Since I use Seroquel for toning down my hypomania's, I have been on and off of Seroquel a number of times.
I have also been on a maintenance level of 100 mg for a time.
The highest I have been was 600 mg, but that was when my pdoc wanted to use it as a mood stabalisor. That didn't work for me. It was playing havoc with my hormones and periods. I was just plain miserable without being able to pinpoint exactly how.
Recently I had to take Seroquel again because of serious changes in m life which had triggered a full blown hypomania. This time the side effects were worse than I can remember from other times. I suspect that I have become more sensitive to that stuff. I was out for the count for 4-5 days (being a total zombie!, spending all my time in bed) and for 2,5 weeks I was basically not functioning. Although the side effects did even out a bit, I still suffered from:
feeling as if lead had replaced my muscles
severe tiredness
memory loss
little to no concentration
severe dry mouth
constipation
when talking it felt as if my mouth wasn't able to form the words, it took an enormous efford to talk at times
weight gain!
and probably a couple of other things I have missed.
I started with 50 mg and build it up to 200 mg. Than I slowly went down and now I am off it, halleluyah!! But I still suffer from some side effects, even though the Seroquel should have left my body by now.
I don't experience much of adverse side effects when tapering of, thankfully.
I have enough of Seroquel and won't be using it again. My pdoc hassuggested to use Ablify. Who has experience with that?
The Crazy Rambler
Thanks for responding 24hbipolar2,
how much weight gain are you talking about? And did you start gaining whenever the dose went up? how much have you taken at one time?
as everybody else i really hate the weight gain. i have had issues with weight, but now it is out of control. the issues i have with it, i mean.
thanks
anyone else?
the crazy rambler
I am so much happier now that I am off of the seroquel.I started out slow too, I never did get to that high of a dose. Like they wanted me to, cause I refused to take it. If I only need to be comatose and sleep my life away, it works fine? But, I have a life and 3 sons and I need to go to NA & counseling & therapy meetings. I cannot just sleep for the remainder of my life. If I continued with the serquel I would have a much different lifestyle. I started slow and then accidently took 2 pills like you did and boy was sorry for that mistake. I slept for 4 days straight and scared my friends & family out of the wits? They almost called 911 because of it. I am better off without it, but it sure does help when your dilerious with pain from a toothache and can't sleep for nothing. It worked wonderfully on that problem. I will try another medication in the future, seroquel isn't not a good fit for me and my lifestyle at this day and age.
Although in the last 3 1/2 years, I have been taking medication for Bipolar Disorder, I have never run completely out of medication. Because of my schedule I couldn't get to the pharmacy for 2 days after my Abilify and Xanax ran out.
I have experienced withdrawal symtoms many times. (Some uninformed doctors had gotten me hooked on pain medications.) I had to experience withdrawal symptoms again last week. No sleep at all last Wednesday night, stomach cramping, diarrhea, nauseous, shaky and weak feeling--and pain. My body just ached.
Now I don't know if it was the combination of running out of Abilify and Xanax, or just because of running out of the Xanax I experienced the withdrawal symptoms--because benzodiazepenes are a BITCH to try to stop. For me withdrawal symtoms become so bad, I would not be able to work, if I had a job and was `going through withdrawals. So sometimes withdrawal symptoms are NOT something that you "can just tough it out." Especially the Xanax it needs to be tapered, but you may still experience withdrawal symtoms.
Marcia- you mentioned first in your article.... 'if your side effects are serious enough' to get off of your current medications which leaves a rather vague definition of 'what is?'...... serious enough?
I have suffered bone loss from my current anti seizure medications. Do I wait until I break an actual bone to acknowledge serious enough side effects?
And YES, discontinuing your meds should be done as slowly as you can possibly wait for total withdrawal......I feel that I have been taking medications for years and if it take a year to get off these current meds successfully then bravo for me!
I wish doctors were able to be more honest with what side effects they have experienced with their own clients in taking similiar dosages of same medications- especially those not listed on our warning pages of information when we are receiving these monthly drugs.
Well, I was talking about discontinuing a medication suddenly - as if you develop a rash from Lamictal (lamotrigine), have seizures or fainting spells, have trouble breathing, etc.
