Hi,
I've been Taked 20 mg of Lexapro for months, and when the treatment is abruptly stopped (although I know that this is totally contraindicated), someone here knows how long can withdrawal syndrome last?
I guess it takes time for serotonin receptors to rebalance, but how long exactly ?
Speaking mainly from my own experience
(Also never was on Escitalopram, just Fluoxetine and Sertraline)
First week was awful, but plenty of ups and downs, my mood is very erratic at baseline so I believe this was transition from the numbness.
Brain Zaps, lasted up to month and got better over time, less intense and frequent.
I was normal ish by a month, but mostly fine after a week or so.
This was the withdrawal from Sertraline, I never did from Fluoxetine, as I swapped onto Sertraline.
For yourself, I’d take into account that apparently Escitaloprams half life is 27-32 hours.
Let’s go with 30, plus the blanket statement 4 half life’s is the drug fully clear.
5 days for it to be clear, 1 week for the worse of symptoms to get better, and another 3 weeks or more for receptor homeostasis.
My uneducated guess is 6 weeks, first 2 weeks to be bad and to slowly mellow.
The more you eat well, exercise, get sunlight, engage in activities meaningful to you, socialise, manage stress and treat sleep like it’s god, you are enabling your body its best chance at a faster and better recovery.
If absolutely needed, 5-10 grams of creatine, 200mg (elemental) magnesium l Threonate, and 200mg L Theanine, would help:
Creatine is a potent antidepressant, and gives your mitochondria a boost, important for the brain to recover, magnesium is needed for everything most people are deficient and I’ve personally found Threonate to be very calming, soothing and help me sleep and relax.
Theanine gives a little boost of serotonin and gaba far as I’m aware, I’ve skimmed some claims of also helping tolerance and for withdrawals but can’t state as a definitive but it has helped me when I’ve come off nicotine and opioids.
Take the creatine and magnesium daily, and use the l theanine only when absolutely needed.
It’s not addictive far as I’m aware but it stops working quickly when used chronically. Some people find it harder but this has been a small minority I’ve observed that claim it has a withdrawal. Due to the GABA and other monamine activity, I use it no more than 3 times a week.
