Greetings all…
I just joined this group in the hopes of getting some feedback on
Lexapro withdrawal.
First, a little history. I’m divorced with two kids…an 11 year old
girl and a 12 year old boy. The ex-wife…who is a bit of a
hypochondriac…observed anxiety attacks occurring with our son.
According to her he would just start crying for no known reason. I
see both my kids on a regular basis and had never observed this
behavior myself. She brought him to a psychiatrist in October of 2002
and he prescribed a daily 5mg dose of Lexapro. She did this without
my knowledge or input, which is a big no-no according to our divorce
agreement, but that’s a different story. I bring it up because I have
serious doubts as to whether he needed to be medicated at all.
In addition to taking the meds, our son was also seeing a
psychologist as part of his treatment. (The psychiatrist didn’t do
counseling…he just prescribed the drugs. Don’t know if that is
normal or not.)
While on the Lexapro, there were no more anxiety attacks. He
experienced no side effects except for an occasional migraine, but he
had been dealing with those prior to the Lexapro. The
psychologist…who has the same doubts I have as to whether he ever
should have been on meds…felt we should take him off the Lexapro
over the summer.
The decision was finally made to take him off the Lexapro. He had
been taking a 5mg dose every morning. The dosage was reduced to 2.5mg
for a week and he went completely off the medicine the following
week.
After being off the medicine for 10 days, school started. He is now
in the 7th grade and attending the same school he did last year.
Now the anxiety attacks are worse than they ever were before taking
the Lexapro. He freaked out looking up a word in the dictionary. He
couldn’t stop crying one night and refused to do his homework. One
morning he was crying and upset so bad that he didn’t go to school at
all. Those were the worse of the problems, but there have been other
teary moments as well.
I brought him to his psychologist to help us figure out what was
going on. The Dr. is about 70-75% sure he is having withdrawal
symptoms. The problem is that the medicine is so new that there isn’t
a whole lot of data on what happens when people come off of it. The
info I have found describes symptoms he is not experiencing and has
involved adults, not kids.
The Dr. wants us to wait it out for a week or so to see if his
problems diminish. At this point we are day-to-day. It’s been a few
days and fortunately he has not missed any more school thus far.
The only other meds my son currently takes regular are for allergies
Flonase and Zertec, I think.
Has anybody in the forum had experience with Lexapro withdrawals in a
child? Any feedback would be appreciated.
Thank you
Jay