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Blocking dopamine increases hunger. Stimulants that increase dopamine reduce hunger and cause weight loss but generally they worsen psychosis and make APs less effective as APs block dopamine.
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Antipsychotics artificially reduce leptin hormone levels which go up when we’re full, and they increase ghrelin levels that tell us it’s time to eat. I researched these in grad school. Plus, they make us tired and sluggish with sedation…
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Starting tonight, I’m taking the orally disintegrating tablets of olanzapine instead of the regular tablets because that’s supposed to help counteract the weight gain a bit.
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Zydis they are called out here and it’s absorbed into the blood before your gut so should help but honestly. Diet and exercise. You aren’t doing either your probably not seeing any gains.
It’s hard. It really is but watch portion size and things like sugar intake and keep moving. You’ll surprise yourself on what you can achieve but it’s doable. Good luck. Keep working is all I will say about that zydis.
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Are you referring to Lybalvi that has the weight loss drug added to it? If so, that one works better than what I am now taking but I can’t afford it @roguetwo
i was on orally disintegrating olanzapine, the way itd have less weight gain than regular olanzapine is if its absorbing sublingual (in the mouth) the problem with that is that itd be much more time consuming and once you swallow it gets absorbed through stomach. if you dont swallow it its pretty much certain youll only absorb a percentage of the full dose, which is what studies were based on but is not optimal if you have been taking the same dose for a while.
also the disintegrating tablets hit me with a tank of sedation and dizziness within minutes, due ti the rapid absorption, never had it effect with regular tablets
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No. You can do it on diet too. Look at keto. It’s pretty radical and you don’t do it without the exercise in my experience but it works for weight loss and helps some people it would seem with symptoms.
It’s pretty new but there’s increasing evidence about the metabolic problems brought about by things like sz. Have a look at Dr Chris Palmer. It’s worth a look but for weight loss I can say it works. If it helps your symptoms then that is a bonus.
I had no significant loss with the wafer but I changed my diet a lot going lo-sugar, lo-fat then onto keto. You have to make the effort with diet and exercise is what I’m saying to see significant gains in the weight loss.
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@rogueone , I totally agree diet is the hugest component in losing the weight and keeping it off.
My issue on olanzapine is that I’m insanely hungry all day and all night long. Nothing can make me feel like I’ve eaten anything at all.
It’s a really intense urge to eat and it’s super hard to ignore and I’m really struggling with self control
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Yeah feel your pain.
I had the same problem with risperdal early. Just gained most of my weight. Zyprexa was neutral or loss for me but that is over years.
How many ap’s have you tried? It’s a cruel game because you change it up you can lose function and it goes pear shaped pretty quick.
Still. It’s worthwhile if your stable mentally to talk to your doctor and ask for options. Whether change meds or doses…it’s a serious problem and you need to move forward with things…I’ve always been pretty aggressive in trying things for better function but it’s a journey…
Some things worked out well. Others set me back years…there’s no easy answers but you need to chat it out with your doc and just consider alternatives.
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@roguetwo , I’ve tried almost every AP I can afford so changing APs is not an option yet. The 2 I can afford that I haven’t tried are Abilify and Latuda. Both are activating according to users here and I need sedating APs because of my paranoia. Where I go doesn’t allow benzos.
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Hey sorry for late reply. Yeah no worries. The wafer approach is better tech but I found you still have to diet and exercise to lose weight. Never found anyway around that. I gained most of my weight on risperdal and have taken it all off on zyprexa. Zyprexa works better for my head.
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Yeah @rogueone , I figured I’d still have to count calories etc. Today I ate ice cream and am going over calories but tomorrow is a new day.
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@LilyoftheValley how is it going with the wafers?
My dr recently has switched me to the olanzapine regular pills. She kept telling me that it doesn’t matter and that either form would be the same. And that the other dr who told me that the wafers do not cause as much weight gain was wrong.
I was doing fine on the wafers and now I’m at the point where I’m not wanting to take my meds because I’m afraid they will make me gain weight. I don’t like that my dr put me in this position.
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I don’t know yet. I’ve only been on the orally disintegrating tablets for 2 days so far. There’s info online about them causing less weight gain and my pdoc has read about it too. I’m not sure why your pdoc said that.
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