My aunts, uncles, mum, dad all said to me , I have nothing wrong with me and I didn’t need these meds. I didn’t listen to them for four years, took it as prescribed and then finally I started believing them and came off. Big mistake. I told my aunt and she’s like go back on them you need them you could see her voice was breaking, she realised what she has done. I mean thank you very much.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me. My moods feel all over the place, normal happy panic sad. thankfully not psychotic … yet. I know this can be associated symptoms of schizophrenia but wow they are extreme. They feel so anyway.
I hope you aren’t heading for a full-blown relapse.Yeah, people don’t understand about medication. It’s often a punch line in some comics stand-up routine. Or like your family they don’t think you need it. When I was renting a small studio back in 1987. I made friends with a neighbor about my age. Things were fine for awhile until he started getting more and more suspicious that I was hiding something.When he discovered I take medication he went crazy and threw my meds away and eventually he got angry and violent about my mental illness.But I understand that your family might have influenced you to go of your meds. But now they should know better. You (and they) are apparently learning the hard way. Lesson learned.
My moods are pretty much all over the place too @anon80629714 My SZ symptoms are in check, my moodiness is from the bipolar acting up. They could be mood symptoms related to Schizoaffective or bipolar as well - do you have either one of those disorders? I am no doctor but it sounds like you may need a mood stabilizer possibly - I would talk to your doctor and tell him/her how you feel, see what he comes up with
Agreed. I had a few people convince me I don’t need to take medication, but over time I’ll become anxious and emotional. I get depression, chest pains, and my mind begins to feel like it’s being torn apart. After about three weeks or more I notice symptoms. I’ve tried coping without medication, it’s just too difficult or maybe impossible.
People only seem to say I don’t need meds when I’m ON my meds and they are working… when I’m most functional. They sure don’t see the behind the scenes. The unmedicated me…
For most people, they take meds when they are sick, and then when the infection or what ever clears up, they don’t take meds anymore. So they don’t understand why I CONTINUE to take meds when I seem to be doing well.
My Dad said it in a great way recently… He stepped in and told people he is on blood thinners and heart meds for the rest of his life. Would they suggest he stop taking those because he’s doing so well at the moment?
They said “Well NO, because if you don’t take your heart meds, you’ll have a heart attack”
My Dad said, “If my son doesn’t take his meds, he’ll have a head attack.”
I personally found that to be very humorous and touching at the same time.
At one point I was , but my Pdoc did not agree with the other pdoc. Whenever I presented with overspending symptoms, she acted as though I was making it up. It hard to be heard.
Get back on meds. There really isnt much to say about this. If your family doesnt believe in mental illnesses, they can shove that up their *** and you can keep visiting the pharmacy and taking medications from a professional who knows ■■■■ from shinola, not following the enlightened advice of your obviously stupid family members.
As for your mood, are you back on meds? It can take a while to get back to normal on meds, the brain gets pretty shaken up by trauma (yes, trauma, taking away 120mg of major tranquilizer that the brain has been receiving every day is in fact traumatic to the brain)
No I am not. Because I need to go through my doc to get back on them. I emailed her yesterday to call me if she can give me the go ahead. I was only on 5mg Abilify and didn’t think that it had much of an effect but it’s hell I am going through. I was ok for a few weeks, doing amazing. Then my GP said hypomania and suddenly that day when I went to work I was crying my eyes out. And for the next three days I was having what felt like panic attacks. I thought I was going to have a heart attack or losing my mind.
I disagree to a point. Just telling anyone out of the blue they dont need meds can be a set up for disaster. But there are some people on meds that have come off and become very successful or at least can manage, and in so doing they lose weight and rid themselves of other side effects.
But I have seen people who went off meds and became delusional and psychotic very fast and i would say until some other alternative is found they would certainly need to stay on meds.
