Off my medication

[ravencrow58]

Two days ago my psychiatrist took me off Eglonyl (sulpiride) that I was taking for my anxiety. Today I believe I experienced withdrawal symptoms, I felt extremely anxious, my body was reacting (numb hands, cold sweat, hyperventilation) and I was very scared going through many thoughts at once. I am going through a fight with my best friend which is definitely making my anxiety worse, but I was wondering if anyone had any experience with going off meds similar to mine and what to expect, or any advice. I cannot contant my doctor since it is the weekend and in my country there aren't any helplines available, and calling emergency services makes me a bit anxious because I dont know if my problem is even worth that or something they can help with. Thank you in advance.

[Sugaree]

sorry to hear how badly you are feeling. I’m not familiar with that medication. Did you stop it all at once? It sounds similar to withdrawal I have experienced. Check online about the med and see if it says to wean off slowly. Maybe you can call your primary care doctor, mine calls back if I leave urgent message, like blood pressure spiking. Any serious issues you can go to emergency room.

[Starrlight]

Hi! You could always try tapering off of it if you’d be more comfortable with that. Seems better than suddenly stopping all together.

[CLB1125]

it’s advisable to always slowly taper off any mental health drug. I was told this by my doctor.

[ravencrow58]

Thank you everyone for advice. I was on the lowest possible dosage of the medicine so maybe that is why my psychiatrist decided to go "cold turkey".

[LearningPiano in reply to ravencrow58]

Can you halve or even quarter the pill? Sometimes the "lowest dose" hits different.

[LearningPiano in reply to LearningPiano]

And if so, I would try taking half (or 3/4) of what you normally do for a week or 2, then reduce by a quarter or half (whichever's feasible). I am not a doctor so definitely check with them.

[scansnap]

It does sound like you were having a lot of side effects to the withdrawal of your medication. This is something you need to discuss with your doctor. Some medications can be stopped completely and some medications need to be tapered off. If you cannot reach your doctor and he or she does not have a backup covering things for the weekend, you might want to call a support hotline. If there is only an emergency hotline to call, you might want to call them and explain that this is not an acute emergency, but you need some sort of support somewhere.

Otherwise, I would engage in meditation, deep, breathing, mindfulness, or anything else that will help you to get through this.

I don’t know which country you live in, but it sounds like they need to upgrade their mental health support system.

[ravencrow58 in reply to scansnap]

They really do need to upgrade yeah.. Thank you, I appreciate the advice and help.