I've been prescribed citalopram...

glithert

This is my first experience with antidepressants. What am I getting into, here? I'm assuming I can't drink anymore, is there anything else I should know? I read all the directions, and they weren't very clear.

godmode

You may already know this, but make sure you give it time to work before writing it off as ineffective. It can take anywhere from a week to a month before your serotonin levels balance and whatnot. As for drinking, I won't say you can't drink anymore (I'm on the same medicine and I still drink from time to time), but be careful since the interaction between the medicine and alcohol can cause stomach bleeding. I would avoid any binges until you know how the medicine affects you. I would recommend taking it with a small amount of food, too.

a_m_a_t

Speaking as a pharmacology/pharmacy student:

The possible side effects that come up sometimes are dry mouth, drowsiness, and upset stomach. The rare one is decreased libido/sexual dysfunction.

Taking the citalopram with a bit of food is a good idea if you find it bugs your stomach.

About alcohol: it's not a straight contra-indication, but the recommendation is not to mix them.

Also confirming that antidepressants take time to work. The general range is 1-2 weeks to feel an initial effect but the full effects could take 6 weeks or longer. Be patient.

If you have any questions I can try my best to answer them for you in this thread or via PM.

B_R

Don't do any other drugs. Just don't.

Also: How old are you?

DivideByZero

I've been on it for 5 months or so. According to my doctor it's not that you can't drink alcohol, in any quantity, ever, so much as you shouldn't get right plastered all the time. Occasional/mild drinking wasn't forbidden. But check with your doctor anyway to be sure.

It does make me drowsy as hell though, so I'm taking it at night before bed.

Usagi

Call your pharmacist and ask, this is what they're there for

Kabitzy

I've been on it since November. The dry mouth was pretty intense while it lasted (couldn't go anywhere without a water bottle because it was like oxygen to me) but that went away in about 2 weeks, as did the extreme drowsiness (try taking it at night, I took mine in the morning and all day I felt like passing out). Seriously though, so fucking worth it for me. My mood has improved by leaps and bounds and I first really started noticing an improvement in 2 weeks. Good luck!

Scorched

I was on Citalopram from January this year, stopped using it beginning of October - so a good 10 months. You might find the reason in my post history, or I assume as much.

I'm mostly posting because I had an extremely positive experience with it and wanted to give a bit of encouragement. I didn't have any side effects except for some disorientation that lasted three days, and that was very, very light. I did have a decreased libido for the entirety of the time I took those pills, (and a bit of adventurous trial showed me that effect was near instant) but that passed quickly (<1 day) if I forgot to take them.

Positive effects were noticeable inside a week. On the flip side: in the beginning, if I stopped taking them, I reversed inside two days. Doctor said I took to them extremely well, so this might vary. Make sure you stick to your schedule, although when I was a couple of months in I could miss a day here or there without it being a big issue.

Mostly, it's really helped me sort my life out, so much so that I've attacked a lot of the underlying causes of depression in that time. Don't be worried about it, they can really help. So good luck! I'm sure you will feel a LOT better soon enough.

Madpanda

Which part of the directions weren't clear?

Make sure you take them as prescribed as it can take a while to kick in, for me it took 5 weeks and the dosage was upped after 3. The only lingering side effect I have is drowsiness which doesn't seem to be dependent on when I take them. Taking an hour nap after work if I know I am going to be out doing stuff at night helps.

I've been taking it for about 5 months now, and coupled with talk therapy it has made a dramatic improvement in my life.

DivideByZero

Also, my personal reaction wasn't that it made me feel "great," just that it made me stop feeling "terrible." Before I took it I was depressed enough that I couldn't get through a week without breaking down over one thing or another, and that more or less stopped the instant I started taking it. (It still happens occasionally, but that's very rare now.)

So, at least for me, it didn't raise my highs so much as even out the lows. However, if I miss a day my mood is usually pretty foul.

Feral

DivideByZero wrote:

Also, my personal reaction wasn't that it made me feel "great," just that it made me stop feeling "terrible." Before I took it I was depressed enough that I couldn't get through a week without breaking down over one thing or another, and that more or less stopped the instant I started taking it. (It still happens occasionally, but that's very rare now.)

So, at least for me, it didn't raise my highs so much as even out the lows. However, if I miss a day my mood is usually pretty foul.

Yeah, when I take antidepressants, they don't make me happy exactly, they make it easier for me to deal with stress. Off antidepressants, fighting with a coworker (for example) might send me into a dysfunctional spiral; on antidepressants, I find it easier to tell myself, "It'll be better in a few days, just hang in there." Off antidepressants, after a bad day all I want to do is climb into bed and nap; on antidepressants, I can hang out with friends or do chores or exercise.

Hikkins

I've not been on citalopram, but I have been on pretty much every other anti-depressant in the book. As other people have said, give it time to take effect before you write it off as useless, because it may well take a while for the positive effects to kick in.

Also, be prepared for it to not work, or for the side-effects to be too much to deal with. Prescribing anti-depressants isn't an exact science. People react differently to each medication. I went through about 5 different types before I found an anti-depressant that worked for me.

Valaena

I've taken Citalopram for about 1.5 years. I had some libido problems, but those went away after about 2 months. The only other side effect I had was that when my dosage got upped, I started puking uncontrollably. My doctor immediately dropped it down a bit, and everything's been fine since. Out of 3 different Anti Depressants, Citalopram (celexa) was the best one for me.