What is addiction? The DSM defines 'addiction' by a number of features, the most important two being: tolerance and withdrawal.
There are a number of legal prescription medications that people develop tolerance and withdrawal to, and so I do indeed think that is is fair to say that these prescription medications are addictive.
Of course there are other features of 'addiction' too such as lying about how much one is taking and partaking in socially devient behaviours in order to obtain it. I don't mean to say that people typically develop these behaviours to prescription meds like effexor.
With respect to the science: Typically people start taking a low dosage of Effexor and the doctor gradually increases the dosage to theraputic levels. Why? Because of the side-effects of suddenly starting on anything other than a low dose. Basically what is happening is that it takes time for your body to develop a tolerance to the drug so that you can tolerate a theraputic dosage. You have already noted about how people often taper off Effexor very slowly indeed.
They only make Effexor in a limited number of different sizes. People often find that the jump in size between one dose capsual and another dose capsual is too great for the purposes of tapering off the drug without seriously disturbing side effects. One way around this is to split the capsuals. (Basically, you open the capsuals up and count the number of grains in them for around a week or something like that. Then you know the average number of grains in a capsual. Then you can gradually reduce the number of grains that you take). If you do that (ever so gradually) then you should be able to wean yourself off it with minimal withdrawal symptoms.
It is indeed important not to over-react to the possible harmful consequences of a medication. If you look at any medication (take a look at panadol, even) there are a rather large number of possible side-effects. Most people don't experience any of the side-effects, however, much less more than one of the side-effects. I'm not at all saying that Effexor is comperable to panadol with respect to side-effects but I am cautioning against generalising from one anecdotal report to what one is likely to experience.
On the other hand... Who is it who does the studies on side-effects do you suppose? Do you suppose that the drug companies fund studies for the side-effects of their medications as much as they fund studies for the effectiveness of their medications? Of course they don't. Effexor is this years (or the past couple of years) 'wonder drug'. Past 'wonder drugs' include Xanax (anybody see the problem with Xanax?) and Prozac. For quite a long time clinician's were told that there was NO PROBLEM with withdrawal from Effexor by the drug company representatives (where doctors recieve most of their information).
That is simply not the case. The MAJORITY of people who take Effexor need to start it gradually (because they need to build up tolerance to it) and need to taper gradually or they have SEVERE withdrawal responses from it. One can minimise / eliminate the observable withdrawal symptoms by splitting the capsuals (as I said above).
I'd like to see the study that says that 99.99% of people who taper off Effexor slowly (without capsual splitting?) do fine with no serious withdrawal effects. I'm not so interested in the absence of 'alien abductions' or 'multiple personalities' as I'm interested in withdrawal effects such as the following:
- Severe anxiety
- Severe nausea
- Vomiting
- Aches
You can stop those with capsual splitting but I'd be surprised if they have done studies on withdrawing by way of capsual splitting.
Sure one should be careful of anecdotal reports (especially when it is a side effect only one person has experienced). In some cases, however, the anecdotal reports are overwhelming.
See for example:
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/wdrawl/...gs/457503.html
(The longest thread in the history of the 'withdrawal' board which suggests people have had more trouble with withdrawing from this medication than any other medication. Though maybe... It has to do with the sheer number of people who are prescribed the drug).
I would like to say that if your depression / anxiety is bad... Some people say that Effexor is indeed a terrific drug for them (there is indeed a reason why it is the current 'wonder drug').
I would also say that withdrawal will indeed be manageable if you do the gradual taper by splitting the capsual method.