In your situation, talk to your doctor as soon as possible about the bone loss situation. Is the physician who diagnosed bone loss sure it is from that particular medication? How severe is it? Is it getting worse with each bone scan? Could you take one of the new medications that helps reverse bone loss? (I cannot, due to their side effects.) Having the physician and the psychiatrist talk to each other might be of great help. Good luck!
Dear Marcia,
Thanks for your sharing and insight.
To me, staying on medication doesnt mean that we arent well -- it keeps us calm and helps us function -- to achieve mental and social well-being really.
However, if I do plan to get pregnant, say in two years, is there any harm that I start to stop medication eventually from now? (given that i have been stable for one to two years).
I really am not keen on having any psychiatric drugs when having baby. And I do want to breastfeed him/her. Any alternative therapy while slowing getting off drugs and during the traumatic 10 months? Any advice is welcome.
Thanks!
J
Last year I decided to take myself off Zyprexa. I was taking zyprexa, trileptal, wellbutrin and lamictal. This is a combination that save my life.
However after taking zyprexa for years I decided to stop be cause I think it ws beginning to cause the symptom of being cloudy. I felt I had healed to the point that I was over medcaticating.
But I also quit because the zyprexa was killing me. Weight gain was horrendus. Diabetes, worry over liver damage.
I tried to get off by stages, but every time I did that I would really get kicked with symptom and I would go back to the regualar dosage. Finaly I made up my mind just to quit. It was hard. I was sick for two months, emotions bouncing up and down, fatigue, nausea and worst of all panic attacks. But I hung in there.
After about two months the withdrawl symptoms dissapated.
I truely believe that getting off the zyprexa had enhanced my healing process.
I was warned of the side effects when the doctor prescribed it but I was so very sick that I was willing to take a chance that it would not kill me.
Now I have the lamictal and trileptal down to half dosage. I am still taking a full does of wellbutrin, that is my next goal, to get that dosage down.
I would not recommend my method to anyone else since everyone reacts differently, but that system worked for me.
Same thing with quitting smoking. I tried over and over to just taper down, but i still had cravings so bad I would start back again. s long as I was putting any nicotine in my body I could noit quit.Then I decided to quit cold turkey. Two months of withdrawl then they dissapaited.
Sending good energy to all of us.
I take 700mg of Seroquel, 300 in am, 400 in pm, going down at all completly messes me up. I dont know what I would do if I had to switch meds again b/c that is such a HUGE dose, my body would not respond well. But I hate medicine withdrawal, I know that fuzzy feeling your talking about, its not a good feeling. I agree with talking to your doctor right away b/c it can be fatal withdrawals.
I would rather shoot myself in the foot ... than stop medications again. It happens, it is the vicious cycle. I get better. I have self-stigma, I'm cured, or so I think, and then six months go by. Bang. Symptoms. I am symptomatic again. One thing leads to another. One symptom and then another. Before I know it, it is full blown mania and mixed states. I am paralyzed in unwellness. I am totally in control ... or am I. This is the me I don't like. The me that is socially undesirable. Everything is more difficult this way. I don't put it together, everything is unclear. Ah, my psychiatrist reviews my medications. "Remember when you went off so and so, or such and such for experimental purposes?" Yes, I am thinking ... I have done it again. The yo-yo factor, medications and me.
If medications are stabilizing your moods, stay on them ! , or if symptoms unbearable, and really worth risking depression and mania again by stopping them, decide with your psychiatrist which one or ones you could dispense with and do it very gradually. You may still need to reamin on some, orconsider something different perhaps. Sometimes just tweaking dosages just a little seems to make a big difference withoit completely losing yoir stability. I think that many of the symptoms people are atribute to medication withdrawal may well be the symptoms of the illness returning for which they were taking the meds in the first place. For exapmple feeling very tired, exhausted , foggy headed,or needing to sleep for hours are actually common symptoms of Bipolar Depression anyway, with or without medications, not necessarily of withdrawal of meds.
