Duloxetine Withdrawal

Firstly, you all know that I have never held back the truth about pain, the ups and downs of the operations to remove the mesothelioma and of course I have published a couple of untasteful photographs. I never said my site would be for the faint hearted and I will always believe if you plan to win the battle against mesothelioma you had better prepare yourself for the biggest fight you will ever face.

Now my operation should be a thing of the past, I went back to work early April, I know it was too soon in medical terms but yet for me it was the right time. I doubt I would have got on top of the pain without Duloxetine for the damage to my nerves. I had mentioned coming off them earlier and should have known I would have problems. At one point I was on 60 morning and night but I couldn't handle them, they (so I still believe) made me dizzy and also caused tinnitus. So after a short period I dropped back to 60, if I suffered any withdrawal at that time I probably didn't notice as I was still suffering quite badly from pain, tiredness and everything else that goes with going under the knife. A few weeks, no less than a month, I dropped to 30 a day and planned to come off them reasonably quick. Discussed this with Trevor and not a problem, one less tablet to take and also lets see how the side is.

I took the last one Saturday morning and on Sunday felt okay. Monday afternoon for no reason I could feel my mind getting aggitated. Had yet another bad nights sleep and on Tuesday I felt ill, went into work my ribs felt like I had someone re-pour the concrete on them so movement is quite restricted and thought I had the start of flu. I had to come home, slept for 3 hours and felt a little better. Had a terrible night again, this time timberines were banging around in my head if I moved it, my ears are ringing, dizzy, headachy etc etc. I got up at 7 feeling restless and yak sat outside in the sunshine for 45 minutes deciding whether I wanted to throw up or not. I had a meeting scheduled at 10.30 with an external consultant so rang him at home to cancel and went back to bed.

Poor Hubby nearly died when he saw me re-enter the bedroom and climb into bed, this is not a Jan thing, he asked if I wanted the Doc but I declined, afterall it was only 8am!

Slept on and off till 10.30, got up and felt even worse. Gary had printed off a list of withdrawal symptoms and side effects, the only few I don't have are the really mindbending stuff! Well no that's not true, I have about 12 of them. He forced me to eat as that seemed to help yesterday, so I downed a sandwiche then fell asleep in the sun, well kind of a sleep. Have phoned the pharmacist so ensures me it should decrease everyday but can take 1 to 2 weeks to completely go. If I feel exactly the same or worse by Friday to contact the doctors.

So you win on one hand and lose on another. I was so excited about having a good scan, I even went to pilates on Monday and thought I was heading on the right track, but I always seem to get knocked back. I haven't managed to go to healing today, when really that should be something I should have done, but didn't dare drive and what if I was sick in the middle of it!

I went on and on in the early days about how wonderful this tablet was and it has to be said it did its job on the pain, why do we have to have such severe downsides!