Posted by nutjob on March 30, 2006, at 17:19:20
In reply to Re: YES - Avoidant Personality and Amisulpride, posted by med_empowered on March 30, 2006, at 14:05:31
Here's the meds I've tried over the past 5 years in various doses and combinations:
Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa, Lexapro, Effexor, Paxil, Geodon, Zyprexa, Abilify, Seroquel, Guanfacine, Adderall, Concerta, Dexedrine, Strattera, Provigil, Remeron, Depakote, Lithium, Klonopin, Xanax, Ativan, and probablly others I can't even think of right now.
Abilify at 7.5 mgs left me zombified and virtually catatonic.
Seroquel at 25 mgs knocked me out for 15 hours, and then when I awoke and the hangover wore off I felt enraged and agitated for no apparent reason. When I took my standard dose of dexedrine these feelings disappeared.
Geodon at 20 mgs made me extremely hyperactive, agitated...I found myself frantically pacing around my house for hours. I literally couldn't stop moving. Again I took some dexedrine and the problem subsided.The best social anxiety relief I ever found was when I took a combination of Prozac at 60 mgs and 1 mg klonopin twice daily. However I became extremely impulsive, prone to rages, and completely out of control. The doctor augmented this combination with Zyprexa, but immediately my social anxiety returned and I began to stutter and mispronounce words a great deal.
The second best combination I have found for social anxiety is dexedrine and klonopin, but only when taken a certain way: 1 or 2 mgs of klonopin before bed, which seems to linger on into the following morning, and then 15 mgs dexedrine ER in the morning. However the effects varied from day to day and over time I couldn't tolerate the autonomic nervous system overstimulation from the dexedrine.
Provigil and Strattera both increase my heart rate, and make my breathing rapid and labored, give me terrible insomnia...further, they actually WORSEN my focus and memory.
Remeron, which I understand to be noradrenergic and serotonergic, eased some of the side effects of the stims, but actually made me irritable around people and generally unsociable. And over time, in spite of increasing the dose, it no longer remedied the stim-induced insomnia.
The SSRI's have never done a damned thing for me, with the exception of Prozac which induced mania.
From all this it seems that for me increasing noradrenaline is bad. Decreasing dopamine is bad. Altering serotonin has neutral effects for the most part. And so my crude hypothesis is, perhaps if I increase dopamine levels in isolation from all other neurotransmitters I might get some relief.It's a shot in the dark, but my life is miserable, and I have to keep trying.
> hi. From the sounds of things, a low-dose neuroleptic might be helpful; for some reason, they can be kind of "pro-social" in low doses w/o causing too many undesirable side effects. Have you considered maybe trying very low-dose Abilify? In my limited personal experience, very low doses seemed to smooth things over for a bit, so I was able to function. It was really one of the most positive experiences I've had on medication--the only downside is that it is still very much an antipsychotic, so all the fun neuroleptic side effects crept up after a while. Also..some people apparently benefit from as-needed use of antipsychotics. I can see how extreme psychic tension and anxiety that only partially responds to other methods could be helped by intermittent use of neuroleptics; perhaps that, too, is an option.
>
> Have you tried Provigil? It might help with attentional stuff and help counteract ill effects on cognition from anything you choose to take.
poster:nutjob
thread:626462
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060329/msgs/626720.html