Posted by bleauberry on March 31, 2011, at 17:12:07
In reply to Previous hospatilizations = more meds?, posted by herpills on March 29, 2011, at 15:59:48
> Well, I'm ready to give up on Abilify because I can't stand the akathesia and increased anxiety, and I refuse to take more Klonopin just to ease those side effects. The thing is, my pdoc thinks that since I have been in the hospital before for my bipolar that I have to be on an antipsychotic. I just don't feel like just because I have been in the hopital means I need to be on certain classes of meds. I'm stable right now on lamictal and lexapro. Has anyone else had this experience from their pdoc? herpills
The hospital's job is merely to stabilize the crisis. You are beyond that. Now the job is to get back to better functioning. Being stable on current meds is a good start. Not it just has to be improved upon. In that department, Abilify is obviously yelling out to anyone who will listen that it is not the drug to do that job.
I would replace it with Nortriptyline, starting very low. The hard part, no matter what you do, will be getting off Abilify. If you do that, plan on a slow weaning in tiny steps. Its long halflife makes that a little easier....every other day, every third day, etc...and if needed use a razor blade to make custom sized pill chunks. They don't have to be accurate for this. No matter, you can expect some dysphoric yuckiness and a false alarm return of depression and false alarm anxiety after you are done with. Adjustment period. So if you start another med within that window, you won't know what is doing what.
If it were me, I would begin lowering the abilify dose and cross tapering in a replacement med like nortriptyline at very low doses. I would extend the cross taper as long as possible to avoiid any big unstaiblization, which would be a sign of moving too fast in the process.
It isn't the amount of meds we take that assures a better outcome...often just the opposite actually....it's the choice of meds and doses customized for the particular person.
I mentioned Nortriptyline for particular reasons specific to your situation.
I've been hospitalized and also failed all the meds and ECT. So how many psych meds does it take to keep me stable? Zero. The meds were actually part of the problem. What keeps me feeling my best are substances that aren't even psychoactive. But that's another story. Well actually, I guess ultra low dose naltrexone could be considered psychoactive. But everything else is purely non-psychoactive and not intended for depression, but just happen to work better on my depression than anything else. I guess I'm probably hitting the depression causing disease itself head on rather than just trying to manipulate the symptoms.
poster:bleauberry
thread:981411
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20110321/msgs/981576.html