So I did 10mg of Abilify for 2 weeks, now I’ve been on 15mg of Abilify for a week, and what I’ve noticed is that my paranoia seems to be much less but I’m still hearing voices and seeing things. I’ve also realized that I’m not believing in my usual delusions! So it’s like it’s helping some symptoms but not helping others… I’m also on Seroquel 50mg twice a day. The Seroquel is helping my anxiety, I haven’t needed Xanax in 3 days (a record lol) and it’s helping my depression too.
So what do I do? Do I ask the doctor to push me up to 20 of Abilify or do I ask the doctor to give me 200 of Seroquel? Agh.
Well I read on drugs.com that going above 15 of Abilify usually doesn’t make a difference. 15 is as good as it gets. Now, I was on the 10mg for 2 weeks so the amount in my system is probably around a 12.5 at the moment. So it should still be doing its job right now.
I’m guessing you picked up that information from the forum section. Please remember that every brain is different, and different doses are more effective for different people.
No I picked that up from the dosage information section, drugs.com is a good resource created by pharmacists to inform patients about their medications. It said that research has shown a dose of 20 or 30 is no more effective than a dose of 15.
"ABILIFY has been systematically evaluated and shown to be effective in a dose range of 10 to 30 mg/day, when administered as the tablet formulation; however, doses higher than 10 or 15 mg/day were not more effective than 10 or 15 mg/day. "
That is in general. Some people are outliers. I do agree that drugs.com is generally a good source, but it is definitely not meant to presuppose actual doctor advice. Some people need 20 or 30 mg.
I had the same thing w Abilify. On 10 mg I no longer had paranoia but I still had my delusional beliefs, hallucinations, talking w entities and voices, etc. My therapist wanted me on 15 but I refused because I was getting so many bad side effects.
I had a run-in with abilify twice. For only 2 weeks at 10mg the first time, I was still seeing things but didn’t really believe any of the paranoia; delusions were easy to just “brush off”.
The second time I kept at it for over a month (also 10mg) and had the same experience but with worse side effects (I promised myself I’d keep at it no matter the side effects…I failed) It gave me anxiety, horrible dreams that seemed so real, and an uncontrollable rage that almost ended my (and a few others) lives. So, safe to say Abilify is not for me. But I do know what you mean about it only knocking out a few symptoms. All it really does is make the symptoms more tolerable. They never fully go away IMO.
i have a lamictal induced psychosis that never went away
i always had to up my abilify dose until the point i am getting injections 400 mg once 28 days
right ninjastar. i switched to 30 abilify long ago and when they tried lowering it back to 15 it was horrible for me so i am back on the 30 and loving it. judy