I have been taking Lexapro for 5 months now and it is the best thing that ever happened to me! Side effects were that I was EXHAUSTED for the first 3 months, but in retrospect I had been seriously sleep-deprived for years before my doctor prescribed it. I now sleep much more than I ever used to, but I'm not exhausted anymore. I recently started having nightmares almost nightly and switched to taking Lexapro in the morning instead of before bed, and that seems to have helped a bit, although you never know what triggers a nightmare.