Effexor question

As far as 24/7 dizziness is concerned, mine is a bit unconventional. I started with episodic dizziness provoked by restaurants and 8 hours a day at a computer for work. Then there was one week after some of that happened where I was dizzy 24/7. Then it went back to episodic for approx. 4.5 years, until it became constant 24/7 dizziness, which I’ve now had for about 2.5 years. Like James said, it seems to be a spectrum of suffering.

@Jess09 you have a window of opportunity. Your brain will start getting the error signals when you wean off Xanax. See a VRT professional and get some exercises going for couple of months. you will feel horrible before starting to feel better. After a point you will do the exercises without problem.

@GetBetter I’ve already done VRT and they got me as good as they thought I could and suspected something else was going on and sent me back for more testing. Weaning off Xanax is a goal but not an immediate one, I’ve already tried and my health suffered greatly for it.

I’m wondering if we should change the title to this site to “The Migraine Associated Vertigo Community” given what I wrote above. It doesn’t have as much ring to it, but would technically capture the scope of the site more fully (yet even that doesn’t take into account our population of Secondary Hydrops sufferers explicitly)?

thank you. I went back to 37.5. this was my second attempt to increase but for some reason is not working for me. The plan was to increase effexor and reduce nortriptyline I 'll try again next month

@blueberry0
What i meant when i said 100% is not possible…I don’t know if it realistic to expect oneself to be 100% symptom free…there is going to be some minor blips and motion sensitivity even on the right meds. this is when you focus on triggers when you have a minor relapse. I have found weather to be a trigger recently.

This is interesting, I was on Nort for 4 weeks and my symptoms felt a good 70% worse for the first 3 weeks and 55% worse for the 4th then I gave up. Its like it had isolated and ramped up all my symptoms the entire time. Does this mean it actually could have worked eventually? when I told Dr S he said this was probably just a coincidence I was feeling worse and that couldnt happen, I remember feeling very disheartened at the time.

You should not feel worse for 4 weeks…Did you return to baseline on stopping Nort ? It could also be you were having a rough patch and the drug trial coincided like the doc mentioned.

drug startup effects should stop i would say within 10 days…there is no thumb rule, i am just approximately making this up.

I wonder if the start-up side effects are related to the half-life of the drug. I just found a great UK website that has a lot of information about antidepressant and benzodiazepene medications. Links to the site and pages are at the end of this post.

From the page about antidepressant half-life:

Why does my medication’s half-life matter?

A drug’s half-life matters because usually:

  • a short half-life = more withdrawal problems
  • a long half-life = fewer withdrawal problems

So if you’re taking a drug with a short half-life and having problems with withdrawal, it might be possible for you to switch to a related drug with a longer half-life, which could be easier to come off.

Drug name… Half-life
agomelatine: 1-2 hours
tranylcypromine: 2 hours
moclobenide: 2-4 hours
venlaxafine: 4-7 hours
trazodone: 5-13 hours
mianserin: 6-39 hours
duloxetine: 8-17 hours
amitriptyline: 9-25 hours
phenelzine: 1-12 hours
lofepramine: 12-24 hours
clomipramine: 12-36 hours
reboxetine: 13 hours
fluvoxamine: 17-22 hours
imipramine: 19 hours
mirtazapine: 20-40 hours
sertraline: 22-36 hours
trimipramine: 23 hours
paroxetine: 24 hours
escitalopram: 30 hours
doxeptin: 1.5-3.3 days
citalopram: 1.5 days
isocarboxazid: 1.5 days
nortriptyline: 1.5. days
dosulepin: 2 days
vortioxetine: 2.8 days
fluoxetine: 4-6 days

From the page about benzodiazepines:

Long-acting benzodiazepines have a long half-life. This means that the drugs are processed by your body more slowly and take longer to leave the body. You are more likely to experience a hangover effect but less likely to have withdrawal problems.

Generally speaking, short-acting benzodiazepines are used as sleeping pills and long-acting benzodiazepines are used for anxiety. However, this difference is not clear-cut – drugs for anxiety will help you sleep if you take them at night, and sleeping pills will calm you if you take them during the day.

Links for the above information:
Half-life:
https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/drugs-and-treatments/medication/explaining-the-half-life/#.WmiaLzdG1Kc
Half-life chart for antidepressant medication category:
https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/drugs-and-treatments/antidepressants/comparing-antidepressants/#half-life
Benzodiazepines:
http://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/drugs-and-treatments/sleeping-pills-and-minor-tranquillisers/comparing-benzodiazepines/?o=6817#.V6xM6BJHOy0

Doctor S said the same thing to me. I do believe that symptoms can get worst with meds

i did get back after id stopped, but the main reason i knew it was the drugs was because as i have mentioned before, i always wake up in the morning almost symptom free, but for the period i was taking this drug i would feel bad when i woke up in the morning too

I dont understand what you mean by this, half life only applies once you’ve stopped taking the drug

I don’t know, it was just a thought. I took Prozac for many years and I remember that it took a long time (5 weeks) for the drug to build up enough in the bloodstream before I felt any effects (and that is normal for that drug). I saw on that chart that it has the longest half-life of any of the drugs on the list, so I wondered if there was a correlation between the two.