It is an atypical symptom called hypersomnia and very common in Bipolar 2 particularly. It is generally diofferent from the sleeppatterns found in Unipolar Depression where it is very fdifficult to slepp thoigh desperate to sleep, and with early morning wakening " in a low, anxious mood, not at all like the sleep difficulties of highs moods where there is no desire to sleep and no subjective feeling of tiredness. Anxiety / agitation too is a symptom of mixed moods and manic / hypomanic moods as iis difficulty concentrating and appetite changes.
When coming off a medication, or medications, that have been taken for sometime (and in some cases, with some meds, a relatively short time)... whether it is due to an emergency situation (like a serious adverse reaction) OR any other reason you feel warrants the withdrawing of the said med(s)... always always always do so under the guidance of a licensed practicing prescribing physician.
Not only do they have more of the medical expertise to perhaps better advise as to how BUT they also are the ones responsible for your medical care should something go awry due to you following their advisement and instructions.
Your body and brain becomes acclimated to the chemicals in which you place within it. Overtime, the levels of the chemicals build up and the body/brain works on those levels. Once you start messing with the levels, the body/brain reacts and in doing so... you will have reaction symptoms or withdrawal symptoms.
Sometimes, they will be a worsening of the symptoms for which you took the med for in the beginning OR they could be a whole new host of brand new, never before had, symptoms (ie., seizures, psychosis, convulsions, etc..).
Even if doc is adding another while withdrawing one, your body/brain has to re-acclimate itself to the withdrawing of one and the addition of another.
Sudden, cold turkey stoppage, could quite possibly kill with some medications as well.
So... you really really do need to be under the guidance of a trusted licensed prescribing physician and/or prescribing provider.
For 2 yrs, I took 900mg of Seroquel per day. 300 in the mornings and 600 at night. (My brother was put on 50mg and all he wanted to do was sleep.) But after a while, it became totally ineffective and it also seemed to make it difficult to breathe shortly after I would take it. That was scary. So I convinced my pdoc to put me back on Zyprexa. He stopped the Seroquel almost cold turkey. He does not believe in tapering off of any medication. Every time I have switched from one medication to another (whether antidepressants, antipsychotics, or Klonopin) he has just immediately switched me from one to the other, in 10 days or less. Fortunately, I had no withdrawal symptoms when I went off the Seroquel.
Zyprexa, however, is another matter. I started off taking 40mg back in 1997, which is a huge dose. (It always seems to take a big dose of everything in my case.) My weight doubled in a few months and I was still ravenous every minute. The weight caused my blood pressure to go up to 180/110 and I had to start high bp meds. My thyroid bottomed out and I had to start taking Synthroid. I developed GERD and have to take Nexium twice a day. Plus Zyprexa demands that I take a nap 2-3 times a day. I felt I was eating and sleeping my life away. So I tried a number of other antipsychotics (Haldol, Risperdal, Clozapine, Seroquel, Abilify, Geodon) and none of them worked for long. Only Zyprexa would take away my sz symptoms and depression.
I have tried several times to taper off of the Zyprexa. If I stopped it immediately, by the next day I would be vomiting my head off and hallucinating and having racing thoughts and end up in the hospital. So I have tried several times to taper off slowly. My daily dose (as prescribed) is now 15mg and I slowly reduced that to zero. But each time, it is only a matter of days (or at the most a couple of weeks) before the symptoms of sz appeared. My pdoc says it is because I have chronic sz that requires Zyprexa for the rest of my life. But it is a love/hate relationship: I love the fact I am sane, I hate the fact that I am fat and a zombie. But I am wondering if this withdrawal spiral down is simply that -- withdrawal. And not chronic sz. I keep thinking, "This time, I will take the Zyrpexa as prescribed and forget about going off of it." But then when my weight begins creeping back up (often 7-9 lbs a week) and I'm sleeping too much, I try to taper off of it again.
So back and forth. I know that can't be good for me. I'm afraid it will damage my brain and/or body. But it seems the only way I can deal with the side effects. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Carolyn
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Actually when it comes to stopping a medication...keep in mind some medications when you stop abruptly can actually kill you. Never go off a medication without a doctor on board to help you accomplish this.