From the article: About Stopping Your Medications: Reasons Why or Why Not
A lot of people with bipolar disorder stop taking their meds. Many others want to stop but don't. What are the reasons you stopped - or what keeps you from stopping? Share Your Reasons
Too tired when sick
- I stopped when I missed doses because I was sick. Didn't want to get up and get water. Plus lost track of time. Then I'd get a headache from the missed doses and feel even worse and be even less inclined to get out of bed and take my meds.
- —Guest Pat_in_Colorado
Want to see if I'm bipolar
- I've gained 60 pounds on Zyprexa. I cannot tolerate looking like I look now-fat. No one takes fat people seriously. I'm used to looking good and this is killing me to be so fat. I'm divorced and have been for 7 years now and not one man has hit on me. My divorce was horrendous but I didn't think it would also be the end if my sex life. I have few friends because I don't want to go out looking like this. I have to see if I can deal with life without this weight that's happened in the last 7 years.
- —Guest East chill
hurt
- I have a bipolar husband that after 47 different meds & dosages is finally fairly stable (took 7 years). It is still hard to keep things "normal" in the house with a medicated bipolar. However, my 38 year old daughter stopped her meds to have a child and never resumed over 3 years ago. We are no longer able to be grandparents to the kids because she cannot see that she needs the meds. Please stay on your meds. You don't just hurt yourselves, you devastate families and those who love you. If you have a family member that has been diagnosed with bipolar, please read up on it so that you can assist them in letting them know when they are "out of sorts". Caregiver is a must.
- —Guest hurt
Had it with medical community
- Recently diagnosed BP after many years of what I thot was just depression. Treatment included ECT. Nothing helps. Research into BP meds are terrifying. Despite severe anxiety, mood swings and depression symptoms I refuse to take their poisons.
- —Guest fedup
The Horrors of Bipolar Disorder
- I was diagnosed with BPI in 2001 and have been hospitalized 4 times with the longest period being 7 months. I have experienced medication indused psychosis, being shackled by my wrists in a "quite room" for hours on end and tortured by medical professionals. I have taken over 20 medications in which I gained 70 pounds lost 60 pounds and most recently gain 104 pounds making for a total of me weighing now 150 pounds more than I did when I was diagnosed. I went from athlete to obesity. I was able to complete a Master's degree and have found no work in my field and life sucks. I have decided to go off my medications being Clozaril, Lithium, Ativan, and Levoxithyrozine to see if I can with diet and exercise loose all of that 150 pounds. I experienced times of extreme stress but I question this stigmad diagnosis everyday and hate when family say, thats because you are Bipolar or did you take your meds. I hope someday I can write again and that life will have some meaning someday soon.
- —Guest Amelia
In the process of stopping
- I, too, am not convinced I have BPII. I have been on Lamictal for a few years (and have been on others in the past) and have decided to get off it. I am working with my pdoc, too. My understanding is that one needs to slowly get off Lamictal. I have been on 50 mg. the last 10 days after tapering down from 100 mg. (I was taking up to 400 mg. in the past). I am tapering month-to-month. What happens is, is that I start feeling weird at around day 4-5 after my decrease. It'll last for about a week to 10 days. Then I even out, pretty much. My body is only adjusting to the decreases. My plan is to be completely off Lamictal next month. I'll go through another slow withdrawal, THEN the waiting will begin. I have no clue, at this point, how I will react/feel when the drug is out of my system. Admittedly I'm a bit nervous. However, hopefully I will then know whether or not I have BP. It'll take a while, I know, but I'm willing to wait.
- —cpvance
to med or not to med
- I have been on many meds for Bipolar Disorder: Lithium, Lamictal, Tegretol, Zyprexa, Geodon, Luvox, Abilify... the list goes on. Now I take Depakote and Seroquel. I don't want to anymore. I'm going to try alternatives to pharmaceuticals such as homeopathy, diet, and vitamens. This is risky because I have been hospitalized over 7 times for psychosis and mania, but its worth the risk. The bottom line is that I think my best chance at living happy, joyous, and free is to be med free. I will come off the meds and go under the care of a holistic doctor and practice meditation, humility, love, patience, and tolerance. My mania has been about realizing God is real and feeling like I have to tell everyone about it and feeling angry toward anyone who does not believe like me. And my depression is about feeling seperate from God and doubting God's realness. Solution:drop ego, love and serve. Meds are toxic, make me gain weight, mess with my hormones, and may be harming me more than helping me.
