Aa
discontinuing antipsychotic cold turkey
Hi,
I have been taking either 5 mg zyprexa, or 50 mg seroquel as a "sleeping pill" for nearly 5 years. I recently discovered that if I change my lifestyle (e.g., normal waking time, excersize and no naps) I have not needed the antipsychotics---so stopped taking them. I figured if they are explicitly for sleeping, they are unnecessary. I am inbetween pdocs so I want to ask this:
Is it relatively "ok" to stop these meds? I am bipolar (the worst type) and have suffered kindling, pronounced affect, depression--but not mania for years. I believe I am manic now, however I believe it is corellated with the stopping of the said med. I have poor judgement, or at least are very clumsy (I just sprained my ankle by stepping in a hole--I can't believe I didn't see it!). Further, I am HYPER aware. I am definitely not psychotic, although some might descibe me (at worst case) paranoid and delusional. I do not think this is the case as I am able to "kick back" and note that my apparent delusions or paranoia are due to hyper-awarenesses. Indeed, I do make correlations in my thinking in an EXTREMELY general sense (e.g., someone says something that has (apparently) nothing to do with you, but you think it does). I believe this last example is not paranoia, but is more of a subliminal action truly going on in the person to whom I am referring. Say you walk by someone, and they say to their friend, "I am so sleepy"--while they just at that moment previously saw a super sleepy looking person just stroll by (i.e., me). This is not a delusion for me to attribute my thoughts about their thoughts if in fact it may be the case that they DID say something about sleepiness simply because someone walked by, and implicitly suggested to them "being sleepy."
My question is: If one takes these minimal doses of antipsychotic for the purposes of sleep, but finds they can sleep without it, and so stops--what affect (or effect) might occur relative to what I wrote above? Relatedly, my general sense is that my thoughts are bottlenecking when I write or talk, and instead--when I am doing sort of mindless activities (e.g., doing laundry), time slows way down, things are simple (bar the ADD), and I get done the things I should have done months before.
My question boils down to, I believe, my making my own decision about whether I can live with this hyper-sensitivity or not. But my hope is that either I'll get used to it, or, that as my previous chemical "affiliation" with antipsychotics "wears off," I'll be better.
Let me describe one more example. I'll try to be brief--so I hope its not too terse. I go to church and am a professing Christian. When I was young (first episode) I thought I was "the second coming. " Smiles--gee, I am such a good guy (not). At this time I make associations with scripture thatare kind of "self-oriented" or "self-absorbed"--but I am aware that I am supposed to feel this way. For example, Thomas a Kempis (famous monk, 15 hundreds) wrote a well known Christian apologetic called, "The imitation of Christ." The key word obviously is "imitation." So Christ oriented associations are not "strange"--but in fact expected in the faith. One might call this brainwashing, but I choose to believe otherwise.
So anyway, that's me. Lol.
Thank you for considering this--I am very interested in any thought about this, especially related to cold turkeying a low dose of sleeping med antipsychotic. Truly-- Ed
I have been taking either 5 mg zyprexa, or 50 mg seroquel as a "sleeping pill" for nearly 5 years. I recently discovered that if I change my lifestyle (e.g., normal waking time, excersize and no naps) I have not needed the antipsychotics---so stopped taking them. I figured if they are explicitly for sleeping, they are unnecessary. I am inbetween pdocs so I want to ask this:
Is it relatively "ok" to stop these meds? I am bipolar (the worst type) and have suffered kindling, pronounced affect, depression--but not mania for years. I believe I am manic now, however I believe it is corellated with the stopping of the said med. I have poor judgement, or at least are very clumsy (I just sprained my ankle by stepping in a hole--I can't believe I didn't see it!). Further, I am HYPER aware. I am definitely not psychotic, although some might descibe me (at worst case) paranoid and delusional. I do not think this is the case as I am able to "kick back" and note that my apparent delusions or paranoia are due to hyper-awarenesses. Indeed, I do make correlations in my thinking in an EXTREMELY general sense (e.g., someone says something that has (apparently) nothing to do with you, but you think it does). I believe this last example is not paranoia, but is more of a subliminal action truly going on in the person to whom I am referring. Say you walk by someone, and they say to their friend, "I am so sleepy"--while they just at that moment previously saw a super sleepy looking person just stroll by (i.e., me). This is not a delusion for me to attribute my thoughts about their thoughts if in fact it may be the case that they DID say something about sleepiness simply because someone walked by, and implicitly suggested to them "being sleepy."
My question is: If one takes these minimal doses of antipsychotic for the purposes of sleep, but finds they can sleep without it, and so stops--what affect (or effect) might occur relative to what I wrote above? Relatedly, my general sense is that my thoughts are bottlenecking when I write or talk, and instead--when I am doing sort of mindless activities (e.g., doing laundry), time slows way down, things are simple (bar the ADD), and I get done the things I should have done months before.
My question boils down to, I believe, my making my own decision about whether I can live with this hyper-sensitivity or not. But my hope is that either I'll get used to it, or, that as my previous chemical "affiliation" with antipsychotics "wears off," I'll be better.
Let me describe one more example. I'll try to be brief--so I hope its not too terse. I go to church and am a professing Christian. When I was young (first episode) I thought I was "the second coming. " Smiles--gee, I am such a good guy (not). At this time I make associations with scripture thatare kind of "self-oriented" or "self-absorbed"--but I am aware that I am supposed to feel this way. For example, Thomas a Kempis (famous monk, 15 hundreds) wrote a well known Christian apologetic called, "The imitation of Christ." The key word obviously is "imitation." So Christ oriented associations are not "strange"--but in fact expected in the faith. One might call this brainwashing, but I choose to believe otherwise.
So anyway, that's me. Lol.
Thank you for considering this--I am very interested in any thought about this, especially related to cold turkeying a low dose of sleeping med antipsychotic. Truly-- Ed
I would not make any medicine adjustments without consulting my psychiatrist. In the past when I've tried adjusting the dose or eliminating a drug on my own -- it has always turned out badly for me and the doc has to get me straightened out again. Even though sometimes I don't agree with his treatment plan for me, in my case he is usually right! Good luck to you as you get through this. It's really a bummer, I know. But I keep reminding myself of people who are worse off than I am, and that helps me to keep going each day. We're all in this together.
Hugs,
Ruby
Hugs,
Ruby
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