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Re: Lamictal for BPII -- Bad Day!

Posted by Lyrical13 on December 22, 2003, at 18:28:39

In reply to Re: Lamictal for BPII -- Bad Day!, posted by Tony P on December 22, 2003, at 15:12:03

Hi..
I had weird side effects coming off of Serzone when I was on it last year. I came off of 600mg over 2 weeks. The first week wasn't too bad but the 2nd week was horrible. Tues of week 2 I made it to work but wasn't there 10 min before I started sobbing uncontrollably and couldn't stop for several minutes. I managed to pull it together long enough to duck into my boss' office which was 2 doors down from mine. The minute I stepped into her office I started sobbing again. Thankfully both of my bosses have been incredibly supportive and understanding. But I cried all the way down the hall...someone had to drive me home. I was probably crying non-stop for a good hour. I ended up being off work the whole rest of the week. I was supposed to come completely off of the Serzone before starting the Effexor but when I talked to my pdoc he told me to continue the plan with decreasing the Serzone but to start the Effexor Wed night. Thursday I had the most bizarre side effects...Besides feeling incredibly zoned, so uncoordinated that I couldn't walk straight and feeling dizzy and exhausted, I felt like my skin didn't fit right on my body. I've never felt anything like that before!

Good news is by the next day the side effects weren't as bad and by the next Mon I was feeling much better.

The other thing I wanted to comment on was how you're saying you don't think you can make it till your docs appt and how you feel so awful. That's how I felt in Sept. The depression started creeping in around Aug 8...(that's about when the dreams started...the past few years in Aug or Sept I start having dreams where I'm incredibly depressed and I have no idea why) Anyway, shortly after the dreams started I increased the Effexor from 75mg to 150mg/day. I saw my pdoc 8-21 and he said to stay with that dose. School started (I work at a school) the next day and I was so incredibly anxious I could hardly think straight. It took so much energy to just get through the day...I had to write every little thing down and crossing something off of my daily routine was like a major accomplishment. I couldn't deal with running any errands after work..I would just go work out and then go home (I found exercise to be VERY helpful for both depression and anxiety but especially anxiety) I was also taking 0.5 mg of Attivan about every 6 hours. (I tend to be very sensitive to medication) A couple weeks later I was still really struggling and falling apart at school and I called my doc to ask him to increase my Effexor. He said to give it another week. I was like you...a week seemed like a year and I didn't know how in the hell I was going to make it that long feeling the way I did. A week later I called him again...that's when the suicidal thoughts started kicking in...he told me to wait ANOTHER week. That's when I started looking for another pdoc. I really didn't have a good feelign about him last year but was trying to give it a chance. I was so frustrated because I never knew how soon he was going to get back to me. It could be the same day or it could be 2 days later. That's an eternity when you're feeling like that.

Anyway, when he told me to wait ANOTHER week I was actually sobbing on the phone..he said that 150mg was the dose that worked last year so it should still work. I told him that it was a differnt time of year last year and he said that shouldn't matter. But it DOES for me. My worst time for the past 13 years has been Sept-Jan. He knew that. So here I am sobbing on the phone and he's saying "just give it a little more time..OK? OK?" So patronizing!!!!! The next day I asked my friend to sit with me for moral support while I called a new doc to make an appt. (the receptionist actually said she would have to check with the new doc to see if it was OK for me to switch docs! What was she? The secret police? I'm the client here...I'm paying the doc's salary..I can choose to go to whoever I want!) Anyway, that doc couldn't get me in for another month and I knew there was NO way I'd make it that long. Then my friend said I should call my current doc back...I was really nervous but we practiced what I would say. Of course I had to leave a message on voicemail because he wasn't available. BAsically I said that I had thought about what he said about waiting and about this dose being the right dose and had consulted with my husband and a close friend who had seen how I was on this dose last year and they both said that I was not doing anywhere near what I had been. also that time of year DOES matter for me...that I was trying to be proactive in preventing further difficulty and that I shouldnt' have to have a total breakdown to get help. I said that I thought it was time for a medical intervention and that my Effexor needed to be increased. He didn't call me back for THREE DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!

What really ticks me off is that I am usually someone who is trying to take as few meds on as low dose as possible. The fact that I was begging for a med increase should have tipped him off that I was having major problems. I finally did get him to increase the Effexor but I had to show up at his office at the end of the day with my husband in tow. Even then he tried to make me go into the day treatment program in order to get the med increase. When he saw we weren't falling for that, he then offered weekly appts. (I had been having a heck of a time getting monthly appts before) I said weekly appts would be wonderful (where the hell were the weekly appts last year when I was so bad that I missed 10 days of work between Sept and Christmas?!!!!!!!) Anyway, I did the weekly appts for a few weeks until I was able to get into a new doc (different one than the one with the KGB receptionist) I actually got in to see the new counselor and the new pdoc within a few days of my first phonecall but I wanted to make sure that I felt comfortable with the new set-up before firing the old doc.

Anyway, to make a short story long.....I love my new doc and my new counselor...actually care about my input and I am very much a part of the decision-making re: my care..which is as it should be IMHO.

Sorry I got off on such a tangent there. I didn't intend to rant and rave when I started this reply. all that to say, I totally get where you are and this too shall pass. Try to hang in there even if it's only by the skin of your teeth. I found that getting 7-8 hours sleep, setting up daily or almost daily things to do with friends or my husband after work, exercising every day, avoiding caffeine and sugar and eating healthy meals and snacks helped take the edge off. I also wrote down my agenda for the day so I didn't spend so much time stewing about what to do next.

Good luck to you. Believe it or not, there IS light at the end of the tunnel.

Lyrical 13

PS I also started saying a little mantra to myself off and on throughout the day. The one that helped a bit was "I've felt better before and I'll feel better again" When I'm in that dark place, it's so difficult to conceive that I'll ever feel any better so I have to remind myself that it IS possible.


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Psycho-Babble Medication | Framed

poster:Lyrical13 thread:292242
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20031219/msgs/292505.html