- —bindu2ojas
Why I keep taking them
- While I worry about the long-term health effects of taking my meds week after week, month after month, I believe that my Lithium and Seroquel are improving my quality of life in the here and now. I suffer some troubling side effects from both meds including weight gain, diarrhea, dry mouth, etc. But when I am overcome by (especially) anxiety, these meds allow me to maintain my normal sleep/wake cycle and enable me to 'bounce back' and face the next day with less worry. Even as my anxieties often re-appear, I feel that the meds (along with cognitive strategies provided to me through therapy) give me with a 'fighting chance' against my bipolar depression. Before my diagnosis (3 years ago) I would suffer for months on end with no relief, I would often turn to alcohol and make other poor lifestyle choices, compounding my depression. Using the meds, for me, is really the only viable option
- —Guest Ian
My experience with stopping meds
- The website: crazymeds.us lists side effects that my doc didn't tell me & why, despite these effects, to stay on my meds for bipolar. Many reasons provided for staying on meds here. Personally, I never want to relive the self destructive, suicidal, levels of hell I experienced with each of 5 "med quits." Severe damage caused by some "Christian" in-laws who said to quit meds & I wasn't praying hard enough or God would heal me. Some 12 step meetings said to quit meds because these were mind altering drugs, therefore, not sober. Too many ignorant people almost killed me by their harmful, unsolicited advice. I educated myself about bipolar, meds, treatment, the truth. Supportive people keep me going. Now 23yrs. on meds, 15yrs. sober. I thank God for keeping me alive. I can NEVER, NEVER, quit my meds EVER again. I don't want my precious children to suffer from my self destruction. Children of parents who commit suicide blame themselves & are more likely to choose the same tragedy.
- —Guest konanacho
STOPPING MY MEDS-NOT AN OPTION!
- Apparently I have had a Bipolar Disorder since I was a child. The Doctor put me on antidepressants whenever I was in a "mood". I didn't get properly diagnosed until 8 years ago. Since then I have been on meds that didn't work or even made it worse. Two months ago the psych put me on another antidepressant and I'm feeling a lot better. Now I'm on three antidepressants, Lithium, Lorazepam, sleeping med along with diabetic meds, blood pressure, iron deficiency. In getting to this point I've often thought about stopping my meds but I promised my husband I wouldn't because I love him and he obviously loves me and both want to grow old and grey together.
- —Guest bcurley
Staying on for now
- I am staying on my meds for now. I was just diagnosed with BPI. If I do not take my meds I end up becoming physicaly and emotionally abusive towards my husband. I also start cutting myself with a knife. In order to maintain peace for myself and family I stay on my meds. Not only for me, my husband but my 7 year old stepson.
- —Guest AW
No Good Option
- So i go on the meds and i have no personality at all i immediately gain 20lbs (that as i get closer to 40 take longer and longer to lose) & then i develop all these great side effects. The best med for me was Risperdall except it made me fat and i walked in my sleep and did alarming things like drink half a bottle of mouthwash, take off my shirt & go outside, or the best fill a glass half way up with coke and half with milk i woke up while drinking it cuz it was foaming up all over the place. When i called poison control about the mouthwash- the chick asked if i normally drank moutwash. Or i can go off the meds, then i have 2-year long depressive periods where i stop driving because the urge to drive the car into a wall is so strong that sometimes i feel i can't stop my self. Or i am so manic that every1 is angry at me- when i go to the movie with my adult daughter and mom they are either yelling at me cuz i fall asleep (depressed- or meds) or twitching and getting up and down (manic)
- —Guest amy
meds vs no meds
- before any meds = picked up a drug habit and went through the motions so my parents didn't find out I'd essentially dropped out of college, they found out about both problems about the time I was diagnosed. trial-and-error-meds: made slow but steady progress after going back to school, switched to a different psychiatrist that I've stuck with ever since, got clean and found a sponsor, finally graduated college then applied and was accepted to law school. on the best combo for meds which have allowed things in my life to attain a stability I've never had prior, almost done with law school and will be preparing to take the bar exam, own a home, much better relationship with my parents, reconnected with God and my spirituality, have become a much better friend and person - I doubt I'd be where I am now if I hadn't found my doc and the right meds.
- —Guest Marguerite
Going off
- It seems that the numbness and the fact that I'm not who my wife married is the kicker for me. She cries because I show no emotion and I feel like I'm numb to the world. Can I handle the person I was before? I can. But can she? She says she is willing to put up with it but I think she is hoping for a miracle cure to fix me. I don't see this helping he situation wither way. I'm more manic than depressed. I'm just worried that the episodes will strike back with a vengeance.
- —Guest Shane
I had no choice
- I have been out of work since the beginning of July and short term disability ran out so without a choice I had to get off of my meds and do it cold turkey. Although I felt numb and mechanical as one guest put it, at least I was stable. I have been off for over a month now and my moods are different every day and even change within a day. It is not fun and I wish I could get back on them. Especially my Cymbalta, that really helped with my depression. I am afraid it might go too far. [Guide's Note: Take a look at Financial Assistance for Medications under Medications.]
- —Guest Mindi
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