I'm on a combo that I think isn't all that common.

Venaflaxine and Well-Butrin.

I LOVE IT. Big time.


I tried many other things over the years and nothing worked well. Also, these two do not work that well by themselves, for me. Alone the Well-Butrin is just meh. It helps, but not much. 150mg a day, extended release. Once my doctor said let's try a higher dose of it! Seemed like a good idea. It was an awful idea! I was super angry, I remember being furious with some poor girl at the pharmacy. I hated everyone and everything for a few days and said nope, I'm going back to 150mg.

Venaflaxine (Effexor) is one heck of a drug. I've done a lot of research on it, it can be quite dangerous I believe. It really messes with your serotonin levels. At first I was on 75, then up to 150 mg a day of the extended release tablets. Without well-butrin. It had a lot of negative side effects. Most memorably, it killed all feeling in my lady parts. I was in a relationship at that time and there was absolutely nothing exciting happening in the bedroom. I wasn't even interested. I felt dull, like everything was kind of numb, especially my brain. Just in a fog all the time. But I wasn't a roller coaster of up and down emotions, so it was ok with me.

After getting off those, trying other meds, getting back on those, adding more meds, I finally just quit all meds. Nothing was working well. It was like no matter what, something was going to suffer. If it wasn't my emotions, I'd have to sacrifice my creativity and love life. I was tired of it, picking one or the other, the lesser of two evils. My bipolar disorder became unmanageable again after a long time and I had to get help. I said I'm comfortable with well-butrin even though it doesn't do a ton, and I'm ok with effexor because it calms my brain, I want those two. I had to pay out of pocket for that visit and the doctor said ok, but Effexor extended release is going to be about $400 a bottle, for a month. What??? That's too much! She said the instant tablets are much cheaper and I can give you a coupon, it's about $40 a month. Way better, let's do that. Then the Heavens parted and angels started singing and life was beautiful. It's nothing short of a miraculous combination for me. And the NOT extended release pills are great. I have a lot more control over what I take and when. I take 75mg every morning when I wake up, then usually half of that around 2 in the afternoon, and another half in the evening. Takes about 20 minutes to kick in. On days when I feel extra up and down, I can add another half or even two more half's and go up to 225mg, and that fixes me right up.

The two medications balance each other out, in my opinion. The well-butrin prevents most of the negative effexor side effects, like sexual issues, and brain fog. It also makes me not hungry at all and helped me completely quit smoking. The Effexor puts serotonin in my brain which makes me happy and even completely changes the way I think. Without it, there's like a million browser tabs open at once in my brain and I need to focus on them All at the same time. Very scattered thoughts, uncontrollable emotions. This pulls up one browser at a time, I can handle it logically and with "normal" emotions. I love being able to control the dose myself. I'll be on this combo the rest of my life as long as it works the same way.