Did it continue to improve your mood past the six week mark? I know, from others who have taken it and Stahl’s works, that it can take up to five months to fully work for negative symptoms and cognition, but what about mood? I’m currently on 5 mg as an adjunct to Zyprexa for cognitive/negative symptoms and mood, and have been for a few days shy of six weeks already. My doc wants to wait one more month before increasing it as they feel it’s best to take a bit longer a wait to see how two antipsychotics work together. Just wondering if my mood will improve over the course of the next month or if this is it, and if I will need to have the dose increased more to get where I need to be mood-wise. Even just five is helping everything, though not strongly so. Yet.
I was on 10 mg abilify, and 2.5 mg Zyprexa . Due to stress and circumstances, i became depressed - or had an increase of negative symptoms. It’s difficult to tell whether its negatives or depression. My psychiatrist raised my abilify to 15 mg, i had some effect after 4 days. Now i am on 20 mg and my depression is under control, but i have some “zombiefication” on 20 mg, so i might go down to 15.
It sounds like you have a good and careful doc. 5 mg abilify is normally considered a low dose. 10 mg abilify is considered a minimum, and i had no sideeffects / zombification on 10 mg.
I don’t think you have to wait several months, i had an effect after a few days.