Advice for switching medication?

[10x10]

Hi everyone,

I just realised there is actually a medication forum! I posted this in the general discussion, oops! This is probably more suitable :)

I am after a bit of advice, and I was wondering if anyone could help me? Over the next few weeks, I am going to be changing medication (from Paxil to Prozac) and I was wondering if anyone has done the same before.

So my back story: After being on the drug Paxil for 2.5 years, I want to try and get off the drug altogether. I have already been to my psychiatrist to work out a plan for tapering off Paxil. However, when I tried to do this before, I tried dropping 2.5mgs every 3-4 weeks, starting at 20mgs. Everything went fine until I hit about 7.5-5mgs, then it all just went haywire. I was horribly depressed, very disoriented, having the 'zaps', felt very dissociated and unable to concentrate and my vision was blurry. So I quickly went back up to 12.5mgs and have stayed there ever since. However, I feel as if Paxil isn't really working for me anymore. I feel anxious quite a lot and experience a lot of 'brain fogginess'.

Since I was so terrified of experiencing the withdrawals I had experienced before, my psychiatrist has prescribed me Prozac to start taking, to get me off Paxil, and then we will work at getting me off Prozac. But... I am terrified of doing this. And I know a lot of it is my anxiety speaking, but I would really like to get some advice (if anyone has done this before), what they did to change drugs.

My psychiatrist has advised me to just start taking 20mgs of Prozac and ween myself off Paxil 2.5mgs every couple of days. But I'm concerned. What will this interaction of 20mgs Prozac + 12.5mgs of Paxil do? How long does it take Prozac to kick in if you are already on an SSRI? Should I take 20mgs of Prozac + 12.5mgs of Paxil for a week and then start weening off Paxil?

I know at the end of the day I should just follow the advice of my psychiatrist, but I guess my concern is my psychiatrist has never weened themselves off Paxil before, and I would like to hear the thoughts of someone who has.

I went onto another forum that specialises in Paxil for this advice, but no one really helped me, and I actually felt as if I was getting attacked since I was changing drugs and not attempting to be "SSRI" free. I do feel like it is my choice to be on medication, so I hope that whoever is reading this will respect that. The switching of medications is majorly to help mask the horrible Paxil withdrawal effects, which I really don't want to experience again.

I would really appreciate any advice, and would love to hear from you :)

[alankay]

I have made the change from prozac(after 18 years) to zoloft and it was fine. I did gets some little zaps(no biggie) and they went away in a few days. Keep on the prozac and ask your doc for the OK to add 5mg of prozac for every 5mgs of paxil drop. You can do that via 10mg samples tabs split in half or your doc can rx you some 10mg tabs as they are cheap.
Paxil has a very short half life and is why the difficulty stopping it. Prozac has the longest(several days) so is easy to spot and start. Know this, the discontinuation syndrome will stop in days and taking the prozac should help that. Your system will adjust.
If needed(if it gets bad) ask about a rx of a long acting benzo like valium or clorazepate(tranxene) for a week or so to ease the anxiousness from tapering off the paxil. In time you'll make the transition.
You can also split the paxil dose, 1/2 in the AM, 1/2 in the PM to help keep the blood levels at a more steady state as you add prozac. Ask your doc about these "strategies".
PM me any time. Alankay

[10x10]

Thanks Alankay!

I really like the idea of splitting the medication in the AM and PM. That is a good idea. I now know of Paxil's short life, so that sounds like a good idea.

Thanks for your advice :)

[ova'it]

Omg that was me. I took a long time to get of paxil was a horrible time. Took me 18mths with a very slow decrease. I stayed of them for one yr then when my dad died and i moved from nz to oz my anxiety came back. In desperated need if help i went back on paxil and after one yr i told my dr how aweful it was first time around. She swapped me straight onti celapram. I had no side effects at all. Am starting to decrease niw of celapram and am doing much better getting of this drug than paxil. Good luck

[andrewWwinters]

If the medication that you plan on switching to really is a miracle, then great. Although, if the one you're currently taking isn't working, like what's happening to me right now, just get off it.