Hello blue_eyed_siamese: Well... I'm afraid I don't really know what one might consider to be normal. I read a lot of posts here on PC. And my impression is that what you are experiencing is pretty common. When a person first goes on med's, or goes on a new med, they do well for a while. But then, over time, the med's just seem to lose their effectiveness to one degree or another.

I'm no longer on med's. Most of the med's I've tried in the past didn't really do much of anything for me at all. The last one I was on was Cymbalta & it was the best of the lot for me. But even there, it didn't keep me "up". My moods would fluctuate noticeably. What I felt it did do was to keep a floor under me, so to speak, so that I would only sink so low; at which point it would sort-of kick my butt back up to within a tolerable range. But I still had to work at keeping myself going day-to-day. Pretty-much all of the med's I have tried in the past tended to make me feel kind-of "spacey" or maybe "groggy"... kind-of detached from reality if that makes any sense. It's part of the reason I simply no longer take them.

P.S. My condolences on the loss of your kitty...