Sertraline side effects- 2 weeks in on 25mg

[Josh1990]

I'm currently on day 14 of 25mg sertraline for anxiety. Still early days but side effects are? consistently causing some issues. Sleep is the biggest... simply cannot stay asleep and find myself waking up every night at 3am. Just feels like I'm in a really light sleep and cannot get longer than 4/5 hours a night. However, a slightly more concerning issue has started the past 24/48 hours. Ive got a strange sensation in my abdomen which is leading me to need to take a really big deep breath to relive it... not breathless as such, but feeling like I need to get a breathe from my stomach for it to be satisfied. Just wanted to know if anybody else has felt this before?

Spoken to my DR who didn't seem overly concerned- I don't have a fever or cough so its not Covid 19. Dr seemed to think it could be spike in anxiety and that the tablets will start to work in a few more weeks as I become more accustomed to it. Also advised me to up dosage to 50mg but will be staying on 25mg for 1 more week, which will be 3 weeks since I started then. Any help/support would be really welcome

[Amethyst27]

When i started on sertraline i was on 50mg first then upto 100mg. I has side effects of nausea, sleepiness and my anxiety went through the roof for about the first 3 weeks. Anxiety is a side effect when starting on sertraline but it does get better, mine did after a few weeks, i didn’t have any side effects when my dose was increased. The pain and needing to take a deep breath could be a physical symptom of anxiety. Hope it improves for you! Just have to bear with it unfortunately until your body is used to the medications x ❤️