Posted by CareBear04 on September 29, 2004, at 23:06:41
if anyone has advice, please help!!!
this might also be better on the health board, but since it's so medication-related, i posted here.
let me begin by saying that i know my problem might be considered enviable by a lot of people, but that anything taken to an extreme can be troublesome.
since switching to adderall xr three weeks ago, i've had no appetite. the first week, i didn't notice and just ate when i felt like it. i didn't lose much weight because my body quickly adjusted by slowing down my metabolism. i felt really tired, but i didn't make the connection as to why. the past two weeks, i've been trying to eat better to help myself feel better. in an effort to keep my metabolism active, i've been trying to eat every few hours. the problem is, food nauseates me, and after i eat, my stomach is really upset. i started eating energy bars (luna), but i can only eat a few bites at a time. over the course of a day, i'll manage to eat about two of those but not anything else. i try to eat a small healthy dinner, but i usually can't eat much. eating has just become so unpleasant-- as far as the process of eating goes, chewing and swallowing are difficult, and in terms of the social implications, everyone watches me closely when i eat, and i can see that they think i have an eating disorder. last week alone, i lost five pounds. i've been feeling worse and worse, first physically and now mentally as well. my hair has been falling out in greater amounts than before, my skin is dry and flakey, my vision gets blurry, and in the past few days, i've been really dizzy and very unsteady when standing or walking. my body is really achy all over, and i feel a lack of control over my muscles. i'm afraid they might be wasting. even worse (at least to me) is that i feel like my mood is out of control. i have bipolar and take 1350mg of lithium, but i don't feel like that's enough to regulate my current volatility. i'm usually very composed and unemotional, even when depressed, but recently, i've been so irritable and emotional and have started crying at random things and haven't been able to stop. to complicate things, i've been on a low-dose oral contraceptive, and this month, for all three weeks of active pills, i had continuous bleeding. my dr. prescribed a higher dose pill, but i'm afraid to take it because of the effects on my already unstable mood. here is everything i'm taking right now:
-Eskalith CR 1350mg
-Lamictal 25mg
-Zoloft 50mg
-Xanax 1mg 4x a day
-Klonopin 2mg at night
-Propranolol as much as needed
-Adderall XR 30mg and IR 10mg in the afternoon
-Birth control pill
-Protonix (a proton pump inhibitor) 2x/day for my stomachi just feel really really horrible. i'm sure it's the meds and my lack of nutrition that are causing me to feel bad physically, and that the cumulative effect is having a bad effect on my mood. i feel so alone and helpless because no doctor has helped me at all. my GI dr. was more concerned about those problems, my PCP said to wait and see. he offered to talk to my pdoc because he thinks i'm overmedicated, but my pdoc knows it and so do i. we just don't know what to do about it, and neither has anything other psychiatrist who has treated me. in addition to being bipolar, i have lots of anxiety and strong symptoms of ADD. it's probable that the lithium is making me tired, so i take adderall for alertness, focus, and a longer attention span. i've tried non stimulant treatments for ADD like strattera and provigil, but they really didn't help. ritalin made me manic. i started this week to switch over to lamictal, but it's a slow process that'll take months. my pdoc pretty much said that i'm stuck until we can take away the lithium.
i think i'm in a situation that needs to be explored, but no doctor has done blood work or taken seriously my weight loss concerns. i'm 5'5 and 100lbs now. i know that's underweight, but since no doctor has seemed concerned, it must not be that low. i just don't think i'm getting enough nutrition, and if i don't have nutritional deficiencies right now, i know i soon will. i have a bleeding disorder, so i'm often anemic. i've been drinking the green Odwalla vitamin juice, but i don't know if that is meeting my needs. i don't know if i feel so weak and sick just because i'm not getting enough energy into my body, or whether it's because i'm undernourished in some way. i tried to see a nutritionist, but my insurance won't cover nutritional advice from a nutrition or even my PCP! i don't know how much it costs for a nutritional consultation and what kind of follow up is necessary. i don't want to lose any more weight, and i don't want to walk around feeling like i'm going to fall over.
i know a lot of people have the opposite problem of gaining weight or feeling overweight, and i hope they get the help they need to feel better. please don't blow this off with a "poor baby..." response because it can be nearly as unpleasant to be told you're too skinny and asked whether you're anorexic, and to not be able to shop for clothes because nothing fits.
please, if anyone has advice...
thanks so much!
cb
poster:CareBear04
thread:397077
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040927/msgs/397077.html