I’m a new member here and a refugee from the SA site. Thank you to the founders for starting a new site and providing an outlet for those suffering from prescription drug harm.

My journey on psych meds began 10 years ago when I was prescribed 10mg Lexapro to treat extreme anxiety from a terminal illness diagnosis of my only sibling. I had no anxiety issues prior to this and had no history with psych meds until that time. I was 55 years old when I took my first dose.

After 5 years (2020) I was feeling great and decided I no longer needed the medication. My doctor gave me the standard 4 week taper, and I had 2 weeks of moderate symptoms, then completely normal. However, 5 months later the onset of what I now know was protracted withdrawal began and I went into a full spiral (I’ll spare you all the symptoms, but the worst was the akathisia). To treat the collapse, the doctor prescribed 1 mg klonopin, 100mg trazadone, and reinstated 20 mg (!!) Lexapro. At 60 years old I wound up in the ER thinking I was having a stroke. Fortunately I realized I was overmedicated and was aware of benzo dependency (my own research) and so reduced the klonopin to .25mg within 10 weeks, then tapered off the rest over 8 months after crossing to diazepam. By the end of 2022 I was off both klonopin and trazadone and began unwinding my Lexapro. I have been tapering Lexapro since 2023, and am now at 2mg.

In May ‘26, I crossed over to liquid and have been experiencing severe derealization and increased post dose reactivity. I had both of these symptoms while on the pills, but both have amped up significantly since the change. As of Aug ‘26, holding dose steady. Currently 3 months into the hold.

My SA thread: https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/32488-timetogetclean-converting-to-liquid-lexapro-for-taper/#comment-728100

Edited August 18Aug 18 by SarahMc

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 withdrawal 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.

 

Please familiarise yourself with the forum rules and the disclaimer located here: Guidelines

 

Please make sure your signature is kept up to date with your drug history. This will allow members to see some basic information about your drug history and situation so that they may help you best. Information on how to do this is located in the FAQs section above, but here is a direct link: Update Signature

Once this is done, future posts made by you will have this signature turned on by default. For this reason please keep it clear but condensed as possible.

Please use the format outline here Preferred signature/drug history format

In particular, could you please update your signature to show how your Lexapro taper has proceeded? Not necessarily all the way from 20 mg, but if you could show doses and dates maybe from the last year of tapering, that would be helpful.

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

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

I’m a new member here and a refugee from the SA site. Thank you to the founders for starting a new site and providing an outlet for those suffering from prescription drug harm.

Glad to have you here. Was your username Saturn468 on SA? Usually we link to former members' SA threads, but I wasn't able to find yours.

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

After 5 years (2020) I was feeling great and decided I no longer needed the medication. My doctor gave me the standard 4 week taper, and I had 2 weeks of moderate symptoms, then completely normal. However, 5 months later the onset of what I now know was protracted withdrawal began and I went into a full spiral (I’ll spare you all the symptoms, but the worst was the akathisia). To treat the collapse, the doctor prescribed 1 mg klonopin, 100mg trazadone, and reinstated 20 mg (!!) Lexapro. At 60 years old I wound up in the ER thinking I was having a stroke.

I'm so sorry this happened to you. As I'm sure you know, this kind of story is much too common. I came off 60 mg duloxetine in June 2025, and about 8 months later ended up reinstated on 90 mg. Absolutely wild.

2 hours ago, Saturn468 said:

Fortunately I realized I was overmedicated and was aware of benzo dependency (my own research) and so reduced the klonopin to .25mg within 10 weeks, then tapered off the rest over 8 months after crossing to diazepam. By the end of 2022 I was off both klonopin and trazadone and began unwinding my Lexapro. I have been tapering Lexapro since 2023, and am now at 2mg.

Congrats on getting off the extra meds so quickly. That can't have been an easy journey when you were so destabilized. As I'm sure you've seen, many folks need to wait a long time before tapering anything after a severely destabilizing event because any kind of tapering causes extreme symptoms.

2 hours ago, Saturn468 said:

I have been tapering Lexapro since 2023, and am now at 2mg.

In May ‘26, I crossed over to liquid and have been experiencing severe derealization and increased post dose reactivity. I had both of these symptoms while on the pills, but both have amped up significantly since the change. As of Aug ‘26, holding dose steady. Currently 3 months into the hold.

 Sorry to hear that you've had a hard time crossing over to the liquid. Sounds like a good hold is definitely the way to go. Usually we say to hold until symptoms are between a 1-3/10 in severity (10 being very severe) before tapering further. I hope things calm down for you soon.

