What Happens If You Stop Taking Antidepressants?

Summary: If you stop taking antidepressants, three things may happen: you may experience mild, moderate, or severe symptoms associated with stopping them, you may relapse to depression, or you may experience little to no effect from stopping them.

Key Points:

• If you stop taking antidepressants, you may develop antidepressant discontinuation syndrome (ADS)
• The symptoms of ADS are most often mild to moderate, but in some cases, can be uncomfortable, problematic, and severe
• Tapering or switching antidepressants before discontinuation can reduce likelihood of developing ADS
• New research shows ADS may be less prevalent than previously reported

Note: if you have a mental health disorder and a prescription for antidepressant medication is part of your treatment plan, it’s essential to consult your psychiatrist or the provider managing your medication before changing your dosage or discontinuing use.

Is Antidepressant Withdrawal a Thing?

There are many reasons you may want to stop taking antidepressant medication if you have a mental health disorder like depression. You may feel like you’ve developed the coping skills to manage depression without medication, you may not be okay with the side-effects of the medication, the medication may not be working for you, or you may want to stop taking antidepressants for a personal or cultural reason.

In any case, the decision is yours to make – with the expert input of your psychiatrist or treatment team, of course. Before you stop taking antidepressants, it’s essential to review the risks and benefits of discontinuation, and make an informed decision based on real, peer-reviewed evidence published in reputable scientific journals, or made publicly available by trustworthy public sources.

Before we go any further, though, we’ll address the question of withdrawal. Here’s the answer:

Yes and no.

Yes, if withdrawal means you may experience symptoms that you wouldn’t have if you kept taking antidepressants. That’s ADS, which we describe above. No, if you’re talking about a withdrawal syndrome like those associated with substances of misuse such as alcohol or opioids. In other words, you may experience uncomfortable symptoms – we’ll share how often that happens, below – but there’s very little chance you’ll experience the extreme discomfort that happens when a person stops taking a substance of misuse.

New Research on ADS: Prevalence of Symptoms When You Stop Taking Antidepressants

A group of researchers based in the United Kingdom designed the meta-analysis “Incidence and Nature of Antidepressant Discontinuation Symptoms: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” published in July 2025, in order to answer the question:

“What are the incidence and nature of symptoms following discontinuation of antidepressants?”

The research team examined data from 50 studies with information from 17,828 participants with a clinical MDD diagnosis who discontinued antidepressant use. Follow-ups to assess presence of discontinuation symptoms occurred between one (1) and fifty-two (52) weeks post-discontinuation, with presence of symptoms measured by results on a standardized metric called the Discontinuation-Emergent Signs and Symptoms [DESS] Scale, as well as individual reports from patients who discontinued antidepressants.

That study is exactly what we’re looking for, and can help us tell you what might happen if you stop taking antidepressants. Before we share the results of that study, we’ll review the information we currently have on the prevalence of antidepressant medication, what the symptoms of ADS are, and how long each different type of antidepressant stays in your body.

Antidepressants: Prevalence of Use, Discontinuation Symptoms, Haf-Life

First, we’ll look at prevalence of antidepressant use among adults 18+ in the U.S.

Data published by the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHNES) shows that between 2015 and 2019, 13.2 percent of adults in the United States used prescription antidepressant medication in the past 30 days, with use greater among females than males, with use a 17.7 percent and 8.4 percent, respectively.

Next, we’ll look at the symptoms associated with discontinuing antidepressants.

An article from Harvard Health at Harvard Medical School, published in 2022, called “Going Off Antidepressants” offers helpful information about the common side-effects of discontinuing antidepressants. Here are the most common types of symptoms:

• Digestion: Nausea, vomiting, cramps, diarrhea, or loss of appetite.
• Circulation: excess sweating excessively, flushing, discomfort in hot weather.
• Problems with sleep: difficulty falling asleep, nightmares/strange dreams.
• Balance: dizziness, lightheadedness, feeling unsteady on feet.
• Atypical movement/movement control: tremors, restless legs, unsteady gait, problems chewing, speech difficulty.
• Emotions: Mood swings, agitation, anxiety, mania, depression, irritability.
• Other: uncommon symptoms include pain or numbness, sensitivity to light/sound, odd sensations in head, sometimes called brain shivers.

Note: don’t let that list alarm you. Review the prevalence of these symptoms in the sections to follow before making definitive conclusions.

With that information in mind, let’s look at the data on how long each of the most common antidepressants stays in the human body. In the bullet points below, we list the medication, followed first by its brand name, second by the length of time it takes for half of the medication to leave your body – called the half-life – and third by the length of time it takes for 99 percent of the medication to leave your body.

Serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs):

• Paroxetine (Paxil) 24 hours, 4.4 days
• Sertraline (Zoloft) 26 hours, 5.4 days
• Escitalopram (Lexapro) 27 to 32 hours, 6.1 days
• Citalopram (Celexa) 36 hours, 7.3 days
• Fluoxetine (Prozac) Four to six days, 25 days

Serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors:

• Venlafaxine (Effexor) 5 hours, 1 day
• Duloxetine (Cymbalta) 12 hours, 2.5 days
• Desvenlafaxine (Pristiq) 12 hours, 2.5 days
• Vortioxetine (Trintellix): 65 hours, 14 days

Dopamine and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors:

• Bupropion (Wellbutrin) 21 hours, 4.4 days

At this point, it’s important to understand that the shorter the half-life, and the quicker the medication leaves your system, the more likely the presence of discontinuation symptoms. That’s why some patients, under the recommendation/advice of their provider, may switch to an antidepressant with a longer half-life before discontinuing use.

Now we’re ready to share the results of the study we introduce above.

Symptoms, Effects, and Outcomes When You Stop Taking Antidepressants

Previous research suggests that around 20 percent of patients who stop taking antidepressants meet the criteria for antidepressant discontinuation syndrome, or ADS. However, the research team that conducted the study we discuss in this article cites problems with that estimate, including the lack of random controlled trials (RCTs) with a placebo group. This meta-analysis includes only RCTs, which increases the likelihood of accuracy, and may offer a better idea of the real-world prevalence of ADS among people who stop taking antidepressants.

Presence of Symptoms Within Two Weeks of Discontinuation

• Dizziness: 7.5%
• Nausea: 4.1%
• Vertigo: 3%
• Headache: 4.7%
• Nervousness/irritability: 3.02%
• Diarrhea: 3.06%
• Strange dreams/nightmares: 2.86%
• Vomiting: 1.86%
• Loss of appetite: 1.63%
• Tremors: 0.76%
• Low mood: 1.29%
• Dry mouth: 0.41%
• Palpitations/tachycardia: 0.21%
• General pain: 1.71%
• Upper respiratory infection: 3.22%
• Insomnia: 2.67%
• Fatigue/excess sleeping: 1.63%

To meet the criteria for antidepressant discontinuation syndrome (ADS), i.e. the presence of symptoms associated with stopping antidepressant medication, patients must report at least 4 or more of the symptoms listed above within 1-2 weeks of the last antidepressant dosage.

In this study, DESS scores were below ADS threshold for the following medications:

• Duloxetine (Cymbalta)
• Desvenlafaxine (Pristiq)
• Vortioxetine (Trintellix)

Additional results showed that discontinuation was not associated with fatigue, paresthesia, tremor, or pain, and rates of two of the most uncomfortable symptoms were low:

• Headache: 1.5%
• Diarrhea: 0.97%

Also, medications that cleared the body fastest – venlafaxine and desvenlafaxine – showed the highest prevalence of symptoms, with dizziness as the most common symptom:

• Desvenlafaxine: 9.4% reported dizziness
• Venlafaxine: 17.5% reported dizziness

Finally, researchers made this important observation:

“Antidepressant discontinuation was not associated with greater depressive symptoms in the first 2 weeks compared to placebo, despite being measured in studies specifically examining MDD.”

What this means is that depressive symptoms are not a significant component of ADS, since they don’t appear within two weeks of discontinuation. Symptoms of depression that appear more than two weeks after stopping antidepressants are likely a relapse to MDD rather than a symptom of ADS.

How This Information Helps

This meta-analysis, with its focus on random-controlled trials and studies that compared discontinuation of antidepressants with discontinuation of placebo, showed a lower rate of ADS – antidepressant discontinuation syndrome – than previously reported. Earlier studies showed wide variability in rates, anywhere between 20 and 50 percent.

The research team on this study theorized that this may be the result of several factors, the first being lack of RCTs, and other revolving around a lack of clarity on the definition and threshold for clinical diagnosis of ADS.

Here’s how the researchers summarized their findings:

“On average, those who discontinue antidepressants experience 1 more discontinuation symptom compared to placebo or continuation of antidepressants, which is below the threshold for clinically important discontinuation syndrome.”

This information helps us by offering a realty check, of sorts, on the conflicting publicly available information about what happens when you stop taking antidepressants. Here’s what the evidence says: ADS is a real syndrome, and in some cases can be extreme and severe, but – according to this new research – it may not be as prevalent as previously reported.

Here’s the simplest way to think about it: when you stop taking antidepressants, having some symptoms is common, but having severe symptoms is rare.

In the end, the decision to continue or discontinue antidepressant medication is personal, unique to each individual situation, and should be the result of an open and honest conversation between patient and provider, where both parties review the evidence and make an informed decision on the best path forward, based on full knowledge of risk, reward, individual needs, treatment progress, medical history, and patient goals.