I’m on 10 mg abilify and i’m constantly restless. I walk around my apartment, often without a reason. Suddenly i rise from the chair, without any purpose, walk in to the kitchen, sit down again etc.
I haven’t got restless, shaking legs and the rest of the symptoms, just this, nervous, inner feeling of restlesness.
Might this be akathesia?
Sounds like it @bluebutterfly.
Worst feeling in the world IMO.
Maybe try propranolol, it works well for me.
Thanks i might try it, i just discovered that Mirtazapine can counteract akathisia, and i just went from 15 mg for sleep disorder and SD, to 7.5.mg a day.
I think i try 15 mg again first.
I never heard of propranol. Interesting.
Here is report that shows mirtazapine can alleviate akathisia:
It’s hell, you walk in circles constantly and can’t sit still. When I had it bad I watched movies standing up and did periodic laps around the kitchen listening to the audio. It’s the only side effect that I consider worse than the schizophrenia itself. It’s the reason I can’t go on theraputic doses of antipsychotics.
Sounds to me like you might have it, you could try propranalol or cogentin, or lower your AP dose. For me lowering AP dose was the only way to get rid of it, I live with voices as a result.
I’m not sure you have it. Restlessness doesn’t equal akathisia.
I will talk to my Pdoc tomorrow about it, thanks.
It sounds like you were much worse than i am at the moment.
and @everhopeful , im not sure either, it might just some psychological stuff. Stress.
I
Restlessness is a side effect of abilify. But it doesn’t sound like akathisia.
To be fair, I think I still have a little bit of akathisia, but the worse it gets now is tapping my foot or shaking my feet a little in bed. It comes in a wide range of severities and on the low end it’s quite manageable. It’s just scary if you’ve ever been on the worse end of the scale.
If you’re doing laps around your living space and literally can’t sit still, that’s probably what it is. It’s important to keep an eye on it. Last time I was in a mental hospital years ago they injected me with something that gave it to me really bad and other patients were yelling at me for walking in circles. I told them I couldn’t sit still but they acted like I was doing it on purpose and could stop whenever. So silly, why would I ever do that on purpose?
Sounds horrible. When i was at a hospital last time, i was constantly walking around, but it was not akathisia then, it was the surroundings. It was a scary place, closed unit.
The other patients were walking just like me, for no purpose. Once a patient stopped me and said:
“It’s like the animals in the ZOO, just without spectators.”.
Then we laughed and were friends for the rest of the stay.
I love when you make a friend in a place like that. That happened to me a lot in the crisis care house. We would have stayed in touch but I up and moved to the other end of the country.
Yes, friends a place like that, is the best.
But often it’s difficult to stay friends afterwards. You never know if a friend you meet in a closed unit, can cause problems later when he is not medicated og all of sudden take drugs.
There was a lot of drugs during my last stay in closed unit. People were mad, but became even more mad, due to smuggled street drugs.
Yes. I got put on risperdal and got akathisia abut 2 or 3 months later. It was horrible. You need to seek a professional opinion though.
I was on cogentin for a while as they tapered me and switched my meds around. That helped.
My akathisia prevents me from sleeping, I constantly move my hands and feet involuntarly in bed. Its against my will, its like if someone is moving my body. When I get up bcz I can’t sleep I keep walking back and forth in home and then go try to sleep. I keep doing this for ~30 min until my Benzatropine kicks in and stops the akathisia.
Ask your pdr about Benzatropine, for me it stops akathisia after 30 min max.
My pdr specifically prescribed me Benzatropine (Cogentin) to stop movement disorders like tremors and akathisia. It works in about 20-30 min.
Jack Henry Abbott (1981) describes the sensation.
…[It comes] from so deep inside you, you cannot locate the source of the pain … The muscles of your jawbone go berserk, so that you bite the inside of your mouth and your jaw locks and the pain throbs. … Your spinal column stiffens so that you can hardly move your head or your neck and sometimes your back bends like a bow and you cannot stand up. … You ache with restlessness, so you feel you have to walk, to pace. And then as soon as you start pacing, the opposite occurs to you; you must sit and rest. Back and forth, up and down you go … you cannot get relief …
I’m so sorry @agent101g.
No worries, I don’t experience akathisia anymore.
It could very well be akathisia.
Yes, the Seroquel I take at night gives me akathisia when I’m in bed. I take benzotropine (Cogentin), and within 30 minutes the akathisia is gone.