Interesting post found on SA

[theloneranger86]

OP : potions (SA)

I’ve taken one neuroscience class in University so I’m no expert but one thing I know is that the brain has an exceptional ability to repair itself. When the brain receives too much dopamine (from Wellbutrin, cocaine, or other things), it adapts by reducing receptor availability so when you come off the drug you don’t respond to dopamine in the same way you did before. Similarly, when the brain isn’t receiving enough dopamine (receptors aren’t responding to dopamine properly, the brain is recycling dopamine too quickly, the brain isn’t producing enough dopamine, usually due to drugs or too much dopamine-enhancing activities or stress), the brain automatically compensates and resensitizes receptors to get everything working properly again. Not enough dopamine? It increases receptor availability. Too much? It shuts it down. You took Wellbutrin, which is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor, so likely your dopamine receptors are downregulated a bit. But over time, your brain should heal. Dopamine receptors do upregulate over time, it even happens with some heavy drug users, and those people take drugs that flood the brain with *massive* amounts of dopamine—way more than Wellbutrin does. There is absolutely no way of knowing if you will heal fully or get back to how you were pre-Wellbutrin. I’m worried about the same thing myself from the Zoloft I took. But there is no question that you should heal/improve. Check out this image of a meth user.



Look at his dopamine receptors after just two years of abstinance. They get much better over time right? And this drug floods the brain with maybe 100X more dopamine than Wellbutrin. Hang in there. You’re healing more than you think. Give it some more time, and good luck.

[sylv]

Receptor desensitization / up sensitization is not a news and represent only a small chunk of the overall brain plasticity related capabilities. It is also a very dynamic process, you will lose up to 70% signalling very quickly and receptor degradation accounts only for a small percent in general loss of the signalling caused by a constant stimulation from over flooding serotonin. There is no satisfying time / event relation between SSRI and receptor desensitization to explain the post ssri syndrome and recovery only using this concept.

As for Dopamine targeted treatments, they have been test back and forth, with no general consensus in being effective.

If the post SSRI syndrome would be simply related to a major dopamine system dysfunction, drugs like amphetamine ( DA, NA releaser) would fix the problem immediately which isn't the case. Actually, if you suffer from an emotional blunting too, you will find the effects of all drugs ( not only DA based) blunted

Btw I hate how is it easy to get your disorder recognised and described only because the offending agent is a drug, not the medicine. Of course without any actual evidence (only anecdotal) . It's a shame that any alcohol / meth / amph / mdma / lsd / opioid related disorder have all the possible research like the above ( PET, NMR, fMRI, TDI ) already done and we, SSRI victims, have only a few publications and all of it is based on questionnaires.

[Timm Thaler]

Btw I hate how is it easy to get your disorder recognised and described only because the offending agent is a drug, not the medicine. Of course without any actual evidence (only anecdotal) . It's a shame that any alcohol / meth / amph / mdma / lsd / opioid related disorder have all the possible research like the above ( PET, NMR, fMRI, TDI ) already done and we, SSRI victims, have only a few publications and all of it is based on questionnaires.

So true!!!

[Trazohell]

1. This is meth, not SSRI

2. We most likely have 5HT1 desensitization and possibly 5HT2 downregulation, no directly dopamine problem

3. Wellbutrin is not a SSRI and therefore does not cause PSSD