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Q. I was concerned about a swooshing sound when my eyes move. Thank goodness I found your website. I thought I was losing my mind.
I had been taking Celexa for generalized anxiety for the last eight years. Four weeks ago I lost my health insurance and had to discontinue the Celexa just like that.
In addition to the swooshing sounds, I’m having anxiety attacks and trouble sleeping. I cry at the drop of a hat. (Don’t show me any pictures of soldiers being reunited with their families!)
Thanks to comments I read about Cymbalta withdrawal I learned that other antidepressants can also cause misery if stopped suddenly. I now know that A) I’m not crazy and B) my eyeballs are not going to explode out of my head.
A. Antidepressants like citalopram (Celexa), duloxetine (Cymbalta), escitalopram (Lexapro) and sertraline (Zoloft) can cause awful withdrawal symptoms when stopped abruptly. Some people describe “brain zaps” as electrical shock-like sensations. A very gradual taper, when possible, is preferable.
Without medical insurance, it may be difficult to get that swooshing sound checked by a neurologist, but hearing your eyes move can sometimes be a symptom of superior canal dehiscence syndrome. If the sounds of moving eyes persist after your other Celexa withdrawal symptoms fade, we urge you to ask a physician to rule it out.
Kris
Tes. brain zap and swooshing eyes. I’m surprised it’s not mentioned in the “formal” side-effects for withdrawal. I’m glad I’m almost through it.
Kenny
THANK YOU SO MUCH! I weaned off Lexapro, but for these last 2 days after I completely stopped, I am experience this “brain zap ” (feels like someone smacked me in the back of the head and my eyeballs are “swishing”).
Yeah! I’m normal!
Peter
I have the eye swoosh sounds. I had been on various SSRIs for a few years on and off. One time my doctor recommended Cymbalta. It was the lowest dosage. I did not go back on time to the doctor for a refill and stopped without reducing it to half and then to zero since I didn’t think you could wean off by cutting a half pill. Immediately after stopping the eye swoosh sounds occurred. I started on the meds again a few days later, and it disappeared. After a few more days I stopped taking the meds again, and sure enough the sounds came right back. They have decreased over the years and mostly only happen while waking up from sleep, and then vanish after a few minutes once I am awake. Just like the other poster mentioned. It absolutely is an SSRI side effect, and my internist was unaware of such a thing.
Tommy
I too have the swishy eye movement thing when I miss a dose of escitalopram (Generic Lexapro). I was only supposed to take it for a couple of weeks to help me through a bad time. When I stopped taking them, the swishing began, and it took a while to figure out what was causing it. Once I did I started taking escitalopram every day now for about 15 years. I don’t take it for depression, but just to stop the unbearable swish. Mine sounds like Grandma sweeping the ashes from the fireplace.
I was wondering if anyone knows how long it takes for symptoms once you stop taking the med. I’ve made it for 6 days and gave in because I couldn’t stand anymore. I’m really surprised that every doctor I tell all of this to acts like I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about. I might as well be saying that I think I have a pickle growing on my nose.
AL
I had made the connection myself with the antidepressants when I often forgot to take my dose for a day or a few more. I weaned off too fast before taking a new med I guess. Some thought I was exaggerating, faking. The few doctors I mentioned this to did not seem to have crossed this before.
Add a bit of humor when the whooshing sound is there, walk around the house with Bruce Lee chop-chop positioned hands and match your hand and head movements. Now every chop sounds just like the movies.
Ira
Indiana
I am so glad to have come across this site. Most people think I’m exaggerating when I say that I can “hear my eyeballs move” when I look side to side. Much like the previous comment, it’s akin to the swoosh of lightsabers, but in the early movies though, when the sound is still grainy and less digitally refined.
I am on a moderately high daily dose of Cymbalta (duloxetine). If I miss a dose one morning, by the next morning the withdrawal symptoms start to set in because, with a half-life of 12 hours, over half of the medication is already out of my system. The eye noises will calm down after the meds have been in my system for another 12 hours or so. The noise leads to migraines, and the migraines lead to nausea. All of which makes me a not great person to be around.
