Tell me about your experience with Effexor!

I'm on 75 mg too. No side effects that I can tell. Helps a lot with the hot flashes. I love that it evens out my moods. 

I am a new member although I have been reading the message board since I was diagnosed in Sept. 2013.  I want to post positive information but I feel I must write honest comments most importantly. 

I have taken Effexor (pre-BC) during two different periods and found it very effective in treating my depression.  However it is extremely difficult to go off of and you need to exercise extreme caution in this regard.  Even as another member posted, you can see negative effects if you miss a dose.  Please exercise extreme caution.

I've been using the 37.5 mg dose for two years. It's still controlling my hot flashes remarkably well.

SophiaMaria, no I really didn't. But I wasn't really having any problems at that time. I went through a brief period of depression right after completing chemo but I was over it before I started the effexor.

Hi ladies. Hope you don't mind me jumping in. I started effexor this week for some mild depression. I finished treatment last May and was doing fine up until a couple of months ago. I saw my MO this week and told her how I've been feeling that the shoe will drop and they'll find a mets somewhere. It wasn't consuming me just always lingering at the back of my head. She started me on 37.5 and the only thing I noticed is I would wake up in the middle of the night. I was taking it before bed in case it made me really sleepy. Last night I decided I'll try taking it in the morning and seeing how that works. I had no idea it helped with hot flashes since mine were only at night and not all that bad but now that I'm reading about your experiences I realize that they haven't been too bad! Thanks for letting me tell my story. 

Karen

so it looks like taking it in the morning works for me. Wasn't loopy and slept good. No waking up. 

Hi itsme203! Are you taking it at night or morning? I was taking it at night and was waking up so I switched to morning and am sleeping through the night now. 

Karen, have you found that it has made a difference with your mood?

Gemini my MO said it takes 2-3 weeks to kick in but if you ask my 13 year old she'll tell you that it's already working!

Argh!  Barely 24 hours since I took the first effexor pill, I now feel pretty horrible. I have a headache that has developed into one of my full-blown migraines, I feel dizzy, have a horrible taste in my mouth, and feel "spacey" mentally. I know it would seem this is too soon, but this is very similar to how I felt on Zoloft after one day. I guess I'm just very sensitive to these types of serotonin inhibitors. 

I realized after I took the pill last night that my MO recommended starting with half a pill ... I took the whole pill. It is the lowest dose, 37.5. I am not going to continue this medication. I doubt I'll have withdrawal this early, right?  I'm loath to taken even a half a pill again.  

I'm disappointed, but the headache and dizziness make hot flashes seem preferable!  I might try it again in a few weeks, but I just want this out of my system and feeling my normal, headache-free self ... sweat and all. 

I know, Lucy!  I felt so crummy today that I feel like I got a new perspective on things, that I can live with the hot flashes.  I just got out of a long tub -- that's my remedy when I'm not feeling well. Soaked for over an hour -- my fingers are prunes!  The headache is going away, and I'm off to early bed as soon as I clean my kitchen. What a day!  :-/

So I've been on it for about 7 weeks and the last two weeks I noticed I've been so tired I was actually getting concerned that something was wrong. Has anyone else felt this way?

yes 37.5 one a day

this thread convinced me to try effexor.  I have peripheral neuropathy and have heard effexor helps. I too have been afraid to try it because of reported side effects but it seems like many here haven't had problems.  Have to have thyroid checked once more to see if those meds need increased and then i am going to give this a try.  Thank you for posting.  So many useful threads on this site.  

When I was diagnosed three + years ago, over the course of several months, I tried several different antidepressant medications.  Effexor, prozac, zoloft, Remeron.  It was not a good experience for me.  They increased my anxiety level so much that with one prescription, all I did was sit on the sofa trembling and could barely get a thing done other than staring and waiting for night to come so I could sleep.  I told that to the nurse practitioner who was working with me to find the right meds.  She said, "we call that 'flat'...the medicine made you flat."

I had been such a jumble of emotions upon my diagnosis that it took me several months to figure out what I was feeling and I realized I was not depressed; what I was feeling was great anxiety. I spoke to the np and she was able to prescribe Buspar, an anti-anxiety medicine only.  It was a Godsend and it gave me my life back.  I take a very mild dose every day and have been able to pack a lot of living in these past three + years because I can keep the anxiety in check.

So, my advice is, if the effexor doesn't help, continue to seek to find what works.  So glad for those to whom it does help.