My Panic Attack Solution

My doctor gave my Novo Venlafaxine to treat my anxiety, panic attacks, and depression. He started off giving me 35mg of the medicine, and to take it daily at noon. I noticed it made my mouth feel numb and to yawn frequently, making me feel as if I was gagging or about to vomit.

So I went back to him about 5 days later, as the previous ‘side effects’ (yawning, numb mouth) went away, but I now faced something much more disturbing. I had severe difficulty swallowing. I was able to swallow liquids, but had a great difficulty swallowing any solid foods, and had been only been drinking water, milk, and eating soups.

So when I went there, he increased the dosage to 75mg. I’m not sure what this would do, and I’ve been feeling a bit anxious about it causing even more severe side effects as the 35mg made it hard to swallow.

Any ideas on how an increased dosage would help me?

+, I’ve only been on the medicine since Thursday, July 24th, 2009, and have just started the 75mg dose today (Wednesday, July 29, 2009).

Could this just be some side effects that will eventually wear off? And it would really help if those answering talked about their experience with the medicine as well.

Thank you in advance for answering.

I just started Effexor as well. I had really bad side effects for the first week or two including decreased appetite, dry mouth, etc. It’s now the end of my second week on the pills and side effects are slowly going away except drowsiness and weird sleeping patterns. You need to give it time to kick in but if you still have really bad side effects after one month then I’d say go to your doctor and switch antidepressants.