Posted by Ritch on February 7, 2005, at 12:30:03
In reply to Re: No more Lithium + questioning dx » Ritch, posted by CareBear04 on February 7, 2005, at 11:22:21
> ritch-- wow, that's such a low dose of depakote. did it really help you? i was on 250mg twice a day, and i thought that was too low. the drs said it was a good dose for me because i was about 100lbs, not very big. i was only on it for 2-3 weeks, so i didn' treally see a difference. but if that small a dose can really help, maybe it's worth another try? please let me know. thanks.
Hi, I'm medication sensitive (to just about everything). Also, I've seen some websites and even some BP guidelines mention that the lower end of the dosage scale for bipolar II is 250mg/day and for cyclothymia the lower end can be as low as 125mg/day. Even psycheducation.org mentions the lower dose range for bipolar (generally) of 750mg (+/-375mg) per day. I was on 500mg/day for a couple of years previously. I've increased to 500mg/day at times since then. I was on Depakote 500mg/day + 20mg/day of Ritalin and that seemed to work rather well from what I remember. It seems I respond to the "migraine" range of dosing with Depakote the best. I will admit that 250mg is definitely not enough right now. In the winter when I get run down I have to reduce it or I will be sleeping all the time. If you were on it for 2-3 weeks and didn't notice it helping much that might be misleading. When I started taking it (as a switch from lithium), I was in the middle of a depressive episode and I noticed that it didn't seem to help and even seemed to make things *worse*. If you will get a good response to it.. you will not really see the difference unless you are high and your mind is all racey. It really settles that down really quick for me.
poster:Ritch
thread:454220
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050207/msgs/454342.html