:

I haven't posted any update for a while.

I managed to decrease my Mirt dose to 2.5 mg. It turned out that while I (quite expectedly) can't stop cold turkey, I'm able to decrease quicker than recommended without serious withdrawal symptoms.

About a week or so after every decrease I feel a bit worse, but then it stabilizes and starts to improve, and with every step it's more manageable.

I still feel off balance and a bit dumb and foggy sometimes, but it seems that bad days now are comparable to the best days three months ago or so.

I'm still afraid of the last step which inevitably awaits me, but now I think it's possible to get out of this.

I'm thinking of all of you who are fighting much harder than I am and I believe all of you will win in the end.

Thanks for the update. I would be super careful here. Lower doses are more potent, consider a long hold and tapering more slowly from this point after you have stablised. Remeber WD symptoms can be delayed.

Can you update your signature for us?

1 hour ago, Chippy said:

Thanks for the update. I would be super careful here. Lower doses are more potent, consider a long hold and tapering more slowly from this point after you have stablised. Remeber WD symptoms can be delayed.

Definitely, thanks for advice. I didn't want to sound like I'm already close to zero, I believe there's a lot of smaller steps yet.

But the good news from my point of view is that (at least up to now) adverse effects were the bigger issue and are improving, while withdrawal is mostly tolerable. So I decided to be optimistic, but cautious.

50 minutes ago, CzechOut said:

Definitely, thanks for advice. I didn't want to sound like I'm already close to zero, I believe there's a lot of smaller steps yet.

But the good news from my point of view is that (at least up to now) adverse effects were the bigger issue and are improving, while withdrawal is mostly tolerable. So I decided to be optimistic, but cautious.

Yes we see adverse effects tend to be dose specific, where as WD effects are more effected by receptor occupancy.

Your nervous system has been through a bit recently so a nice hold would be good for it I think now that you have gotten a good bit of the drug load down and are benefitting from the reduced adverse effects.

Give your system a nice platform to taper the final but very important stage of the drug.