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.

Hello @SarahMc , thank you for your thoughtful and kind response. It is both sobering and comforting to know that there are so many of us in a community none of us wants to be a part of.

In your thread, you asked if my handle on SA was the same. I believe it was just Saturn over there.

In terms of updating my signature for my Lexapro taper, I’ll take care of that over the next few days and will put the information in time blocks since there are too many individual steps to detail.

Regarding my klonopin and trazadone tapers while destabilized, yes they were not fun at all but I didn’t want to turn several months of use into years of use. Given the way receptor occupancy curves look for all of these medications, I took the view that there was no dose too small to have dependency and felt the clock was ticking each day I took them, especially the klonopin. It wasn’t pleasant but now I’m 4 years removed from those meds and happy I didn’t allow the dependence to get too entrenched. NB: I’m well aware that others aren’t as fortunate and have to taper more slowly, despite the increasing dependence after short term use, and I consider myself fortunate to have been able to handle it (albeit barely).

Regarding the liquid, given my history of a clearly kindled system, I’m not surprised I am having difficulty. It’s been 5 years of consecutive off-on-off, and 3.5 years of tapering punctuated only by two 10 month holds.

Regarding the suggestions you made, first of all thank you! I do not drink alcohol, take any supplements, drink 1 decaffeinated coffee daily, walk regularly when I’m physically able to, and drink lots of bottled water. My one no-no is my sweet tooth, and I seem to have become addicted to chocolate chip cookies. I know that’s not a great choice, but at least I get some pleasure from eating them! Histamines are an interesting topic, since I’ve researched this and a lot of foods you wouldn’t think would be a problem have a lot of histamine. It’s very hard to navigate low histamine foods since even seemingly healthy choices (e.g. avocados, tuna fish, etc) are high in histamines.

Lastly, I’d love your thoughts, and the thoughts of other members, on the long hold. It’s very clear that I’m one of the unlucky folks that has both post dose reactivity (relatively severe for approx 6 hours) and withdrawal. I wonder if standard holding advice still applies in that situation ? Yes, I’ve thought of splitting the dose, but I’m trying to minimize as many changes as possible.

Thank you again for your warm welcome into the AR community.

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

In your thread, you asked if my handle on SA was the same. I believe it was just Saturn over there.

I did find a Saturn, but they were tapering Zoloft so I assume not the same person?

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

In terms of updating my signature for my Lexapro taper, I’ll take care of that over the next few days and will put the information in time blocks since there are too many individual steps to detail.

Sounds great -- appreciate it!

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

Regarding my klonopin and trazadone tapers while destabilized, yes they were not fun at all but I didn’t want to turn several months of use into years of use. Given the way receptor occupancy curves look for all of these medications, I took the view that there was no dose too small to have dependency and felt the clock was ticking each day I took them, especially the klonopin. It wasn’t pleasant but now I’m 4 years removed from those meds and happy I didn’t allow the dependence to get too entrenched. NB: I’m well aware that others aren’t as fortunate and have to taper more slowly, despite the increasing dependence after short term use, and I consider myself fortunate to have been able to handle it (albeit barely).

Fair enough! We all have to do what's right for us and I definitely understand wanting to get off the new meds quickly. I appreciate you being forthright about the fact that it certainly wasn't an easy experience.

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

Regarding the suggestions you made, first of all thank you! I do not drink alcohol, take any supplements, drink 1 decaffeinated coffee daily, walk regularly when I’m physically able to, and drink lots of bottled water. My one no-no is my sweet tooth, and I seem to have become addicted to chocolate chip cookies. I know that’s not a great choice, but at least I get some pleasure from eating them!

Sounds like you're doing what you can to keep yourself in good health during this process, that's great. I also don't drink at all, am pretty active, and eat a balanced whole foods diet for the most part, but I definitely enjoy odd baked good from time to time. My husband is a really good baker and I can't very well refuse his cooking! 😂

1 hour ago, Saturn468 said:

Lastly, I’d love your thoughts, and the thoughts of other members, on the long hold. It’s very clear that I’m one of the unlucky folks that has both post dose reactivity (relatively severe for approx 6 hours) and withdrawal. I wonder if standard holding advice still applies in that situation ? Yes, I’ve thought of splitting the dose, but I’m trying to minimize as many changes as possible.

