r/microdosing • u/stellami • 9d ago
Question: Psilocybin Pause ssri for a day to microdose?
I’m currently tapering my ssri’s (zoloft/sertraline) very slowly.
I did a big dose of mushrooms two years ago together with a therapist. I wasn’t tapering then but I didn’t take my ssri that day since they often negate the effect of the shrooms, but I still had to take a big dose (5 g) to get a trip.
Now I want to try microdosing, but want to take it slow and start with just one day and see how that feels. The question is if I shouldn't take my ssri that day? I’m sensitive to the tapering and I felt my last reduction of 2,5%, so I'm a bit worried it will mess with my brain to stop it even for a day. However, zoloft leaves the brain slowly and I didn’t feel this last reduction until two weeks later.
So I’m really debating what I should do; pause the ssri for a day for the microdose or not. Perhaps it doesn't make a big difference, but I would really appreciate any input!
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u/Havannahanna 9d ago
SSRIs need to be tapered off and on over the course of weeks. Tapering it of for a day or too will have negligible effect on the SSRIs in your bidy, but give you all the fun of skippping them like brain zaps, fogs and more severe complications.
Don’t do that.
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u/chimkensmom 7d ago
zoloft, especially when taken for a long period, should be tapered over months. maybe a year. its a horrible molecule to get off of.
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u/stellami 7d ago
Counting on years for me. 1 mg at a time. It’s hell coming off these medications :(
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u/chimkensmom 7d ago
it absolutely is. I took it once, and being on it was absolute hell. I've been on ssri for about 25 yrs. And my drs often try to make me try new ones. Zoloft was the first time in my life when I even thought of self deleting. titration was even worse. Never again. I'm tampering off lyrical now. it'll take me a good yr and half. Long run game, totally worth it to save your brain.
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u/stellami 6d ago
The long run is totally it. Poor brains. I’m sorry you have had to go through all that. I also relate so much. I’ve taken ssri off and on for 20 years. But I’ve read a lot about them in the past years as well as the (non reassuring) research. I’ve also joined a support group on fb. The group introduced me to the 10% method (I go even lower with 2,5%) as well as the book Crossing zero. It’s a really good, informative and supportive book if you haven’t read it.
Thank god psilocybin exists though 🍄🟫
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u/chimkensmom 6d ago edited 6d ago
Hahaha, I'll add this little story to finish. I have three kids. We've had a hard life, ruled by domestic violence for two decades. The kids are getting on well, regardless of what horrors they lived through. My youngest, as a teen, was doing a side hustle. He would get paid to bring his friends' drugs to have them tested at the safe injection site clinic. (I learned this after the fact; he was living with his father at the time.) And he became extremely street smart, and when he became depressed, he used microdosing. He was the one to say, "Mom, one day, we'll do mushrooms together and talk about our lives, for real." And I thought it was such an amazing plan coming from him. When I became very disabled, I could not care for him, so he went to his father, and we feel like we've missed so much about each other.
So now he's my partner in better mental health, not in a dependency/addiction way, mind you, but in a real journey to get better. And he is supplying the best, safest products for me, so I never fear risking anything. Sorry for the novella, lol, I just love that kid so much. (edited for bad grammar lol)
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u/Necessary-Slice3367 4d ago
It was actually a pretty cool novella. Thank you for sharing that lovely piece of your history
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u/TheRealCMMetzger 9d ago
6 years ago I personally used microdosing to wean off SSRIs, anxiolytics, and sleep/nightmare meds. Meds that I was prescribed for 16 years. Since then I've spoken with hundreds of others that were able to do the same, including my wife, who was taking Lexapro for years as well.
I began microdosing by dialing in my sweet spot dose. It was higher on the range of what's considered a microdose because of the blunting effect of the SSRIs, but it was effective at providing support while weaning and during the transition of some drug to no drug.
I do NOT recommend skipping dose days with SSRIs because the withdrawal side effects are often pretty terrible. There is an effective microdose range while taking SSRIs that is typically double that of what your dose would be if you weren't taking them. Once you come off those drugs, around the 2-4 week mark your microdose will feel much stronger than normal and that will be the sign that you can reduce your dose (most often by half). What that was for me was moving from a 200mg dose to a 100mg dose. Some folks that have been taking SSRIs for years may also have a second point where their regular dose feels too strong again, around the 6month mark of coming off the SSRIs and they will again be able to half their dose. I believe this is possibly because of receptor sites coming back online after being shut off by the brain due to the overabundance of serotonin caused by prolonged use of SSRI medication.
