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Anyone who has had discontinuation syndrome knows the experience of "brain zaps" - basically feels like an electric shock toy going off inside your head somewhere behind your eyes/sinuses. Is it anything like that?
Brain zaps are the worst thing ever. I had to go off of effexor because I'm bipolar and had my first manic episode while on it. I looked like a crazy person for a while. I mean, I am a crazy person, but you can't tell that up front lol.
For real. I'm on that stuff and if I am just a few hours late taking it I get the zaps. Slightest head movement and ⚡ zzzZZAP ⚡. Missing a day and I'm unable or unwilling to move.
It’s not head movement I think. I believe it’s eye movement triggered.
Given the predatory nature of our species, it's gonna be a tough call moving your head without having your eyes snap to various objects around.
Can't even begin to imagine.
Me too 😟
It's been great getting off it.
(Different drug but still SSRI)
I still get the zaps when I'm tired.
Took about a month for them to be less noticable.
It was Effexor for me too, I was forced off it cold turkey and had been exhibiting signs of serotonin syndrome. 10 years later I still haven't found anything that works long term to help keep the zaps away and they get debilitating sometimes.
Strange I also took effexor for a while, it was the worst drug I ever taken. I got brain zaps as a kid long before I ever took any antidepressants but eventually they stopped. I never knew they were associated with stopping antidepressants, I have never seen anyone describe them before other than this thread.
When I was taking effexor I would forget to take them and also eventually I just built up a tolerance to them, and when I didn't have the drug in my system I got this sort of lagging feeling. Like my whole body would feel like it was lagging behind me, moving my hands or head or whatever felt weird. I kept getting those symptoms even when taking effexor and I also developed worse symptoms like psychosis and an inability to sleep(like didn't sleep for over a week) so I eventually just stopped taking effexor cold turkey. I felt that lagging feeling for months after but it eventually went away. I refuse any psych meds now because of my experiences with effexor.
I went on a pretty hardcore low-carb diet once to combat some digestive issues, and it triggered brain fog and brain zaps in the first couple of weeks. Our body treats sugar like a drug, unsurprisingly.
I went off Effexor cold turkey (not by choice) in 2013 and this has been my life ever since. Sometimes it's so bad it makes my limbs tingle.
Same, but mine did eventually go away. I hope you find some relief.
Came here to say this. Like someone taking a tens unit to my gray matter.
WTF I had those brain zaps a lot as a kid, I have described this to many doctors before and no one has ever given me any sort of explanation. And now I just see some random lemmy comment precisely describe them. I didn't have them in association with discontinuing antidepressants just randomly got them as a kid.