Hi, I'm Stepbystep

Hello AlI I’m a 33 year old male from England. I started struggling with insomnia and anxiety in December 2025. After trying lots of approaches to fix my sleep I was prescribed trazodone by my doctor in January this year. I was desperate for some relief at the time however completely naive to what I was taking in absence of any guidance from the doctor who simply said take 1-3 tablets (50mg) each night as needed. The leaflet said take 75mg for anxiety so I started taking 2 tablets (didn’t know you could split tablets), 100mg each night. They helped me sleep however my troubles started after about 5-6 days I started having a severe and unbearable activation period, cognitive issues, severe agitation and inner restlessness , anxiety attacks, constant crying, depression, dull body aches, even suicidal thoughts. My immediate thoughts were I needed to stop taking these tablets however after consulting with my doctor there advise was that this was normal! and symptoms would begin to subside after 4-6 weeks when the medication starts working, so I white knuckled through but did agree to reduce dose to 75mg (6th February) by splitting a tablet. I was having trouble splitting tablets so the doctor gave me liquid suspension to get my 75mg. After a few weeks the symptoms did subside somewhat from being unbearable but I still had bad nervousness, anxiety and a dull electrical ache/sensation that would make it really difficult to relax anywhere. (Still have this today) Not educated at the time my thoughts were this was side effects from the tablets and I needed to reduce my dose, so I dropped to 50mg (10th March). I now know that these symptoms were likely still lingering from a sensitised nervous system after the strong activation and that this drop was too much! 6-7 days after this dose drop I started feeling worse again with symptoms of increased anxiety depression and agitation not unbearable like before but bad enough to come off work for a couple weeks. At this point my sleep was starting to become disrupted again and I couldn’t get more than 4 hours sleep. Acute symptoms let up after 2 weeks but again still felt really bad with brain fog, anxiety and agitation. After a number of weeks of not improving i thought that the medication now wasn’t helping me sleep and was making me feel terrible (was still off work) so i wanted to stop taking it. I knew that it had to be tapered and again consulted with the doctor who said just stop CT, I asked about reducing slowly and was told if I want to taper drop current dose 25% each week for 4 weeks until off. So that’s what i did. Dropped to 38mg on 16th April, actually felt better the first week (pre withdrawal honeymoon period that has become common occurrence) then dropped to 25mg on 23rd April a week later. Then severe withdrawal symptoms started one week after that, BAD. Full panic attack started things off, shaking, poor temperature control, severe agitation, brain and head buzzing, major anxiety, dizziness, disassociation, depersonalisation, loss of appetite, numbness in extremities, jaw dystonia, Anhedonia, constant urination. I found some peer support groups which offered guidance and I decided to hold my dose at 25mg while also quitting alcohol, sugar, processed foods, caffiene and intense exercise. fortunately I have stabilised somewhat after two months with symptoms still uncomfortable but manageable. I had a bad turn when switching manufacturers of the trazodone middle of June so after conversation with doctors agreed to stick with the current one. First attempt at continuing the taper was on 7th July down to 24mg and felt that 5 days later increase anxiety and inner agitation being the main symptoms. I believe I’ve had an adverse reaction and/or have hypersensitive nervous system. From what I’ve read majority of people don’t tend to struggle with trazodone if they stick to a slow 10% taper but it’s definitely going to be a long difficult journey for me. After months off work I recently started a new job which I need to keep some level of stability for financially supporting my family. I think I will try a .5mg reduction next and try to do that every 2 weeks until I have to reduce reduction size again.