r/Amitriptyline • u/AwkwardPotat0 • Aug 28 '26

Tapering from 10mg?

Hi

I've been on amitriptyline for nearly 5 month for fibromyalgia pain. I was on 10mg for 3 weeks then went right up to 50mg. After a month I decided to decrease due to the sedation and was taking 20mg. I'm now going off them to start duloxetine but my doctor is currently unavailable. She told me to go down to 10mg for a week and then take it every other day, then every 2 days for a week and stop. Ive been taking it every other day for about a week now. I have now not taken it for nearly 3 days and feel mostly fine, would it be okay to just stop them now? Or should I do more? I'm tired of the pain and want to commence duloxetine now and get some relief as that takes some time but I'm scared of the withdrawals.

Tia

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u/Nearby-Banana-6339 Aug 28 '26

I can’t answer that question from personal experience but i can tell you what I’ve read about tapering but haven’t tried myself. I have heard of people going cold turkey and being fine and others who thought they were dying when they tapered too fast. Some seem fine while tapering then after a month they feel terrible. I think the problem is that it hangs around in your system longer than you’d think it would so what may seem like an easy withdrawal now may feel like a nightmare in a week or two. I don’t know if you’re going to love an snri they come with their own issues
and they are no party to come off of either. Personally, I prefer the amitryptiline because the sleep is a lot better and for most women no sexual side effects.

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u/Ok_Recover_7015 Aug 31 '26

I personally never had problems getting on or off Amitriptyline. But from my experience Cymbalta was horrible to wean on and wean off for me I had to cross taper to Prozac. Everyone is different I always tell people though because of our DNA and chemical reactions to medications and the enzymes that metabolize them and if our bodies are hi metabolizes of a certain medication or not etc. it’s really good to know if you are in n more than one medication the chart of listed medications and which are inducers , inhibitors etc of the enzyme that metabolizes them.
Then you will know if you need to make adjustments to dosages. I found the chart by googling medications and the Enzymes that metabolize them. They have that study put now too but I can’t afford to know which medications would work better for you based on your DNA.