Sertraline?

[leavingthesoultrap]

After lexapro and wellbutrin failure I am thinking about giving sertraline a try.
Would you recommend it?

 

[AnxietyHangover]

I'm interested as well, escitalopram worked for exactly 2 months for me. Venlafaxine stopped working long ago and I'm already on a pretty high dose (300mg). I want to taper off because it sedates me very hard as well. I would try sertraline as my third and final medication, and I would like to know if it's sedating if anyone can share with us.

 

[unnecessary]

It varies from person to person, I took it for almost a year and it gave me anxiety at the beginning, it reduced my depression a little, it helped me sleep a little.

 

[toro]

i took sertraline for a while (i stopped taking my meds lol)! my mum is on it too, and 2 of my bestfriends, so ill list how it affected us (we are all women and some of us take other medications alongside sertraline + birth control so all may not actually be at fault of sertraline!!)

• ZOMBIE. all of us agree that we just feel numb when we're on sertraline, there's no tears, there's no anxiety, there's nothing really, you just sit there empty headed, its really hard to get excited about anything at all - this can be good! it totally cuts out the mood swings, horrible panic attacks, and made a noticeable difference in how depressed we all felt, but it also murders your sex drive, gives you very vivid dreams (often nightmares in my experience), and you just stop enjoying things, because it numbs out all of your emotions, it numbs out ALL of them, including the positive ones.
• DOSING. literally all of us keep having our doses raised and raised by the doctors on some random measure, you start at 50mg, but suddenly they're increasing it, and they just keep increasing it!!!!
• CREATIVITY. it honestly killed any creativity I had, maybe that's just because I'm usually very emotion driven, but where normally i could entertain myself with imagining shit in my mind, being on sertraline i was constantly zoned into the real world without feeling like i could really escape at all, might be a plus for you if you prefer that, but I'm way happier in my pretend world where everything good lol
• SYMPATHY. this kinda ties into the zombie one, i felt almost no sympathy at all while i was still taking my medication, my closest friends and family could cry in front of me and i wouldn't feel anything at all, which is insane because I'm normally a massive crybaby, i just didn't care that much. it lead to me going through some darker phases because i knew that while MORALLY something was wrong, my empathy wasn't going off, so it cant be that bad.

again, this is just my (and friends) experience! multiple things factor into how a medication affects you, age, sex, environment, other medications you take alongside it etc, if you think sertraline could help you then go for it!

 

[ForgottenAgain]

I was on 200mg Sertraline, I can attest to what @toro said. I mostly felt numb, like a zombie, I still cried though and felt sad and empty, apart from that I felt just meh. I am a 29yo female, for reference.
It is hard to get into Sertraline and to stop, the side effects were annoying (dizziness, body falling when getting out of bed suddenly, nausea, depression when getting off it).

I'm not sure whether it helped me or not, I wish the psychiatrist had told me what I was supposed to feel so I could attest to the efficacy of the med.

 

[halleyscomet]

I am currently on sertraline 50mg daily. I have had quite a positive experience with it.
The only side effects I've had is difficulty focusing and light sensitivity the first few weeks of taking it. It has improved my energy and has lessened my anxiety. Doesn't solve anything but it does help.

 

[bearbrikk]

anyone have a experience coming off of it?

 

[Meteora]

I think it is supposed to be a very goid medication. It can even lower flashbacks. For me, it did not work unfortunately. I get restless and uncomfortably driven under SSRI's.

anyone have a experience coming off of it?

I changed to Venlafaxine. Did it slowly, was not pleasant but the side-effects disappear after two to three weeks.

CREATIVITY. it honestly killed any creativity I had

I have that with every anti-depressant. It s annoying.