Vraylar 2 weeks on

Medications
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Have been on Vraylar now two weeks

The first dose was 1.5mg for week 1, now I am on 3mg

It made me feel nauseous for a bit, but so far so good

Latuda was giving me horrible withdrawal, so I am sticking at 74mg (I was on 129.5mg), and things seem better

We’re going to drop the Latuda at 18.5mg a week instead of 37.5mg

Psychosis seems to be minimal, but the anxiety is still partly there

But, they told me the anxiety was driven by psychosis

If this is the case, I want to be treated for psychosis and remove the Pregabalin - which I have been on for 4 years

How’s everyone else med journey going?

@shutterbug - are you ok with your reductions?

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I’ve been on brexpiprazole 4mg/day for a year and a half now. Up until early this year with the pdoc’s I’ve spoken to I have been unable to convey how poorly I am doing at work and life. That changed in January. The last pdoc I spoke to seem to intuit I needed an AD and put me on vortioxetine. This helped greatly but wasn’t the complete solution. A couple of weeks ago he added a 5mg dose of olanzapine and I’ve been good since.

I used to think that the fewer meds I was on the better, but now I don’t think that is the case.

Aside from sleeping a lot, I have been without negative and positive symptoms except a small amout of paranoia, which I tend to deal with well. I’m back at work almost working full days.

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That’s great to hear @Pat6398 - I hope the combo works for you

I have tried a lot of meds, but they keep telling me not to lose hope, as combinations can be useful

Wish you luck!

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I tried eliminating my very low dose of clozapine on my own but I noticed that I’m more stable when I take it. So, I’m back on it.

Hope Vraylar works greatly for you.

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I am on a small dose of Aripiprazole. It seems to be working fine. Been on this reduced dose for many months without problems. Tried to reduce too far and had some problems though. I think I’m good with where I’m at. Minimum dose that controls symptoms is the way to go IMO.

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If it works for you I think you were wise to lean back to it. Maybe one day you can come off it if your recovery goes well.

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Definitely the best way

I have been experimenting with this but it has been hard work trying to figure it all out

Abilify on paper looked like one of the most favourable drugs side effects wise to me

Unfortunately when I took it I found it really activating

Do you sleep well on it?

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Yes. I sleep fine on it. I had a bit of a period of insomnia when I first started but now my sleep may actually be too much.

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I am glad it subsided and works for you :slight_smile:

Hoping that it serves you well as long as needed

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Could you explain to me what you mean by anxiety driven by psychosis?

I take Abilify 30 mgs along with Haldol 10 mgs. However, when I was taking 7.5 mgs, I was getting a lot of anxious thoughts (sometimes very fast), and I was wondering whether these thoughts were because of the Bipolar part of my illness, however, the psychiatrist thinks it is psychotic anxiety.

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Im on the max dose of invega trinza now for 2.5 years. It works pretty well. Could do without the negatives but sadly meds dont really help them. Im also on citalopram 40mg for depression/anxiety, buspar 60mg for anxiety, and visteril 25 mg as a PRN for anxiety. Im hoping to bump the visteril up or ask my doctor if i can take buspar 3x a day. The middle of the day is an anxious time for me. Nothing really helps to calm me down but meds and doing something. But i need meds in order to start doing something.

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I’m on five meds now and my pdoc wants to try reduce them but I’m not doing very well at the moment.

He reduced my citalopram today from 20-10mg and aims to take me off of it and increase my mirtazapine. He also wants to try get me off my mood stabilizer (?? Don’t know how I’ll cope without it if I’m taking an antidepressant and sza bipolar type!??)

I don’t know how I’m going to cope with my med journey

Sometimes I just want to give up!

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So far so good. Haven’t cannibalized anyone on a Greyhound bus yet. I suppose the fact that they discontinued bus service in my part of the country after that last incident helps.

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I’m working to get my meds changed but it’s a slow journey. I applied for pdoc 4 times and got turned down. So basically I have to ask my GP to write a letter to the local pdoc team and their reply seems to take 2-3 weeks.

I want off olanzapine because of trouble sleeping and go on Latuda instead. I had really good effect on the minimum dose of Latuda 18.5mg when I tried it last but had trouble sleeping.

The pdoc team suggested I take nozinan for sleeping, but after reading up on it, I refuse to take it. In the US it’s not even approved to be used on humans. So I’m going to ask if I can use seroquel for sleep instead. I see the gp next week.

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All throughout Covid-19 and a bit before that, they thought I had GAD

But I saw my pdoc in January and he said the anxiety is a symptom of the psychosis and not a standalone issue

This meant a change in treatment, and now I have been on 5 different meds this year, but it has not gone away

It basically was recognition that the psychosis was not being treated

That’s all I know. Not sure what else he was thinking. The letter never came for that review, so can’t be sure on his other observations

But, so far with the Vraylar, the anxiety seems less and now I want to reduce the Pregabalin

I think we’re both reliant on the pdoc assessment in this regard.

Temporarily I have stopped researching these things, as I am going a bit over the top with it and making myself worse reading the fine print

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I am glad the meds are helping even in a small way. Pregabalin was a noticeable difference when I started taking that. Before that I was struggling to even go outside

Its a long process for sure, but it’s the best we have right now. Hopefully with a bit of luck things will turn around for you. I have my fingers crossed that happens soon. Try not to stress too much, you’ll get there!

I guess that’s something! A bit concerned with your yard stick though… I hope you’ll be open to going back on something if it comes to that!

Hahaha! Sorry to laugh, but I am a human, and I was on that! I took it for sleep, and every morning it took hours to recover. It felt like I’d been hit by a bus, but it sure did let me sleep well

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“Nozinan”

Yeah, I guess it’s been around in Europe for a long time considering it’s a first generation AP.

It’s just that I tried seroquel before and it did help me sleep pretty well. So I’d rather try that than some new drug that I don’t know how I will react to. Seroquel being a second generation AP should statistically be more safe.

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I hereby solemnly swear to resume medication if I have the urge to cannibalize anyone that isn’t someone on my front step trying to sell me something.

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I think what you’re asking is more than reasonable!

They should have a duty of care to meet your needs

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