Medication Withdrawal

Medication withdrawal

This post is not meant to diagnose, treat, or save you from mental illness, if you or someone you love is in danger, please get help. You can text HOME to 741741 to be connected with a crisis counselor. I personally have. You can also call or text 988 for suicide and crisis help.
http://www.cdc.gov/suicide/facts

Medication is a must for me personally. There are other things I can do for my mental illness, but unfortunately in order to not fall into a psychosis again (I have fallen six times) I have to maintain a medication regimen for anti psychotics and mood stabilizers. This is all for me personally, everyone’s story is different and medications don’t work the same for everyone. I have learned this the hard way unfortunately. I have taken over 15 different medications in varying regimens and combinations. I know that it can take years to discover the right fit for me, but it has been a dueling process. The worst part of the medications are obviously the side effects: ranging from headaches, to anal seepage, to confusion and much more. Next is the fact that some of the medications make me feel really weird. For example, one medication made me feel like I was stuck inside my own body, but I couldn’t do anything about it. I felt like everything was going wrong, impending doom and all. I can’t really explain it, other than to say I wanted to crawl out of my own skin. I was frozen inside myself, but at the same time I wanted to run screaming, I just couldn’t. Other medications have sedated me to the point where I fall asleep sitting up, unable to stay awake no matter how much caffeine and other stimulants I would ingest. Not being able to stay awake and having a depressive episode adds up to sleeping all day and still feeling exhausted.

Finally we get to the medication withdrawal. It should be noted that I always take my medications on time and as prescribed. However, when a medication is presenting too many side effects, or when one specific side effect is too severe, your doctor may chose to take you off that medication completely. That’s when the withdrawal kicks in. Sometimes it feels like I have the flu. I get really shaky, cold then hot and it always comes with the worst headache of my life, almost like a migraine. I feel like my head is literally going to explode. My neck gets tight, my eyes pulse, and the pressure feels like my brain is being squeezed from the inside. These are the effects I had two days ago. My headache got so bad that I started vomiting. My head felt very heavy and my thoughts began to jumble. I began to shake and sweat and feel my body fight me with everything it had. The only flu symptoms I didn’t have was congestion and a fever, but the sweats sure made me feel like I had one. The only thing that helped was sniffing peppermint oil and getting in the bathtub.

This last medication I am withdrawing from is for anxiety. I have been on this medication for a long time, although I was just told by my doctor that it is not safe to take it long term. This was new news for me and I was shocked. Since I have been hospitalized many times this year for my condition, I have had many prescribing doctors. This is not my fault, I try to report everything back to one doctor and keep him solely in charge of my medication. But that’s a problem in the mental health industry as well in overall health care: doctors don’t always talk to each other about their patients. The doctor in the hospital may prescribe me one thing, then when I get out, my doctor prescribes another and the cycle continues. I definitely see why some people refuse medications, they wreak havoc on your body. The thing is, with my condition of Bipolar 1, it is way worse for me to be off all my meds. I have tried it before and I end up in psychosis again; that’s the tricky part, the scary part, the part I am always trying to avoid. I have left my family for the psych ward three times in one year and I am terrified to do it again.

I am learning instead to listen to my doctor, see my therapist regularly, maintain my stress levels, blog whenever I can, make and stick to somewhat of a schedule and track my symptoms. The thing I fall short on so often is eating regularly and healthily. Although I take several vitamins and minerals, it is very hard when you are depressed to chose healthy foods. You either don’t eat at all, or eat way too much. A lot of the medications that I am on have weight gain and increased appetite as a side effect; it sucks. Sometimes I am sickened by all food, other times I want to eat everything in the house in one sitting. I have gained 60lbs since being on the medication I am now coming off of. I know it sounds like hell and it can be. I have made it my mission to look at the positives though, I am lucky to be able to afford my medications. I am lucky to have healthcare, because although it is not always perfect, it is better than no health care at all. In my journey I have seen people who have never been seen by a psychiatrist for their mental health issues. I know people who are close to me who do not get any kind of help with theirs and I am here to say I would much rather suffer through the hassles of doctors and medications than to try to navigate this mental health journey without help; getting help took me a very long time. For those of you just starting your journey: I would say do your best to find your resources. If you have healthcare, call the number on the back of your card to find a psychiatrist. If you do not, talk to your local welfare office and try to get approved for some kind of help. There are many options available to you. Believe me when I tell you that the psych ward saved my life, but if you can avoid it and get outpatient care, that is ideal.

-A Manic Monday