My Last Dose of Lexapro!

I finally made it! I finally took my last dose May 22, 2012! I wanted to wait a bit to see what if anything was going to happen.

Some people report probelms after the last dose and even months later be hit with a "Phase II" type thing. I really do not fear that at all ebcause I tapered so slow, see that is the key, not to get off of it as fast as possible because all you will have is WD hell for a longer period of time. The key is slower is better and if that is too much then ubber slower! Micro tapering is actually being tested with people trying to do it a different way. With interesting results and quite possibly better than the 10 percent method especially for people who have trouble with 10 percent or even 5 percent drops in their tapering.

So the mg I jumped off of was .8mg the weight of the Lexapro powder was .010.  Coming from 40mg, that is twice the recomeded dose for the last 7 years! This was a very difficult thing to do. I will recap what I did.

My History of Taper with Lexapro.

My first attempt was a 10mg drop every 3 months. Until I got to 5mg which I broke the half of the pill in half. I crashed with horrible results. Mind numbing dizziness, double vision, headaches from hell, nausea and was scared. I ended up having a brain seizure (I do have epilepsy).

I was so scared I went right back on Lexapro to 30mg and let myself stabilize. I decided to try again 6 months later and  my family suggested 6 months between drops. They thought that maybe it would be easier on me.

So then I did 10mg drops every 6 months until I got to 10mg, this is when I came across a website about drugs and ran into someone who suggested paxilprogress,org. So I checked it out and spent hours there, reading threads about Antidepressants in general and also searching and finding Lexapro threads.

So I decided to do the 10 percent method with the last 10mg of Lexapro. I ordered a Jeweler's scale from amazon (about 25.00) and gelcaps (I used to put the right dosage weight in the gelcap instead of shaving pills).

I downloaded the Excel spreadsheet at paxilprogress.org. I weighted one pill and put the weight in the column. The sheet then does an auto 10percent reduction down the graph. You then know every 3 - 4 weeks to weight out the next weight listed. This is what I did for the last 10mg of Lexapro.

Withdrawal symptoms I found to be less painful then the big 10mg drops and I was able to function everyday. When I did the big drops, the physical pain was ongoing and made me miserable. I had a hard time walking, I could not walk or stand on any uneven surfaces and stairs were very challenging. Before my tapering attempts I never had any pain in my legs or muscles. It was truly horrible. I also had waves of depression with anxiety with the big drops.

The 10 percent drops I had symptoms, but nothing near the previous symptoms.

By the time I had gotten down to 3mgs most of my withdrawal symptoms are very minor. I would have one day of very bearable muscle pain which sometimes included a irritating headache.

So I decided to jump off at .8mg and I felt like it was a normal drop, some muscle pain and a slight headache and that was it as far as to this moment.

About a month and a half ago, while I was still tapering, my Doctor told me I had high blood pressure and prescribed a water pill-potassium pill. I had no side effects until after I took my last Lexapro. Then I felt horrible (some how I knew it was BP pill related because it in no way felt anything like withdrawal or similar to any thing I have felt in the last 3 years)

I called my doctor and he said to stop the BP pill. So I did and it has been about 3 days and I am feeling almost back to normal ... Gee what is normal? I have to monitor my BP for a few weeks and then we are going to revisit this topic, I go in if it jumps up however. So far it has been close to normal.  If the Lexapro or the withdrawal caused theHigh BP I would be happy, because then I won't have to take medication. The doctor seems surprised. We will see.

Okay so I am very happy to finally being off this drug! To me it feels like Christmas Eve! The day after my last pill I had gotten a beautiful floral arrangement form my significant other!  It has been 16 days since I took my last dose of Lexapro and I am just beaming. When I took my last dose I did have my normal withdrawal symptoms for day 3 which then vanished by Day for, since day 4 I have had zero feelings of anxiety and depression. I am not afraid of withdrawal anymore.

Today or actually yesterday now was a very liberating day for me. I got rid of all my Lexapro in my house. I have to have them safely disposed which will be sometimes today. So not a bit if it is in my house I do feel truly free and I do not know how to describe this with mere words. I feel like a huge weight is off my shoulders.

Now I have plans to address the damage Lexapro has left. The weight gain is the main one. I also am still taking online classes to get my brain back into shape. This coarse I am taking now is actually making sense to me know, I have taken 3 other classes that is supposed to lead me up to this one and I had a hard time keeping up having to read things over and over to comprehend them. This coarse now is harder yet I have not had to re-read materiel and am grasping it much better.

I am still exercising 6 days a week. With every other day added strength training (weights) I hope to finally see results. Although since my last dose I have lost 6 pounds.

I have purchased a new scale, food scale and a calorie book. and am looking at a few differing methods of slimming down. So far I am leaning towards calorie counting with nutrition quality of food being at the forefront. I took a close look at how I am eating now and I was happy to see that it was not really far off of what other professorial say it should be. Well more about that at a later date. I might just add a Weightloss Blog To blogger and have it linked here through my account.

I also have a Klonopin taper to do. That also might have it's own little blog so Benzo addicted people can run across it. So I will post here about Post-Lexapro things which will include some topics of Klonopin, blood pressure and weightless since it is kind of related.