Trazodone withdrawal symptoms

Wow.  That was me above.  I really flew into a rage there, didn't I?  I still am anxious, shakey, irritable, weepy, and suffering from the migraine, but everything has improved about 50% with 75mg of nortriptyline.  Guess this is my solution for this week.  Next week I don't know what I'll do, because I'll be working and can't be falling asleep at work.  Nortriptyline puts me to sleep.  That's why I take it.  I just needed trazodone in addition while going through a divorce.  I still am needing answers if anyone is reading and willing to reply.  When do trazodone withdrawal symptoms peak? When do they abate?  What helps WITHOUT putting you to sleep?  Thank you in advance. 

I wish I could stop cold turkey like that.  I tried, but now one week later, the withdrawal symptoms are still getting worse each day, so I gave in: I just took 1/2 of my normal dose and feel better but not well.  I think my tablets are 100mg, so that would mean I took 50mg.  Maybe I'll go back to zero tomorrow if I can.  I'm trying to come off as quickly as I can without going to the hospital. 

I feel like a failure after giving in to 50mg of trazodone.  The irritability, shaking, migraine, and weeping are gone, but the anxiety is still here full force.  I can't take any more Benedryl for it, because my eyes are so dried out from Benedryl that they sting, and I can hardly open them.  This is unbelievably more difficult than I ever imagined.  If 25mg works for sleep, why was I prescribed 100mg as my initial dose?!? I'm angry at my doctor for putting me on this stuff, and angry at myself for taking it for seven months, even though I had no earthly idea how addictive the stuff is.  If I weren't afraid of being hospitalized for too rapid withdrawal, I would flush those pills right down the toilet.  This is hell.

tuppence- not two cents!

Guess I'm alone reading and posting here now.  Will try to find an active discussion forum after this post.  This would be my 7th day off Trazodone, but I gave in to 1/2 of my pill yesterday.  Last night was my first night without sleep, and oddly the only night in a week ON any trazodone.  Go figure.  Now I'm bedridden on Thanksgiving Day.  And brain dead too.  Trazodone zaps my energy, strength, and mental capacity to think clearly.  Can't work like this, and work starts in five days.  Sent my kids to their father's house for today and tomorrow, because I'm too sick to care for them.  I'm more functional OFF trazodone, but much more miserable too.  Today I'm a cool and calm zombie in bed.  I NEED a chill pill that doesn't make me sick like this to take in place of trazodone.  I'm losing hope that I'll ever get over the withdrawal.  It really, really would help if anyone would reply- even if you don't have answers.  I'll take mere moral support at this point.  Off to find a more active discussion thread now.  Will come back and post if and when the withdrawal ever subsides.  Good luck to all of you.

Ellen

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I would speak with your Doctor as your diagnosis could be wrong- often bipolar is diagnosed as depression and if that is the case often antidpressants have the opposite effect. Look online and take a bipolar quiz and take the results to your Doctor.

Thank you so much. It really helps that someone replied. You're an angel. You're right: I don't have depression; I have bipolar disorder. I'm just so embarrassed to admit it. Oddly enough, it was a psychiatrist who prescribed the trazodone, not for the bipolar though, but for sleep. If it's contraindicated for bipolar patients, why did she put me on it? I saw her yesterday, and after discussing how it makes me unable to function, she prescribed two 50mg tablets in place of each 100mg tablet so that I could taper off it slowly. Last night I took 75mg instead of 100mg (had gone back up due to unbearable withdrawal), but I STILL woke up shakey and with a migraine, so I took the other 25mg this morning. Now I have to drive to my new job (which starts tomorrow- yikes!) three hours away today when I'm falling asleep and so energy zapped that I can't even shower. I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to work either on the full dose or while tapering. Any suggestions? You're a very keen observer to have picked up the bipolar. Perhaps you know how to help with the withdrawal? Thank you either way. God bless...

Hello. I have been on Trazodone, Paxil, and Buspirone for years. I actually was up to 5 Trazodones, 100mg each at night as I have severe anxiety. I have been lowering it all year after a severe reaction last January, 2013, when a dr. in Urgentcare gave me a rx for congestion, etc. I asked if there could be a reaction with Trazodone, etc. and she said "NO". Well, after I took the pill, I felt like I was going into a drug world and started shaking all over and my balance was all off, couldn't even walk straight, and husband called 911 for ambulance. Went to ER and dr said I had severe reaction with drugs taken. After being there for 3 hours, I came home and looked online for Trazodone and what drugs react with it and sure enough, there it was in big bold letters- Trazodone and Clarithromyocin can react with each other. Since then I have lowered the Trazodone and have had severe horrid itching and stinging on my back which bothers me all the time...it is just tormenting. My dr. told me to just go off Trazodone..yeh, right, and go crazy..I'd like to know if anyone else has this horrid stinging as I am going nuts with it, just nuts. It is so hard to go off this horrid durg as you all know, but I don't sleep without it and, and don't want to start anything new as everything is so addictive. I have also lowered the Paxil and Buspirone.

My back does itch when I taper down the trazodone now that you mention it, but no,it doesn't sting. Right now the most horrible withdrawal effect (from just reducing the drug 25%) is a daily, constant migraine. I don'tknow if I'll EVER get off this drug! I've come off both Vicoden and Percocet after surgery, and neither was nearly as difficult as the trrazodone. The withdrawal migraine is unbearable. Lat night I took the full dose, as the migraine was making me want to die to escape the pain. Trazodone should never have become a legal drug.

Yes, I have wanted to die with this constant horrid stinging (and itching)on my back, too, but of course we know we can't die until the Good Lord says, huh! I am so sorry about those migraines. I tried going off my drugs(Paxil, Buspirone, and Trazodone) too fast at the beginning of this year and thought I was going crazy, felt so, so scared and "down" big time. I had no warnings when I started these damn drugs and am so, so sorry I ever went on them...but I belive the drs no NOTHING about these pills and just let the damn pharmaceutical guys talk them into giving them to patients..probably get paid big time for giving them to us. God help us both..I will pray for you as I do for myself to get some peace from all this torment.

Kathiemarie, sorry- just now saw your post. I'll pray for you too. I was soooo much better before I started on this trazodone, and you probably were too. So are you off your meds now, or back on?

Yes, I have experienced the same thing - getting up 3 or 4 times during the night to urinate. I stopped taking trazodone 3 nights ago. Also having night sweats. I was taking 50mg for about 6 months.

How are you feeling now Ellen?