CELEXA ( citalopram )
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I have suffered from depression since having a second baby age 21 my mother died when I was eight. I have had several severe depressions where I seriously tried to kill myself. I took 100 Paracetomol but drank it with milk so I survived.Since then I have been on antidepressants Anafranil Lithium. Venlafaxine which was fantastic it worked straight away. Took it for two years then it stopped working.I took prozac for while when that stopped working. I took Duloxetine 60gm for six months then that ceased to work. I have also spent time in mental hospitals I was sectioned. I do not know why these depressions occur I have no real problems. I use Ativan for anxiety first thing in the morning.I have recently started taking Celexa for a week I have taken 20gm then increased it to 40gm at night. I suffer sweats in the morning and cannot stop crying for no reason I take the ativan to counteract the crying but since I have started taking 40gm I feel really drugged. Should I go back to 20gm as I only gave it a week. I do not know what to do I can still walk my dogs and run my house. But I just want to be my normal self. I am so tired of being like this. Can anybody help. Should I take Celexa in the morning as I did the Venlafaxine?

my email is jonwat@ntlworld.com

There are good things and bad things about my experience with Celexa. I have severe panic disorder as well as a reumatological (joint) condition. I find that if I miss a dose of Celexa, I am a mess. Worse than I was before I started the med, which frustrates and scares me. While on it, I find that some days I feel better than others. It does increase my anxiety, but nothing else seems to work. It gives me hand tremors, muscle weakness, heart palpitations, and makes me very tired. Coming off of it is tough. It helps with racing thoughts and depression quite a bit.

i am female aged 63 and have been taking 60mg citalopram for 3 years. the results are that I am well again, to the extent that I never ever imagined I could get my old self back again. new GP says high dosage and long time, but lets not rock the boat, I agree with this and I am hoping after Xmas and New Year times are past, to start cutting down and stopping altogether. I have a good mindset, once I decide what I am going to do. I was ill with what I would describe as a pretty major nervous breakdown due to several horrendous happenings in my life and sufered from agorapgobia for more than 2 years. Since May this year 2007 I started getting out and about again and I feel well and blessed to be enjoying life, and looking forward to what's in store. Previously I had the same illness and was prescribed Seroxat but I dont want to go there to talk about that experience as it was dreadful.

When I took 20mg citalopram I found that my anxiety levels were raised so high that I could not sleep. I became a shivering and shaking wreck. I began to have hallucinations and paranoid delusions. At one point I could not move and became catatonic. My legs would not stop shaking. After three nights without sleep I became extremely paranoid and had to be sectioned. I was all right before I took citalopram just a bit depressed about my situation. I thought the doctor and his pills could help me. Boy was I wrong. Once in mental hospital nobody would listen to me when I said the citalopram gave me these awful side-effects and continued to drug me with various stronger psychoactive drugs until I was in a right mess taking four different drugs at once. Now it could be that I am a poor metaboliser of citalopram and other drugs. There is a test for cytochrome P-450 2-D 6 which is the liver enzyme that metabolisesis most psychotropic drugs. I think it would be useful if doctors started using this. Also I think doctors should use proper informed consent with their patients and warn them about these side-effects. If a person doesn't know that these drugs, I mean SSRIs, can make a person hallucinate then that person's anxiety is going to be so much worse by which time it is going to be too late for them to read the patient leaflet in the drug packet.