Anti-depressants and weight loss/gain

Lilith5

I have been suffering with depression for awhile but only the other day I finally plucked up the courage to speak to my doctor about it.
Seen her again today and she has prescribed me Fluoxetine. I am scared to take these as I don't want to get addicted, I have been told once your on anti-depressants your stuck on them for life as they are hard to come off of. I've read up on them a bit but have noticed alot of people have reported losing weight on them.
Has anyone taken these and what are your thoughts? Did you get any nasty side effects? Did they help at all? Lose or gain weight?
I would really appreciate any advice about these pills, I haven't taken any yet. My prescription is 1 tablet daily, I'm shaking just thinking about taking them :frown:

laylaness

They're not addictive in the heroin-is-addictive sense, so don't worry about that.

They can affect your appetite, but I would talk to your prescribing doctor about that.

In my experience, the weight I gained on antidepressants was my own eating habits, it wasn't caused by the medication.

I'm on a medication for migraines that causes appetite loss, but I continue to eat normally, as my doctor cautioned me about it, also noting that the weight will come back anyway once I started eating normally again when 1. my body adjusted to the medication, or 2. I went off of it.

pennysteed

If you are concerned about weight gain, and lets face it who isn't, talk to your doctor about it again. As for becoming addictive and being on meds for the rest of your life, I am walking proof that this is bunk. I have dysthymia, and was on three different anti-depressants, though not at the same time. The first two did not work for me, and one jacked my blood pressure up. I ended up on Prozac for a few years. I weaned myself off of it almost 5 years ago. Am I healed? No. But I simply refused to go back on Prozac, and thankfully my last psychologist okayed it. I take 5HTP when I am stressed, and am at the point now that I know how to deal with my depression and when I need to get help again. Depending upon what is wrong, you could suffer from this for the rest of your life. My suggestion to you would be to have your doc enroll you in classes to understand what depression is and new life coping skills to deal with it. Coming off your meds in the future may or may not be for you, I know one person who can tell if he forgot to take his meds by lunch time.

hkb85

Hi,
my answers

Did you get any nasty side effects?
No

Did they help at all?
Yes, bought me out of my depression, helped with the counseling, but they are only part of the solution.

Lose or gain weight?
It stopped my weight gain, but I was so depressed I was not doing anything other then eating and sleeping. It was a struggle to get up out of bed in the morning.