That's an interesting question. I think I would still lean towards holding, just because I've seen others who seem to be reacting to their doses try to taper while unstable and get into even more trouble. Chris Paige, a good withdrawal coach, has a theory that a lot of paradoxical reactions are actually signs of an unstable nervous system and the solution, although it seems contradictory, is to hold. But I'm still pretty new to this community and I'm sure other more experienced members will have thoughts as well.

@SarahMc Thanks again for coming back to me. I didn’t know there was another Saturn on Zoloft! Let me reconfirm my handle, because thankfully I never took Zoloft (although interestingly my doctor wanted me to move from Lexapro to Zoloft and since she couldn’t explain the benefit to me in basic language I told her no).

When I ask the AI the same question, it tells me what Chris Paige says which is that dose intolerance is indicative of a hyper sensitive system and holding is better. I’m not paradoxical in that I have no anxiety or panic attacks after dosing, just feel like I’m being electrocuted for a few hours (aren’t these medications lovely?).

I’m really curious about others experience with crossing to liquid. My experience has been difficult but I know it’s not the norm.

I see from your profile you live in Nova Scotia—-I love Canada and that province looks beautiful. If you’ve got some spare chocolate chip cookies laying around, send them my way!

@SarahMc ok, clearly a senior moment, although I’ll just blame it on the medication. My handle on SA was not Saturn, it was TimeToGet Clean! Sorry for being a bonehead!

Welcome to the forum.

I’m really curious about others experience with crossing to liquid. My experience has been difficult but I know it’s not the norm.

This is something we've seen a number of others have difficulty with. Whether it can be called "the norm" or not I'm not sure, but it definitely is not uncommon to have significant difficulty with this.

14 hours ago, Saturn468 said:

When I ask the AI the same question, it tells me what Chris Paige says which is that dose intolerance is indicative of a hyper sensitive system and holding is better. I’m not paradoxical in that I have no anxiety or panic attacks after dosing, just feel like I’m being electrocuted for a few hours (aren’t these medications lovely?).

Thanks for clarifying the difference between dose intolerance and a paradoxical reaction! I don’t think I’ve seen that expressed so clearly before, and it’s a helpful distinction. Lucky for me the feeling of being electrocuted isn’t one of my many symptoms, I’m really sorry you’re experiencing that on a daily basis.

14 hours ago, Saturn468 said:

If you’ve got some spare chocolate chip cookies laying around, send them my way!

One day I’ll have to put together gift baskets of baked goods and mail them to forum members all over the world 😂

14 hours ago, Saturn468 said:

@SarahMc ok, clearly a senior moment, although I’ll just blame it on the medication. My handle on SA was not Saturn, it was TimeToGet Clean! Sorry for being a bonehead!

Haha, no problem — thanks for clarifying. When I’m at my computer later today I’ll add a link to your SA thread into your intro post.

4 hours ago, Luke said:

Welcome to the forum.

This is something we've seen a number of others have difficulty with. Whether it can be called "the norm" or not I'm not sure, but it definitely is not uncommon to have significant difficulty with this.

@Luke , thanks for weighing in and letting me know I’m not imagining this. I’ve heard it can take some time to stabilize on the new format. I’m three months into it, and still having problems although some symptoms do feel to be getting milder. I’ve heard this can take 6 months for some—is this accurate?

Welcome to the forum @Saturn468 another ex-SAer always extra welcome :)

We see that moving from a tablet to a liquid can often be upsetting, we suggest doing this is steps, a crossover taper if you will.

If this has mainly started when you changed types of drug, I think perhaps holding makes sense. Have you considered an appointment witjh Dr Horowitz and see if he agrees? We have a few members in a similar situation and for them tapering has not been a good move.

Good morning @Chippy , thanks for your welcome and crossover suggestion. I am at a relatively low dose of 2mg, and was having trouble cutting the pills with enough accuracy to do a gradual crossover, so opted for a full change. Unfortunately, it’s been 3 months and while some symptoms have settled, others have been appearing. I am scheduled to speak with Dr Horowitz next month, and will see what he suggests.

Thanks for your input!

5 minutes ago, Saturn468 said:

Good morning @Chippy , thanks for your welcome and crossover suggestion. I am at a relatively low dose of 2mg, and was having trouble cutting the pills with enough accuracy to do a gradual crossover, so opted for a full change. Unfortunately, it’s been 3 months and while some symptoms have settled, others have been appearing. I am scheduled to speak with Dr Horowitz next month, and will see what he suggests.

Thanks for your input!

Pleasure.