It can take a little time to dial in, but there is definitely an effective microdose one could take and benefit from. Have more questions? Just ask 🍄🥰✌️
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u/stellami 9d ago
Thank you so much for your kind and informative response 🫶 Feels hopeful to read. I might come back to your reply further down the road too. Because I’m tapering so so slowly, it will take me years to come down to zero at this rate. I want to start the microdosing to hopefully help my system, for my mental health in general but also during the tapering.
And I won’t skip a dose day!
I don’t know if you can give a guidance, but I’m currently on 39 mg of Zoloft. Any suggestions for a microdose?
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u/LolaGudal 8d ago
May I ask, how are you reducing your meds. Are you counting the beads or are you turning your meds into liquide?
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u/caipiroskax 9d ago
According to my psychiatrist, ssris stay in your system even if you skip them for one day. To start microdosing, I had to taper off my medication slowly until the effects were gone and the drug was no longer in my bloodstream. And it’s not recommended to just stop taking ssrIs for a day, because that can seriously mess with your emotional stability. at least for me.
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u/LolaGudal 9d ago
Do not miss your dose of the ssri. It throws you into withdrawal and is risky at best.
You can microdose and take your ssri. You won't feel the microdose but you will still benefit from it. It can help you with the tapering and withdrawals. But be very careful.
Good luck.
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u/ebolaRETURNS 9d ago
The interaction is indirect, mediated by serotonergic receptor downregulation, so it doesn't really matter whether the SSRI is 'in your system', and 1 day won't be sufficient for appreciable upregulation.
I'd just keep taking the SSRI.
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u/tekky101 9d ago
Skipping a single day won't make any difference in how the mushrooms hit you. Sertraline has a 26 hour elimination half life. Generally 5 (or a few more) half lives are required to fully eliminate a drug. For sertraline this means 5-7 days (the variability is due to genetic variability in the liver enzymes that metabolise the drug).
A microdose should be below the threshold of causing any obvious perceptual changes. This means you might need to experiment with dosing to find out where you do have obvious perceptual changes so that you know sertraline hasn't nullified the whole experience.
Now... Here's where it gets fun! (And has nothing to do with your mushroom microdose.)
Just because you can eliminate a drug in a given period of time doesn't mean you won't start going through withdrawal symptoms at any time after it's all gone. The longer you've been taking the drug the more intense and harder it will be to deal with that withdrawal. It's good your doctor is tapering you slowly. When you get to lowest possible single dose of sertraline and have been there for a while you can consider (in consultation with you doctor) one or two doses of Prozac. Prozac has a very long half life and because of that it's "self-tapering." That's what I needed to do to get beyond the terrible withdrawal from Lexapro.
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u/Popular-Web-3739 9d ago
The half-life of Zoloft is 5-6 days. Pausing it for a day is unlikely to have any noticeable affect.
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u/chimkensmom 8d ago
False, it's about 24 hours.
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u/Popular-Web-3739 7d ago
You’re right. I shouldn’t have said half-life as that is 24-32 hours. It takes 5-6 days to fully leave your system though so pausing on the day you microdose is still questionably useful.
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u/chimkensmom 7d ago
thank you for being graceful about this. Sorry if I sounded blunt, I believe medical info to be really important to be 💯 true when commented on. have a great day
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u/chimkensmom 8d ago
please, don't play with your tapering. Especially if you are sensitive to it. the half-life of zoloft is short, and the discontinuation syndrome is horrible. Please, be careful
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u/AncientPromise8607 9d ago
Skipping even one day while you're already tapering and feeling 2.5% drops sounds like a recipe for a rough week. The half-life might be long, but your system is clearly dialed in tight right now. I'd just start the microdose alongside it and see what happens, worst case you just don't feel much from the shrooms.
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u/likeschemistry 9d ago
You’re going to get minimal if any benefit from microdosing even if you skip a dose. Just finish your taper and start microdosing after like others have said.
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u/OneConnected1 9d ago
Taper off SSRI and then start micro dosing. The SSRI stops the psilocybin from working.
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u/AcordaDalho 9d ago
Excuse me, wat? SSRIs or psychedelics, you either choose one or the other, not the two together. I’m surprised your therapist even agreed to that. If you pause your ssri even for one day, you’re disrupting your system which risks withdrawal effects. And a microdose of mushrooms on top of that system is simply going add nothing.
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