Pros and Cons Of The Antidepressant Cymbalta — And The Unpleasant Withdrawal Symptoms While Slowly Tapering Off

October 14, 2021October 17, 2021 by Banananxiety

I Was ANTI Antidepressant For a Long Time

To provide a little background info, I started taking Duloxetine, aka Cymbalta at the beginning of 2019. I had tried 2 other antidepressants many years prior, but they made me feel worse than ever! Those were SSRIs. I then swore off antidepressants. But after struggling with depression constantly and for so long (since I was 14 [I am now 35]) I figured it was worth a try. My psychiatrist suggested Cymbalta because it helps people with chronic pain, depression, gives people energy, and helps with anxiety. This sounded like a wonder drug, even though I was skeptical.

My Reluctance To Start, And Negative Side Effects

I went home and did my research, I was scared about all of the bad reviews I read, but I also found some good ones. I had the prescription for about a month before I decided to try it. When I first started taking it, it made me very sick. It gave me bad headaches and sometimes I’d throw up. But I knew these side effects would eventually subside. I eventually started feeling better and no longer had the unfavorable side effects. Then I started feeling like I had energy, that was new! Oh, I also stopped drinking alcohol at that time. I had been lessening my drinking for a couple years up to that point and the Cymbalta made me more sensitive to alcohol than I already was.

So I suddenly became sober and then, I discovered pour painting! This is a style of painting that made me extremely happy to start doing. This actually began my painting career. I wonder if the Cymbalta made me able to feel more happiness while doing an activity that I loved than I would have when I wasn’t on Cymbalta. I had always wanted to be an artist, and I was as a kid, but then adulthood happened and I was too stressed about bills and work and college that I wasn’t painting for a really long time.

Life Changing Benefits From Cymbalta

Basically, Cymbalta helped me a lot. As I found something I absolutely loved to do it kept me from wanting to go to bars anymore as I had something I actually loved that I could be doing instead. It also caused me to lose weight which was a nice bonus. I also started intermittent fasting at right about the same time. And then 8 months after I started it, I got my dog, Luna who is the best part of my life. I believe that not drinking helped me save up extra money so that it was easy to afford and take care of my dog.

I didn’t get much pain relief from Cymbalta because my body wouldn’t tolerate any higher amounts than 20mg. That is the lowest possible dose and is too low to help with pain reduction. When I tried increasing the dose, it made me so sick and have headaches every day. I went back down to 20mg and that seemed to be my sweet spot.

Tangent About Discovering Art

I don’t need to get into the details of how immensely art has helped my life as a whole, but when you find something you love to do that much, AND people pay you money to do it….it puts things into perspective. I no longer wanted to invest my time and energy into jobs that I was bored by or not fully into. All I wanted to do was art, all I wanted to talk about was art. And then all these doors for job opportunities opened up that were art related and I knew that was the universe telling me I was on the right path.

Before that as I had spent soooooo mannnyyyy yeaaarrrrssss applying to all of the jobs and getting interviews and getting rejection almost every time, I definitely wondered what was wrong with me.

But I now know that I was trying to get those “fancy jobs” as a way to prove my worth. Whatever my job title was and how important I was, that’s how I measured my sense of self. Now I no longer seek these things from a place of ego. I don’t worry about what others may think of what I am doing with my life. I look inward and remain as aligned with that as possible.

Back to talking about medication!

Starting To Wean

About 2 months ago I started the weaning-off process of Cymbalta. Since getting off this med is very hard to do, I am counting the beads. This medication is so hard to get off of, that this past spring I missed one dose of it and I was sick for 2 days! The first day it was an insane headache and I threw up and was incopacitated all day. The next day (after taking the med again as normal the previous night) I still felt messed up! It felt like the 2 hemispheres of my brain had swapped sides and I couldn’t think or function correctly. It made me think that’s what people addicted to hard drugs must feel like when withdrawing, except I’m sure it’s worse.

Counting Beads

I’ve been told this is a good way to wean off Cymbalta and I’ve read about it, and confirmed it with my psychiatrist. In a 20 mg capsule there are 100 beads. I started taking out 3 beads every day for 7 days. That went well, then I started taking out the beads in increments of 5 every 10 days. I am now up to taking out 35 beads every 10 days. It has gone pretty well.

I have been getting more headaches and I would guess it’s from this medication reduction. Otherwise I’ve been feeling happier than I was prior to reducing this med. 4 months ago I started taking Wellbutrin, which is an antidepressant, and I think Cymbalta wasn’t working anymore and maybe my body was overloaded with these drugs so that getting off of one of them is helping me to naturally feel happiness feelings again ? (I’m not sure if that’s accurate, that’s just a guess of what might be happening with my biochemistry).

I’ve definitely been in a bad mood sometimes and I think that is caused or exacerbated by reducing the Cymbalta. I also sometimes am extremely tired, but I kind of was already (shrug emoji)

Self-Care To Help With Withdrawal

I think it helps that I’m on the lowest dose possible, and that I’m doing it very gradually. I’m making sure to focus on self care, and nutrition, and getting the best sleep possible. I’ve been a little nervous about the Fall season starting. I get winter depression, and fall makes me worry about that. To combat this, I am being very proactive and already started using a Verilux Happy Light to help with the already shortening days of sun. I made a promise to myself to make monthly goals, of doing social things, and outdoor activities even in the winter. Getting out and socializing helps a lot to get me out of the winter funk.

Getting off Cymbalta is happening slowly, but surely. I am in no hurry to get off of this, as I know some people do it much quicker than I. I will continue to post updates about this adventure as I go along!