my doctor recently prescribed me paxil and is weaning me off of ativan i hear that paxil makes you gain weight, has anyone had this side effect from paxil?
my doctor recently prescribed me paxil and is weaning me off of ativan i hear that paxil makes you gain weight, has anyone had this side effect from paxil?





I was on it at 13. Gained about 20lbsAs soon as I was off it the wieght melted off. Also killed my sex drive.
you live like an ivy vine
you can only survive by clinging onto trees
that's your flaw
put down some roots so you can stand on your own
-Kenpachi
My friend and mother had bad side effects from Paxil. Fever, chills, nausea, body aches and bloating (my friend was allergic to it, my mom just got bloated all over). It is not considered an idea antidepressant (it has been replaced by better ones, like Celexa & Zanax.) OK anyway if it doesn't work for you, get off of it fast.
My brother currently takes paxil. He has gained about 30 pounds. He was always a pretty thin and in shape guy before. I think that weight gain is a bad side effect from paxil. Other than the weight gain the paxil has been very helpful to him. I take zoloft and have not gained an ounce. Zoloft might be a good alternative for you if you are worried about weight gain, which I know that I was worried about weight gained. I think if I had gained weight I would have ended up more depressed.
I just started Zoloft and Ive lost 10lbs. It makes you not hungry and you bounce your legs alot without thinking
- Save a mouse. Eat a Pussy-



Out of all the meds in that class (SSRI), Paxil is probably the best for anxiety, but it also causes the most weight gain.
I never gained weight with it..infact I lost weight
but it did the reverse shit. I became anxious, nervous..had social anxiety etc . Which is what its supposed to correct. INstead it gave it to me and it took 9 full months for the effects to fully wear off.
ITs one of those "meds" that I dont think people should be on. NOt just from my experience but in a general from what I've heard other people tell me as well.
But if it works for you and makes you feel better then awesome
eeek. this sounds soo crappy![]()
I had panic attacks on paxil, and I had never experienced those before. I'd much prefer Celexa.
Zoloft is the way to go.....no paxil or lexapro
"Tell people whatever they want to hear, then do whatever you want"


Personally, I think it's best to stay away from all those meds. Usually a lot of depression is based from things going on in your life...family issues, personal issues, etc etc. I've always found it very helpful to go see a counselor, or there even were a few times when I used one of those hotlines (I think it was a domestic violence line...although I figured even though I wasn't getting beaten up--it was verbal abuse--it was so helpful to have a live person listen to me). Check the yellow pages or some places online for resources like that. Sometimes a life coach might even help too, but i've never tried one.
A lot of times prescription drugs for depression issues are pushed so hard because it's a business...people make lots of money off of it....so that's why on tv commercials and in the magazines, they keep saying "depression is due to a chemical imbalanc e in your brain...it's not your fault..." Well, of course there's some kind of chemical imbalance...your whole entire body is based off of chemical reactions happening...from when you have sex to when you have your period to when you taste a delicious food... The commercials make it sound like you have absolutely no control over how your body feels. Don't get tricked by this. While some peop;le might have some serious imbalances due to messed up stuff happening in their body (for example, some people get polycystic ovary disease and get hair everywhere on their body because things are messed up...or some people are born with diabetes type 1...and i'm sure some people are born with some abnormalities in their body that affects their mood). but I think it's more likely to occur that your depression is due to struggling with life issues...go to the self-help section at a bookstore, watch some oprah...that stuff is probably mnore likely to help than some pill... perhaps the pill is more of a band-aid effect? And if you'[re on the depression pill, but don't address your life issues that caused you to get depressed, then you'll probably be stuck on the pill forever...
im not depressed i have panic attacks and anxiety.
Originally Posted by taintedlove
This is to funny. I am on 150 mg of zoloft and I was just sitting here reading this thread and not even realizing how much I was actually bouncing my legs until I read the above quote. So yes it does make you bounce your legs alot.
i haven't gained any weight on it.
it's actually helped me a lot. i think people who make blanket statements about these drugs are full of shit and have never experienced DEBILITATING anxiety. paxil helped me get my life back.
i guess ill try it and if i see myself gaining weight then ill switch meds.
how long did it take everyone to notice they were gaining weight? was it over months or weeks?



