# Quitting Celexa cold turkey



## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

Due to reasons I won't go into here, my script ran out yesterday and can't get it filled til at least tomorrow afternoon. I've been wanting to get off the celexa anyway (I think it's interacting badly with my adderall and feels like a sugar pill)... I think I'm just gonna tough it out and not fill it.

Now, I know a lot of you are smart with knowing how medicine works, do you think if I take adderall it will help ease some withdrawal symptoms I may have (due to it somewhat having at effect on serotonin). I was taking 30mg of the celexa. I heard the w/d from this isn't as bad as say, Paxil. Any experiences would be great.


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## bazinga (Jun 9, 2010)

How long have you been taking celexa? I wouldn't recommend going cold turkey especially if you've been taking celexa for a while. I would expect flu like symptoms, stomach aches, fatigue, depression, etc.


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## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

Also, I think I may have had a mild case of serotonin syndrome yesterday while taking the adderall with the celexa. I'll try to explain it here...

I ate Christmas dinner around 1:30pm (I had taken the adderall/celexa around 2 hours prior), and was feeling fine until a little after I was done eating. I got nauseus all of a sudden, and my head felt weird and tingly. My muscles would twitch sometimes, and one time I had trouble moving my fingers. My heart felt weird also. xanax helped me a lot, but this didn't happen before while taking adderall and celexa... well not to that extreme. I feel like also the celexa kind of "blunts" the adderall, like I'll come up nice, but it won't last long. I do get anxiety sometimes from the adderall though too.


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## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

I've been taking celexa since july I think.

When should withdrawal start? I haven't taken it since yesterday morning... I still feel okay now (5:23pm the day after).


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## wxolue (Nov 26, 2008)

im pretty sure its just a bad idea to stop an ssri cold turkey.


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## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

well no matter how bad the w/d gets, it can't be as bad as the benzo withdrawal I've gone through before (and that was hell... got off it by myself, stuck it out and was okay).

If I can get through that, I should be able to get through this.


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## gilt (Jan 7, 2010)

My own personal experience: I went cold turkey on 20mg Celexa about 2 years ago (although I'm back on it now after over a year away). I noticed no side effects at the time.


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## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

gilt said:


> My own personal experience: I went cold turkey on 20mg Celexa about 2 years ago (although I'm back on it now after over a year away). I noticed no side effects at the time.


awesome. yeah i've heard it's one of the easier ssri's to withdraw from.


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## UltraShy (Nov 8, 2003)

wxolue said:


> im pretty sure its just a bad idea to stop an ssri cold turkey.


I wouldn't recommend it due to potential withdrawal, but I know it's possible to stop an SSRI cold turkey without adverse effect.

I did it with Zoloft. I really beat that dead horse, pushing it to 300 mg, to prove it absolutely positively does not work for me. Over a week I dropped from 300 to 100 mg and then simply stopped. I was a man on a mission. I was determined to prove it does nothing (other than killing libido) that I wanted to see if I could even manage to get any withdrawal effects from it. I got none. As uneventful as could be.

I knew the potential for feeling like hell from withdrawl existed, but I was determined to prove my point and I won.


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## rockyraccoon (Dec 13, 2010)

I was on Celexa @ 80 mg for about 3 months. I stopped cold turkey and did not experience any withdrawal symptoms. I guess there was nothing to withdrawal from since it didn't do anything for me. I didn't even get any side effects from the medication. Although I wouldn't advise this, for me if a medication isn't working, I always just stop abruptly and go cold turkey. But that's just me.


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## behindblueeyes (Apr 11, 2010)

my 2nd day off Celexa... definitely starting to feel the withdrawals a bit... esp. the vertigo type feeling and I barely slept last night. suckssssss.

might try an adderall in a day or two to see if it helps. a lil experiment of sorts.


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## Emanresu (Jun 2, 2010)

It has a pretty short half-life(35 hours) so out of your system completely in 7-9 days. So if you just find a way to rough it out for a week you should be free and clear.


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## PoKkaDee (Mar 30, 2011)

*I wouldn't do that*

Hi there Behind. Just from my personal experience, I wouldn't just discontinue your prescription. If you want to stop taking it, I would refill the prescription and dose yourself down slowly.. maybe 5 mg at a time.

I recently had a similar experience, although mine was due to dr negligence, and unreliability and insurance conflict, anyway, I ran out for almost 2 weeks. The first 4 days or so, were just wierd.. I felt numb, kinda out of touch with everyone and everything around me, tired, irritable, kinda nasty and snapping @ people for no reason. Day 5 was when the fun started. I woke up with terrible stomach pain that got gradually worse through-out the day. I couldn't eat, I wasn't thirsty (which is very odd for me, as I find it necessary to always have something to drink with me.) My body felt like I was run over by a mack truck, twice. Then the nausea began, SERIOUS nausea.. My mouth was running constantly. Then I began to vomit, only except I couldn't eat anything.. So that was fun..
By day 6, after throwing up all night.. Feeling like I had a bad case of the stomach flu or food poisoning.. I crawled out to the couch and laid there all day long with my bucket beside me.
Day 7-Terribly hungry and attempted to eat.. Didn't go well at all!.. Instant, violent vomiting. Body pain, muscle pain everywhere.
Day 8-In desperation, I went to another dr who refilled my prescrition of celexa and within 2 hours of taking it, I was almost back to normal.

This may not be what happands to everyone.. But it happaned to me. So if your going to stop taking it, I would really think about talking to your dr about tapering off, or dosing yourself down in small increments.

Good Luck!


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## etrain (May 23, 2012)

*Quitting Citalopram Cold Turkey*

I am new at this. But my script also ran out and I did not stay on top of it and suddenly the weekend came. I am going on 5 days without citalopram 40mg and so far I feel okay. My symptoms are sudden dizziness and tingling down my forearms. I feel that my memory is getting worse. I have been using citalopram for over a year now. My doctor thought it would be a good idea to try it since I was always angry. I thought it was just putting up with my wife. But I was showing signs of Post Trematic Stress. It worked great. About 6 months ago, I found out that I have severe sleep apnea. I new I had it for years. Possibly as a teenager. I am now on a VPAP. It is helping. This might be why I am not having suicidal thoughts. I hope. It's scary and way too early to tell if this was an okay decision to make. I know I should have weaned down, and I didn't. I, like many of you, have lost friends over the years because of mental illness or switching meds or just stopping them. It's pretty scary but so far so good I guess....


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## kct29 (May 22, 2012)

I took Celexa for 5 months and went cold turkey. It gave me a foggy feeling.
The only bad symptom for me was an extreme worsening of my depression for a week or so. It depends on how many mg you are taking. Opiate withdrawal is much worse, in my opinion. Hope everything works out!


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## mrpositivity (Aug 12, 2011)

Everyone is different but celexa was the worst withdrawal ever for me.Vertigo like crazy, wooshy head feeling, and the worst was having every feeling at once. I felt like I was loosing my mind. Zoloft, paxil, and lexepro I was fine. Which is weird because lexepro is very much like celexa. Def taper off of it. That **** took like a month for me to get over.


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