I have been stable on Risperidone 2 mg for the last 6 months with no delusions. I have a full-time job and I live with my family.
I feel that taking Risperidone has taken away a lot of joy from my life. It is hard to get enthusiastic about life and future. Could this feeling of blahness be a symptom of the underlying psychosis itself?
Risperidone, even at a low dosage started causing sexual dysfunction in the first two weeks itself.
Should I be content with the current state of things? Or should I give Abilify or some other drug a try?
Is it true that Abilify is notorious for causing Akathisia?
Changing meds could risk my current stability and might affect my job too. I am looking for advice, thanks!
You could be experiencing flat effect from the illness, not from the med.
About the sexual side effects, if itâs too much yeah, change medication.
Maybe some other members can give you some perspective on their experience with Abilify, but remember everybody is different and meds affect everyone differently.
Iâm on Abilify 20mg, before I was on 15mg and 10mg. It didnât cause akathisia or other extrapyramidal symptoms. I have sexual dysfunction but thatâs due to my illness, not medicine. On the contrary, Abilify is notorious for causing unwanted erections in some patients lol
I never really got along with abilify, I hated it. But everyone is different. You may really like it. Iâm on respiridone right now and have absolutely no sexual problems. That just goes to show that everyone handles meds differently. On abilify I had no interest in sex, but I was very active and always out. I made lots of friends on abilify⌠Just had no interest in sex or girlfriends, which isnât like me at all. Abilify was not for me, but u may like it and have no problems.
Risperidone is the cheapest atypical for a reason, it makes negative symptoms worse and makes you foggy mentally. Its easy to tolerate it just has the most unbearable side effects, thats why everyone is prescribed it right after their first episode, so they can move onto a better med.
Abilify has a corny name and that makes me biased against it thinking it will never work. There are some really together high functioning people on this forum who take abilify. There are also many who discontinued it due to the unbearable side effects.
Risperidone works for some people, for others Abilify works better. The only way you can figure out where you stand is through trial and error.
If you are working then things will fall into place. Takes awhile to start living without all of the dopamine. I take loxapine and two years later I finally feel like I have motivation. But then I will be 50 in 6 years and feel like its time to get it going. Give it time.
get a DNA test, I posted mine for you to see. Risperdal is on my definatey donât use list, but yours may be different.
Abilify is in my 2nd column, so I wonât try that one either. The pdoc said to stick to meds in the first column, thatâs what the report can tell you.
I switched from Risperidone to Geodon and it was a great decision for me personally. No sexual disfunction, except at higher doses. But everyone reacts to different meds differently. Also, I donât know if Geodon is available in India.
It is great to hear that Geodon is working well for you.
Geodon (Ziprasidone) is available in India. However, I donât handle capsules very well. I am scared of swallowing them (weird I know). I also do not want to get injections.
800mg seroquel xr gave me increased sexual pleasure but I was a zombie on it, It eliminated my higher order cognitive function.
Im on Rexulti a drug which is very similar to abilify. Im thinking of increasing Rexulti and decreasing Seroquel so I can lose some weight and maybe have my alogia improve.
If that doesnât work for alogia Im thinking of trying abilify. Hopefully it doesnât do any of the stuff people on here complain about it doing; eliminating concentration, causing insomnia, increasing negative sx. I couldnât tolerate any of thatâŚ
So I guess weâre in the same boat, both on the edge of trying Abilify but unsure of what effect it will have on us. I wish you luck!
I had a chat with my pdoc about trying aripiprazole but he was not in favor of switching to it. He mentioned how risperidone has been very good for my stability over the last few years. He also mentioned that tolerating aripiprazole is hard for many people. Overall, I have decided to stick with risperidone (2 mg at night) for now.
Also, I have started taking pacitane 2 mg in the morning to counter EPS.
Oh! Well, if youâve been stable on resperidone, maybe it is better to stick to that.
When I switched to Abilify it worked (and has worked) since 2008 for all my positive symptoms. The downside: without low cost health insurance, a monthâs supply costs over 700 dollars in the US!! I asked one of my pdocs back in 2009 or 2010 to switch me to something cheaper but his response was, âif itâs not broke, donât fix it,â meaning it wasnât worth the risk of going off one med and on another med with uncertain effects.
So, whatever works for you, maybe thatâs the best for the moment! Glad to hear youâve been stable these last few years!!! A full time job is great!! congrats on being a functional sz!
I didnât have a problem with akathesia when I took Abilify. It did amp me up, though. I actually got an increase in physical strength when they put me on it. They eventually had to take me off it because it got me too ampâed up. I think theyâre recommending that you take it with an antidepressant now.
Here in Romania we have a fund called PharmAccess, I donât know where they get money from, but they pay for whatever the insurance policy doesnât cover - in my case it means I pay exactly zero for my otherwise expensive Abilify medication.