I don't know if you're into natural treatment but 5-htp is supposed to promote weight loss as well as helping conditions like anxiety and depression.
I'm guessing you've never been clinically depressed. Advice such as "watch some Oprah" is goddamn ridiculous when someone is suffering from the disease of depression. I have struggled with it my entire life and I think it is incredibly rude (and ignorant) to suggest that someone suffering from depression should just try to fix it via self-help books and Oprah.Originally Posted by da
If someone has struggled to the point that they have been prescribed medication, it is entirely possibly that they have exhausted other options. Sure, you can try to do different things to make yourself feel better, but ultimately, if you have a chemical imbalance it might not make one iota of difference.
Check out my new eBay auctions.......
i took zoloft for anxiety....panic/anxiety attacks can control your life...they can keep you from work, school and friends..It is definitely not fair to say that if you're going on meds that you'll be on them for the rest of your life...I took the Zoloft for awhile before I figured out how to control and get rid of my panic attacks....don't knock what you know nothing about.... This conversation reminds me of the Tom Cruise/Brooke Shields thing... lol...
"Tell people whatever they want to hear, then do whatever you want"
I should preface this by saying I'm not clinically depressed, but I suffer from severe social/generalized anxiety. Enough to impede my life. I went to the psychiatrist, a psychologist, and all of them reccomended I go on paxil, and so I did. Sure, it calmed down my anxiety, I was able to go to classes and answer the phone without fearing death, and I thought everything was fine. Then I tried to go off paxil because of nasty side-effects. Aside from the fact that withdrawl from that drug after any period of time is absolutely wretched (electric shock sensations in my fingers, feeling like I had lost moments of time in a conversation) I realised I didn't have any coping strategies. It's fine to utilize medication to help, but I think we over rely on medicine to make us feel good when the problem is behavioural and chemical. For some, Oprah helps. Others, self help books, and still others, frequent counselling sessions. For me, it was actually talking with someone trained in social work (not psychology) who worked out a way of identifying what upset me and why that might be. That way, I was able to more conciously deal with my triggers. Sure, I'm still a bit more skittish and stressed out than most people, and I do intermittently utilize medication dependent on the level of that stress in my life, but I'm proud of working to improve myself...it makes me feel more like an active participant in my life, rather than a passive victim.Originally Posted by Andygirl





Paxil is evil stuff. IT helped for the depression but it actually increased my anxiety so much that I needed to take Xanax for the attacks.
It might sound silly to most of you, but since I cleaned up my way of eating (no sugar, no processed flour etc), and stabilized my blood sugar, most of it went away and I was able to deal with the rest by talking to a therapist. Now I'm med and therapist free.
^^ same here! i had to go on xanax for the panic attacks and ambien to sleep! All in all i was taking 2 bars of xanax a day, 10 mgs of ambien to sleep and 10 mgs of paxil to function if you wanna call it that.
My solution as of the last 2 weeks...no birthcontrol. while i understand its not an option for most and not even really for me., the hormones in those fucking things are horrid. I have never felt more sane,secure and realistic in my fucking life. I've been on some form of a hormone type birthcontrol since 16. beyond pregnancies Ive never been off of it ( I got pregnant by fucking up the pill , the shot and the good ole noraplant )
Im all about the todays sponge at the moment. its a godsend.
I think more depression and etc would be linked to birthcontrol if a study was done.
BTW i did take that sam-e shit or awhile .It did work but list most stuff it only works for so long. I think cardio daily , not smoking, less sugars and fats and ridding yourself of toxic relationships be it friends, lovers or family memebers it the best way to go
along with learning new coping skills. But then again there are other mental illnesses that can't be dealt with in just new eating and dietary habits. Which is sad. Bi Polar, Manic and Schizo are things that have the handled with a combo of healthy living and medications. The worst part of the medications i've noticed is that after awhile people develop facial ticks and even worse side effects. which is why i think many people opt to not take em'.
I thinks science has some growing to do in the field of mental health and helping not just pacifying the issues.
have you or anyone you know used it? it looks promising but id like to hear about someones first hand account of using it.Originally Posted by Beauty's Release



I used it. The nice thing about 5-htp is that if it is going to work for you, it often works very soon. Like within a week or two. I felt better after day 3.
I think in the end it did more for my anxiety than depression. I also found I slept much deeper. No other side effects for me.
Of course, do your research and all that first. However, it's not bad as far as side effects go... and unlike St John's Wort does not react badly with most other medications (BC, etc).
If you want personal accounts, do a search on here. Lots of SW ladies have used this and there's a few threads on it.
Oh, and I agree with Dylan about the sugar thing. That was my experience as well.
Hmmm...after trying a few different anti-depressants, I've been on Paxil for over a year and I can honestly say it has saved my life. I AM scared to go off of it, though-but it's the only dryg that allows me to leave the house.
Paxil made me eat and sleep way more than I should. I have a really fast metabolism so I didn't gain weight. I was just a zombie.
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