I have been told by some doctors they recommend meds but never that i absolutely need them, just that they might help with certain issues…however I do not have those issues presently and havent for some time. many issues were trauma related, and some were even alcohol related when i tried to self medicate with alcohol for the traumas. Removing the alcohol and eating very healthy solved a huge amount of problems
. I have also had a couple doctors say i dont need meds, or that meds were available if I felt I needed them, leaving it up to me.
Mind you I was only SZA bipolar and that dx was even changed to a non SZ dx.
IF a person goes off meds they should not stop cold turkey (I have observed both weaning slowly and cold turkey), and they should watch themselves and have someone else who is trustworthy like a close family member or friend they spend a lot of time around watch them.
yeah my doc calls me back in a few hours tops. You need to tell them its an emergency and that you need a refill of your meds. Never go back off meds if you are doing well. I feel pretty damn normal and its because I take my meds, not because I am “better” and “dont need meds anymore”.
People will voice their opinions. I would only listen to people who have the title of “Doctor”, their opinions are usually worth listening to and obeying. My doctors are really good, I trust them with my sanity and do exactly what they tell me to do. It works pretty well.
I listened to this good Christian woman. She was 7th Day Adventist and was adopting my nieces. She came over all the time and told me how the medications were masking who I really was and how I needed to get off of them and become a vegetarian. So I became a vegetarian and a 7th Day Adventist without medication. Boy, did I ever have to start all over from square one back on meds.
I would however caution that not ALL people worthy of the title doctor are worthy of one’s trust. I learned this the hard way the first time around and am still struggling to cultivate a relationship of trust with both therapists as well as psychiatrists.
Sadly, people are human and so are doctors. For myself, putting my absolute trust in my first doctor was the biggest regret of my life and in hindsight incredibly naïve of me. I SHAKE when I go in to meet a new doctor or therapist, literally my hands and legs shake uncontrollably.
I believe that it is this concept of the infallibility of doctors that allows a very few of them to get away with being idiots. If you have a good doctor who you can trust, this is golden, I however was traumatized by my first doctor and a therapist he referred me to. Let’s just say he thought there was more than one person inside me and one of these had killed someone…
So feel it out, do your homework and use your judgment. Never trust blindly in any human being, trust must be gained and no one’s title whatever this is should make them infallible.
My take on this is that meds are a good thing, however they can cause bad side effects. I’ve experienced my share of them, and thats definately not fun. When your not taking meds life seems more fun and spontaneous. I know some people who have been off meds for years and doing really good. I guess some people can do it and some cant. If there were no side effects I would willingly take whatever they gave me for as long as they wanted, but reality is that I seem to respond with side effects to almost all meds.
I feel bad about saying this, but I am thankful for my two Great Aunts that had sz. I know that is all kinds of wrong, but because of them I was able to get the help I needed. My Dad refused to think there was anything wrong with me and didn’t want me to have my meds.
But my Mom went through her Dad (my Grandad) getting calls in the middle of the night because something had happened with one of his sisters. It was hard on him and she saw it. It might have been hard on her too because from a young age she didn’t understand what was going on but saw that her Dad was hurting. She might have even known them. I don’t know. But because of her experience she knew that sz was no laughing matter and that it could get very, very bad.
I personally think that it is very rachet to tell someone else to stop taking medication. There’s so much of this anti-vaccination crap and ignorance that passes for wisdom. What I’d do in your situation is if you can’t reach your doctor in a few days go to a hospital. It is your quality of life that is at stake here. Never let anyone tell you to stop taking medication unless they are a trusted physician.
Learn to be passive aggressive with those types of people. Treat them as you would a contagious person. Their ideas are the poison which they hide under their “concern” about your health.
They are narcissists.
My son takes Clozapine. I remember doing research and the recommended starting medicinal amount was 450 mg, I do believe. My son only takes 450 when in active psychosis to get him stable. Once stable he gets weaned down to a much lower dose. His last pdoc ended up acknowledging that 150 was significant in his system and supported the lower amounts. 5 mg of Abilify may not seem like a lot however if it was allowing you to lead a better life then it is significant. I hope that you get a response from your doc very soon so that you can feel better.