Weaning off a drug

[Tim W.]

3 weeks ago I was feeling 75% better with my anxiety and PTSD. Than 2 weeks ago my doctor had me wean of a drug that I have been taking for 3 1/2 years and recently found out it was a controlled substance.

As I went from 2 to 1/day I had a meltdown and was immediately put on 2/day. Yet a week later I am not back to 75% which I only enjoyed for one week.

Has anyone else experienced something like this?

 

[Neverthesame]

Sounds like the taper down is too aggressive. Is your doctor planning to try again with a more gradual dosage?

The not feeling 75% again, could be you're still just shaken up from the meltdown.
Or, depending on the medication and how long you were taking only half the usual dose. It might need to build up in your system again before you regain it's full benefit.

 

[EveHarrington]

I’m guessing you’re tapering off a benzo?

I think the maximum safe/comfortable taper is 10-20% every few weeks.

Cut dose.

Stabilize as you withdraw.

Get comfortable on new dose.

Cut dose again.

Coming off meds can be a prolonged process. And if it’s a benzo? Depending on your dose and your body, it can take upwards of a year to safely taper and be rid of all withdrawal effects.

 

[Tim W.]

Sounds like the taper down is too aggressive. Is your doctor planning to try again with a more gra...

Thanks for the input. We are going to try again but wait for me to be back at 75% or better for 4 weeks or so.

I’m guessing you’re tapering off a benzo?

I think the maximum safe/comfortable taper is 10-2...

thanks for your advise - its actually belviq which is for losing weight - I had no idea it was a controlled substance.

 

[Friday]

It was classed as a schedule IV drug in 2012, so very recently (as these things go), because it’s a hallucinogen at high doses. Whether or not it’s habit forming is still to be seen. Most likely, yes, in the same sense that antidepressants that have to be weaned off, are. Rather than in the sense that opiates or benzos are. They’re both physically addictive, just in different ways. The schedule IV isn’t for the addiction & abuse potential, but for the hallucination party factor. It’s also worth noting that as far as controlled substances go? Schedule IV is pretty benign. Street drugs are Schedule I, most painkillers are Schedule II.

It’s also a serotonin agonist so it reeeeeally doesn’t play well with most other psychiatric drugs... as well as a few others (like cold medicine & nutritional supplements). So if your doctor is looking at possibly having you trial any other psych med? First step will be to taper you off this one, completely.


ETA... Forgot to list sources on that, for you... Because I’m just a chick on the internet.

https://www.drugs.com/pro/belviq.html
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3828930/
Dead Link Removed
https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/fed_regs/rules/2013/fr0508.htm
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidk...esity-drug-have-abuse-potential/#3afcccdd2fea

 

[Tim W.]

wow thank you for that information.

 

[joeylittle]

So if your doctor is looking at possibly having you trial any other psych med? First step will be to taper you off this one, completely.

@Tim W. - I just wanted to add a thing to friday's post. Since Belviq is relatively new, most data sets have not developed beyond testing how the drug affects people after being used regularly for a year or less. You've been on it 3.5 years, and that (unfortunately) means that you're in the no-mans land of, no-one knows how the drug behaves.

It does have psychiatric effects, as friday pointed out. They are not well-understood. It's very possible that you will need to weather a discontinuation period, in order to just get off of the stuff. Talk with your doctor about what your best options are for getting off the belviq, how to schedule that into your life, what drugs you might be able to use to mitigate some of the discontinuation symptoms, and how to give yourself the best shot at keeping track of all of that, so that you can get yourself back to the 75% better that you have been able to be.

Some drugs are odd in a particular side effect: you cannot come off of them and then use them again. They will have a tendency to not work. I only know a very little about this, and certainly there's no-one who could say with certainty that belviq is one of those. It sounds like your experience, though, might be indicating this. If you find that you don't come back up to your previous steady state in another week or so, after giving your dose the bump back up, that could be the reason why. In other words, it's possible.

I'm so sorry. This kind of stuff is just so hard, annoying, frustrating....all those kinds of words. Shitty, really.

 

[Tim W.]

Thank you for your input. I went to a diet specialist who prescribes belviq all the time and her advise is wait 4 weeks of feeling 75% or better which is what I felt to do, than for two weeks do 2/pill day one and 2, one pill on day three and than the same thing for two weeks, on week 3 it would be 2/1/1 for the next two weeks. I was in a cardiac diet study for belviq and its just now wrapping up - that's the only reason I was on it for so long. Yesterday and today I'm just starting to feel better, thank goodness.