However, as bad as the withdrawal symptoms can be if I miss a dose, it’s worth it compared to the chronic depression and anxiety that used to be my life.
Jim
Canada
My sounds are a whoosh-whoosh thing. Usually when adjusting my Effexor dose down or up. Eye movement, sometimes head movement (although that may implicate eye movement) and sometimes just changing my visual focus with out changing the field will elicits the sound that usually repeats for two or three cycles. Less often, these sounds can arise in periods of worse depression in the absence of any dose adjustments.
I’ve been on Effexor for about 13 years for major depression and the frequency of these whoosh spells has not worsened; perhaps it has improved slightly. It’s part of my world. Whoosingly Jim
pen
Washington DC
I had the eye movement sounds when I stopped taking one of the SSRIs. I’d been on them for a few years, and I’m pretty sure it helped me get through a really rough period. Anyway, to me, the sounds came when I rolled my eyes significantly to either side or up and down. I’m a child of the 80s, so to me, it sounded very much like a Star Wars light saber whooshing as it’s swung.
I never had any of the “brain shocks” or other problems of withdrawal some people mention, just the crazy light sabers mounted to my eyeballs. It was pretty bad for a couple of weeks, then gradually faded away.
Jonathan
CA
I know these symptoms very well. A very disconcerting “shuck-shuck” sound when I move my eyes, mostly when I am falling asleep or just waking. Once I’m up and about, the effect minimizes and mostly disappears. But it is definitely an eerie and very real effect.
One thing I can absoluely guarantee you is that for me these eyeball-movement sound effects started ONLY when I began a ‘script of SSRI antidepressant meds. I never any symptom anything like this in my entire life beforehand. Nothing even remotely similar. I also believe the effect may be tied to a reduction in dosage and/or varied timing of taking the med.
In addition to the “shuck-shuck” sound when my eyes move (sometimes it sounds like “shock-shock”, ironically), I also get the same “brain-zaps” others mentioned, plus less-often but just as vivid and real, something I’ve been calling “nueral-quakes”, where when I walk it feels like Wiley Coyote looked after he took the Acme earthquake pills or whatever they were.
Here’s a question: has anyone experienced these same effects (eyeball sounds, or telated brain zaps, nueral quakes in their fingers, etc, with any meds other than antidepressants?
For instance, on one forum someone said they though their symptoms were buprenorphine related, another guy on another forum thought his symptoms were due to a transmitter having been secretly placed in his tooth crown by his devious CIA dentist (funny though, he actually seemed rational and educated, so who knows? In this day and age such a thing could even be true).
Anyway, relieving to hear many others are experiencing the same effects, so thanks. Good forum.
Someone out there with the means should have a good investigative attorney look into the big pharma’s knowledge of this side effect. Because if they knew about it and didn’t say, that’s s big deal. And I find it very hard to believe they didn’t, with all the studies they do, and the immense amount of feedback they get, both before and after a drug is released. And if they somehow didn’t know, that’s just as troubling, as they certainly should have.
Lastly, anyone have suggestions on best way to reduce or nix the effect(s) other than than stopping the med?
Tromp
USA
I was on Celexa for the past 4-5 years on and off. I stopped cold turkey off 10 mg in January and had the worst withdrawal ever. Dizziness, brain zaps, head pressure. Horrible. After a month I couldn’t take it anymore. I decided to go back on it and taper off at a later time. So I tapered off this past thanksgiving. Going down 5 mg each week from 20 mg. Apparently that was not slow enough, because here I am having severe dizziness and brain zaps and head pressure. My doctors tell me withdrawal isn’t possible since it has been 5-6 weeks since I have taken it however, I have read symptoms can last 90+ days. Everyone is different. So now I have been scheduled for an MRI Monday morning to eliminate possible MS or a compressed blood vessel in the back of my head. I’m glad to know I’m not the only one having withdrawal..
Patricia A.
I, too, had the electric shock symptoms when I tried to get off of Celexa. I’m down to 5mg. (I cut a 10mg. in half), and still have this weird feeling if I skip a day or so. I guess I’ll have to be on it forever!
Barb
MI
I am able to get citalopram (the generic for celexa) at Walmart for $10 for 3 months. That’s without insurance.