# How to Taper off of Lexapro?



## batmell (Apr 4, 2002)

Hi - I am wondering if anyone out there know how one should taper off of Lexapro? My mother started on 10 mg on August 11th and did that for 3 weeks; then she cut the dose to 5 mg for the past week and a half. She found that she felt much worse on the meds so decided that she was better off not taking anything right now. She can't ask her doctor because he is a total jerk, she has to find a new doctor. It seems like every anti-dep / anti-anxiety she has tried has made her worse which may be attributed to the fact that she was taking Ativan for 2 1/2 years and successfully tapered off of that in April. I think that by being on the benzo for so long really did alot of damage to her nervous system - and because of that her whole system is out of whack.Anyways - she really wants to be med free for a while and really needs help in tapering off of the Lexapro - after only being on it for 5 weeks total does she even need to taper at all?Any advice on personal experience would be greatly appreciated!Thank you.


----------



## Brice (Aug 19, 2003)

not familiar with Lexapro withdrawal, but i am very familiar with Effexor withdrawal, which is one of the worst.She def. needs to taper off, not just quit cold turkey.Now the length of the taper just depends on how she responds to the dosage drops.Only being on it 5 months should be pretty easy for her to get off.I had to use 10mg of Prozac everyday for a week to get off of effexor that really helped me out.Also if she experiences dizziness and brainzaps, as well as flulike symptoms try some benadryl, that really helped me as well.


----------

