Posted by Christ_empowered on November 13, 2011, at 11:34:32
In reply to Re: Soltice, posted by rjlockhart04-08 on November 11, 2011, at 23:33:28
To me, it sounds like a couple of things. 1)Your brain adjusts to medication. If you're using an antipsychotic to treat, say, psychosis or bipolar, the adjustment isn't always a bad thing. Sometimes there's a need for an additional medication, sometimes there's a need for a dosage increase, and sometimes the adjustment is a good thing--maybe the patient is less sedated, there's fewer EPS, whatever. In your case, you're using a high dose antipsychotic as a tranquilizer. It seems to me its acting as a band aid to cover up what are essentially non-psychiatric problems. Eventually, between medication tolerance and the build up of problems and certain life experiences, you're going to find that the medication doesn't "work" as expected.
2) A lot of your problems, like I wrote above, are more about finding meaning and purpose than they are related to some psychiatric disorder (and those often involve the same issues, too). You can only get so far medicating yourself to deal with your situation. I mean, look at the middle- and upper-class housewives of the 50s. Tranquilizers and uppers only got them so far, as anyone who has read "The Feminine Mystique" can see.
3) I think, personally, that some of your meds might be working against you. Not only are there very real health issues involved in taking high dose antipsychotics+high dose antidepressants, the medications your doctor has selected are basically functioning like emotional novocaine; they're numbing you up big time. I mean, I have the same thing going on with my Lamictal and Abilify (more with the Abilify). My emotions definitely aren't as intense as they would be if I wasn't taking these medications, but for me the trade off (less emotional intensity, but no more stints in a mental hospital or jail) is worth it. For you, someone who doesn't experience psychosis or severe bipolar and who is in the process of getting your life together, I don't know (speaking as someone who only "knows" you through the internet) that the trade off is really in your favor.
I hope things work out for you. Maybe this is a sign that you should lower the doses of some of your meds or eliminate some of them altogether. Can you get therapy or do some kind of group therapy? That might be helpful.
poster:Christ_empowered
thread:1002290
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20111110/msgs/1002462.html