Yes I can appreciate that can be tricky when you get to a low dose.

It’s great you are speaking with Dr H. Let us know what he thinks won’t you.

@Chippy Absolutely, will do. My guess is he would have suggested the gradual crossover, but I’m not sure if I just keep white knuckling it at this point or partially revert back to pills.

2 minutes ago, Saturn468 said:

@Chippy Absolutely, will do. My guess is he would have suggested the gradual crossover, but I’m not sure if I just keep white knuckling it at this point or partially revert back to pills.

I agree it’s a tricky spot. You’ll stabilize at some point I’ve no doubt. I know it’s been 3 months however it can take some time on a long hold. Always very interested in what Mark has to say he’s a good guy. We’re here for you what ever you choose to do.

@Chippy Thanks so much for the support and encouragement.

I’ve spoken with Mark before and think he’s fantastic. Apart from being a great guy, his lived experience is invaluable in helping others. Also, I have extremely high admiration for a man who is willing to stand up to an establishment that doesn’t want to hear what he has to say. It takes a lot of guts to do what he’s doing.

Hey @Chippy , I can’t find your med history on your profile or in a signature. Can you point me to the right place?

10 minutes ago, Saturn468 said:

@Chippy Thanks so much for the support and encouragement.

I’ve spoken with Mark before and think he’s fantastic. Apart from being a great guy, his lived experience is invaluable in helping others. Also, I have extremely high admiration for a man who is willing to stand up to an establishment that doesn’t want to hear what he has to say. It takes a lot of guts to do what he’s doing.

100% agree!

4 minutes ago, Saturn468 said:

Hey @Chippy , I can’t find your med history on your profile or in a signature. Can you point me to the right place?

You can find more about my journey if you search for my personal thread.

Are you feeling any better @Saturn468 since your crossover?

Are you still holding?

Sounds like you have a great attitude. Glad you found the forum. 💯❤️🙏

Hi @LostinCanada , thanks for checking in.

I’m still clearly dealing with the after effects of the crossover. Some of the more violent symptoms have settled, but I haven’t felt the same since making the change. My most prominent remaining symptom is noticeably thickened derealization, which I had in a milder form before the crossover.

Thanks for your welcome, although I think it’s fair to say that most if not all of us wish we didn’t need to be here!

I hope you are feeling as well as could be expected, all things considered.

10 minutes ago, Saturn468 said:

thickened derealization

That is such a hard symptom. You have been such a trooper. I am glad some symptoms have settled. I have heard that a few never do well of the manufactured liquid primarily because of the preservatives. You may have a sensitivity to one or more of the ingredients. Can you find or do you have a list of the non medicinal ingredients?

Thank you LIC! Interesting point on the preservatives….I tried to get across to this same liquid when I was at 5mg and got unbearable nausea and went back to pills. At that time, I attributed it to the preservatives which given the higher volume made sense to me. Interestingly, at the materially lower dose I’ve had minimal to no nausea so I don’t believe it’s the preservatives this time. Given that my primary symptom is the DR (which I agree is quite a *******), I just think my body doesn’t like any change at this point and has dropped the DR visor to protect me. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know, but that’s what I choose to believe.

Sorry @LostinCanada , I forgot to properly tag you in my latest response.

On 8/19/2026 at 2:09 PM, Saturn468 said:

Good morning @Chippy , thanks for your welcome and crossover suggestion. I am at a relatively low dose of 2mg, and was having trouble cutting the pills with enough accuracy to do a gradual crossover, so opted for a full change. Unfortunately, it’s been 3 months and while some symptoms have settled, others have been appearing. I am scheduled to speak with Dr Horowitz next month, and will see what he suggests.

Thanks for your input!

Hello @Saturn468 , I hope you are as well as possible. Since we were talking about holding on my thread, I wanted to hop over and ask you how you are doing with yours?

Now you must be about 3 1/2 months into holding, and I was wondering whether you felt any positive effect? Also, I would be very interested what Dr. H said about this question. If you would like to let me know that would be very nice.

@Nemina Hello again!

Regarding my hold, I’m now 4+ months in and am noticeably more stable (that is a very low bar to clear however) so I consider it the right decision in hindsight to give my body the chance to accept the liquid with a long hold. Unfortunately, holding has done nothing to mitigate my morning dose reactivity which remains persistent and is a bit worse on the liquid than the pills. Regarding your question on Dr Horowitz, his advice is always very consistent—- hold until you reach a level of stability that allows you to continue lower safely. Hope this is helpful!