Oh nice, I have this exact issue. I’ll try weaning off.
I can’t imagine how it started. I probably took Zyrtec once every few months when I went to someone’s house with a cat.
Zyrtec aka cetirizine or Reactine. I used to take it to ward of the exact itchiness symptoms I thought were caused by other medications.
Huh, yeah, I’ve had this effect too when i quit cold turkey.
If you reduce to just a pill every few days, you can ween yourself off
I quit a few years ago when I noticed every time I stopped taking it I would go through a few days of the worst allergy attack I ever experienced. Nonstop sneezing and runny nose. Much worse than the symptopms I took it to escape. Switched to allerfex or whatever it’s called, and it works just as well with no withdrawal, at least so far.
My palms, ears and shins have been really itchy lately. I don’t take Zyrtec, so I must be SOL.
Apparently you are.
Why do my shins itch so bad?
Itching is a common symptom of diabetes. Itchy skin can be caused by high blood sugar levels over a prolonged period of time. Sometimes the skin itchiness can be caused by complications of diabetes, such as poor circulation, kidney disease, or nerve damage.
I’ll send you the bill.
On topic, during ragweed season claritin works, and there are no withdrawal symptoms.
I never had the itchiness problem, but did get really nasty withdrawal headaches for a few days after I quit using it the last time. That’s when I stumbled on similar research and figured out what in the world was happening.
I probably should’ve been clued in when I thought recently I should stock up on Zyrtec in case society collapsed.
I do take zyrtec, but luckily I only have allergies for a couple weeks in the spring. No side effects, but it also doesn’t work very well, so I suppose that balances out.
I have experienced this exact issue, but it was with Claritin, not Zyrtec. It was awful and as a consequence, I rarely take any medicine now.
I’ve only tried it a handful of times, and it never helped so I stopped trying. Guess I dodged that one.
I probably spend way too much money on air filters, though.
My wife has serious, but seasonal, allergies and has been taking Zyrtec for the past 10 years, only on onsets of symptoms, which count at about 20 days/year I’d say. She hasn’t experienced the issues talked in the article, but what I learned reading it is that some people drink it daily for years? That can’t be good, of any medicine.
Lots of people take medication daily for their entire lives. Please be careful about trafficking in pseudo-science suggesting there’s something inherently bad about that.
I was taking hydroxyzine (sp?) the past few weeks for a case of urticaria that has cropped up again. It works, but it made me too sleepy and I couldn’t get any work done, so I stopped taking it. I wish I could figure out what in the environment is causing the rashes. I had them once before and they kind of just went away on their own after several months.
Psh, my 10 Ibuprofen/3 Aleve/day habit is super good long-term. The gradual ulceration of my entire GI tract agrees!
(Okay, more seriously, your point is certainly valid, but for the stuff that does list warnings or have guidances, it’s worth paying attention. I mean hey, no one’s ever had a good time taking 20 Tylenol in a day. . . )
Yes, I was talking self-medication (which the article is about, as the quoted practicians there imply), not life-saving prescribed steroids, psychotropic, painkiller drugs and the likes.
One thing that I am strict about is taking only 2 Aleve per day. I made the mistake of ignoring the label once. My stomach disagreed.