the side effect that pains me the most about being on the Effexor is the loss of appetite and the losing of too much weight. i'm 5' and i lost 38 pounds and i couldn't go anywhere without people staring and whispering. i was working in ER at that time and i wore a size 0 pant. i had to force myself to eat while on that drug. talk about poor ole nicole ritchie, i weighed a lot less than she did when i finally got off of it. and i became more susceptible to illnesses while i was down like that. i had pneumonia twice.

effexor truly scares me to death. thinking it over, i would surely want the patient to know that it's nasty side effects might make it wise to choose something else for pain.

i found online mental health forums when i was trying to get off of it. i googled "getting off of effexorxr" and pages popped up and that's how i eventually wound up here at PC.