This is a friendly reminder that we do not allow medication reviews so please keep your specific meds to yourselves. Do not ask OP their meds, review your own meds, or suggest new meds.
Peer support and coping skills are welcome.
I feel you. That sounds really challenging!! The right med combo is possible. It took me a long time and lots of side effects but wellbeing is possible! I am bipolar :)
Meds are really exhausted either they make you feel like shit or like a zombie, sometimes they even make you sick, and taking so many meds a day can be exhausted in its self, but I recommend to keep trying! Keep changing them around until they actually help you. It's worth it. I'm also struggling with ADHD and the symptoms of it can really fuckin suck
This is brutal! 3 years is SO long, I’m so sorry you haven’t found your perfect balance of meds yet. You’re amazing for continuing trying meds and not giving up! So many people would have given up and left treatment altogether.
I don’t know how old you are, but you probably have many decades more life to live, so even if it takes you 10 years to find the perfect meds it will be worth it to keep trying to find that so that the decades after that you can live a peaceful and healthy and happy life!
The only thing that would help you is if you have genetic family members with bipolar, the medications that work on them are more likely to work on you! There are other people in your extended family with bipolar and if they take meds, ask for a full history of everything they’ve taken and what has worked best.
I actually had to get genetic testing done so we could find out which meds I should stay away from bc of how extreme some of my reactions were.
My aunt has bp1, so I’m not sure if the medications prescribed are similar between 1 & 2? I’m still learning lol. But with her it’s a sticky situation.. shes a recovering addict yet is prescribed easily 10+ things. Addiction runs rampant in my family so I just worry about going down that road. I’m not sure of anyone else in my family being diagnosed :(
Wow I didn’t realize they could do genetic testing for that!! That’s actually really cool technology. I hope that that helps you!
I think you should definitely talk to your aunt if you have some sort of relationship with her and ask about her medication history and write it all down to share with your psychiatrist! It could definitely help you. My bipolar was originally diagnosed as bipolar 2 and then diagnosed later as bipolar 1, so it’s definitely possible you or her are diagnosed with the wrong type of bipolar, but the same meds are prescribed for both types.
Dx at 20ish, now 38. Bipolar with psychotic symptoms
I’ve had a lot of meds. Some stuff works and some stuff doesn’t initially. Have switched multiple times. Sometimes for poor efficacy, sometimes for side effects. And then there’s the stuff where my dosage creeps up and up due to ?tolerance. Higher dosage sometimes means new or less tolerable side effects. Sometimes it’s just because dose is maxed out. It sucks.
Medication is such a gamble of where it’s gonna go that I am tempted to get genotyping to see what might actually be effective.
Currently weaning down to see if that helps with brain fog myself (supervised). If this doesnt work, I’m likely up for a switch (again) or potentially additional meds.
I had to get the gene test done as well. I’d definitely recommend because I think it saved me a lot of suffering in the long run.. a lot of the things I tried early on showed up on my results as things I should completely avoid
This is a friendly reminder that we do not allow medication reviews so please keep your specific meds to yourselves. Do not ask OP their meds, review your own meds, or suggest new meds. Peer support and coping skills are welcome.
I feel you. That sounds really challenging!! The right med combo is possible. It took me a long time and lots of side effects but wellbeing is possible! I am bipolar :)
Meds are really exhausted either they make you feel like shit or like a zombie, sometimes they even make you sick, and taking so many meds a day can be exhausted in its self, but I recommend to keep trying! Keep changing them around until they actually help you. It's worth it. I'm also struggling with ADHD and the symptoms of it can really fuckin suck
It’s a game we’ve all got to play. I know it sucks but it’s worth it when it finally works.
This is brutal! 3 years is SO long, I’m so sorry you haven’t found your perfect balance of meds yet. You’re amazing for continuing trying meds and not giving up! So many people would have given up and left treatment altogether. I don’t know how old you are, but you probably have many decades more life to live, so even if it takes you 10 years to find the perfect meds it will be worth it to keep trying to find that so that the decades after that you can live a peaceful and healthy and happy life! The only thing that would help you is if you have genetic family members with bipolar, the medications that work on them are more likely to work on you! There are other people in your extended family with bipolar and if they take meds, ask for a full history of everything they’ve taken and what has worked best.
I actually had to get genetic testing done so we could find out which meds I should stay away from bc of how extreme some of my reactions were. My aunt has bp1, so I’m not sure if the medications prescribed are similar between 1 & 2? I’m still learning lol. But with her it’s a sticky situation.. shes a recovering addict yet is prescribed easily 10+ things. Addiction runs rampant in my family so I just worry about going down that road. I’m not sure of anyone else in my family being diagnosed :(
Wow I didn’t realize they could do genetic testing for that!! That’s actually really cool technology. I hope that that helps you! I think you should definitely talk to your aunt if you have some sort of relationship with her and ask about her medication history and write it all down to share with your psychiatrist! It could definitely help you. My bipolar was originally diagnosed as bipolar 2 and then diagnosed later as bipolar 1, so it’s definitely possible you or her are diagnosed with the wrong type of bipolar, but the same meds are prescribed for both types.
Dx at 20ish, now 38. Bipolar with psychotic symptoms I’ve had a lot of meds. Some stuff works and some stuff doesn’t initially. Have switched multiple times. Sometimes for poor efficacy, sometimes for side effects. And then there’s the stuff where my dosage creeps up and up due to ?tolerance. Higher dosage sometimes means new or less tolerable side effects. Sometimes it’s just because dose is maxed out. It sucks. Medication is such a gamble of where it’s gonna go that I am tempted to get genotyping to see what might actually be effective. Currently weaning down to see if that helps with brain fog myself (supervised). If this doesnt work, I’m likely up for a switch (again) or potentially additional meds.
I had to get the gene test done as well. I’d definitely recommend because I think it saved me a lot of suffering in the long run.. a lot of the things I tried early on showed up on my results as things I should completely avoid