ive taken serequel for a year now. and other times past. i don't call this living. i miss church on sunday. i miss lunch with friends. i miss driving. i wake up at 2pm everyday. lately i slept all day. i sleep twice because medicated sleep time is more like paralysis. time when my brain may be hallucinating. i dream i have children i don't know about. one of the children i don't know about had a botched circumcision. a voice recently told me my unrealized child was both male and female and had had a sex change. my life was better the way it was before. before the change to daylight savings time. i always have an episode when they change the clocks. last year my episode landed me an increase in dosage to risperdone orally dissolving tablets times two.two two mg tablets. and they also added serequel. its just not fair i want my life back. after taking the two meds together i metamorphose into sleep paralysis. muscle rigidity and wake up sweltering in bed at 2pm. im addicted to the serequel. i needed to be weaned off.
Q: what can i take while weaning myself off serequel to replace serequel
Hello,
I am sorry to hear of the side effects and understand they are upsetting to you.
Even with that I would urge you to work with your doctor to either change the dose, or change the dose times, or change the medication, or add an adjunct medication that can help promote wakefulness.
These are all options you have that would be better than discontinuing your antipsychotic on your own. I would also be reluctant to try to quit the drug with a doctor's supervision, as I have done that and I had to be hospitalized again for two weeks because I got sick again.
The reality is people diagnosed with schizophrenia who discontinue their meds will relapse. After repeated episodes, it will be slim that a person can regain his or her level of functioning prior to the relapse.
I understand you do not want to hear this.
What alarmed me was your term "weaning myself off" because that infers you are going to do this on your own.
We are not psychiatrists and cannot precribe medication or tell you what to do with your medication.
So like I said if I were you I would work with your psychiatrist to find a drug routine that minimizes the side effects in the long term.
When I first went on the Geodon and was taking the Stelazine at the same time, I would fall dead asleep on the couch in the kitchen at work after lunch. When the cross-titer was done with and I was only on the Geodon, I no longer had that problem. A switch of the extra dose of Geodon to nightly dosing instead of in the morning stopped me from falling asleep at work.
So I would contact your psychiatrist and work with him or her. And if you feel the doctor isn't receptive, or that he's prescribing medication with a "paint-by-numbers" or "one-dose-fits-all-patients" approach, you may need to find another doctor who will work with you.
I do hope you find some relief.
Regards,
Christina
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