#vraylar

[joellesolo]

I am losing my mind... not doing well at all...

I don't know if I can last til Friday's appointment. But... I don't have any other options...?

This is the worst manic episode in years (that I can recall).

I asked Michael, and he said this is the worst he's ever seen me, hands down, no contest (and we met nearly fifteen years ago).

I don't know. What's the point of this post? Who knows? I'm hanging on by a thread, I guess. Send help, or good vibes, I could use them...

Oh also! My endo flared up Sunday night, five days before it was supposed to, and I can't take anything for it, including ibuprofen, until all these other meds are cleared out of my system, so that's fun for me!!

(heavy sarcasm. it's not fun. i'm in excruciating pain. this is the fucking worst.)

[foreshvdowing]

if the bitch is on antipsychotics you just know she has good pussy

[finboii]

F I N —

24 — 5’4

They Them —

CW- 175ish

GW- 145

UGW- 120

year 6 of AnnA

[vulpine111]

I mostly just caught up on my sleep and napped all day. When I got up, I noticed my 6mg vraylar and "as needed" bottle of hydroxyzine was in my mail.

I am relieved I don't need a ride to the pharmacy. It's all the way downtown and it stresses people out to take me there.

My coffee subscription is also here. It has lions mane in it which I need to be careful with. Anyways, it came with a free sample of matcha which I am excited to try in the morning.

[artemismatchalatte]

I hate being obsessive over someone. I feel like I'm heading there and I don't want to be overly clingy either. Ugh. I don't know if it's a bipolar thing, a possible crush thing, a loneliness thing or a combo of all three. My medicine has been working pretty good so far but I'm a little concerned that someone is taking up a little too much room in my headspace. I like this person BUT I do not want to slide back into my weird obsessive loops like I used to when crushing. That's embarassing and unhealthy. Ugh.

[schizophelia]

Day 1 of Vraylar. Here we go.

[cannibalsamruby]

My Vraylar was increased to 3mg and it's completely thrown off my sleep schedule

[thatawkwardbookthing]

what if

what if I just stopped taking my meds

[bpdrug-addict]

I think the medication is making me sick I can't keep doing this. I spent all of last night rolling around in bed feeling sick and so hot and cold. my stomach feels like it's gonna explode. why are my doctors insistent on poisoning me right after asking me "you don't think your medicine is poison or anything 👀". you're sick and I can't stand you the most out of all my evil psychiatrists

[joellesolo]

So, I started taking carbamazepine (tetregol) on Sunday, which was actually planned out over a month ago by my psych and I at our last appointment in September because I did NOT want to have a repeat of caplyta and spent October as a zombie and miss out on Halloween events and the Something Corporate concert and Emo Night Tour and everything, you know? So that was the plan, to start it a night after ENT; cool right?

But then of course ENT gets cancelled literally two hours before it started, it triggers a manic episode (okay, to be fair, I was manic before it got cancelled, I guess...), I start the carbamazepine, and of course, have a terrible reaction.

And what a fucking WEEK to have a terrible reaction to it.

I tried to give it a couple days, but, I couldn't even walk up the stairs unassisted, so on Tuesday night Michael was just like, you gotta call your psych, and I was just like, so defeated... like, are my options to either be depressed or a zombie?! Because this is exactly what happened with the caplyta last fall. Except I gave that med three and a half weeks of being a zombie before I gave up on it and went back on vraylar. So I've spent over a fucking YEAR being depressed and ragey. And that's not fair to my girls...

So, I stop the carbamazepine, and, this morning, wake up feeling not great, but I wasn't falling off the treadmill like the last few days at least?? I was able to drive Peanut to the dentist and to school, which, I HAD to, so that's good? And I got home, and took the fanapt, and then got in the shower and semi blow-dried my hair and then... could barely keep my eyes open and fell down the stairs.

And then googled fanapt and discovered it causes sedation and drowsiness and could barely make it to the sidewalk when Lil's bus got home.

EMBARRASSING.

So I guess we'll see how it goes. I'm supposed to take another one this evening 😭 And increase the dosage tomorrow, and the next day, and the next...

Maybe I'm just doomed to be depressed forever?? Idk. Things are not looking good.

I'm swaying right now, and it's supposed to be nap time and it's taken me fifty fucking minutes to type this out 😭 I guess that's my cue to fuck this.

[brennacedria]

FUCK do I need to eat before taking vraylar? It says online "with or without food" but almost everything says that. I don't need to know if it works either way, I need to know if it's going to make me sick to take it on an empty stomach.

Cause, y'know, I just took it without really considering that and the only thing I've had so far is coffee.

[finboii]

new gym shorts get here monday. ordered them online in a Med and they BEtTeR lOOk NicE

[thats-amnesty-babe]

Please note that many antipsychotics are known to actually CAUSE type two diabetes in people who take them long-term. It doesn’t have to just be genetic. Diabetes can be medication-induced. It is still just as permanent and lifelong.

I had normal A1C and fasting glucose levels in my yearly blood tests for my entire life before starting Vraylar (a second-generation antipsychotic, which my psychiatrist recommended to me because it had “milder” side effects than many other antipsychotics). Taking 3 mg of Vraylar each day for perhaps a year and a half landed me a full-blown diabetes diagnosis. I actually started tapering off of it (with my psychiatrist’s permission… not that I trust psychiatrists much anymore, anyway) very quickly after I was told about my diabetes diagnosis and then did some cursory googling. Turns out this shit is kind of COMMON KNOWLEDGE. And nobody told me.

Source: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/drugs-vraylar-side-effects

This condition will never go away and will affect my health negatively for the rest of my life — in addition to the mental health effects of being unable to consume sugar without health anxiety.

At NO point did a psychiatrist or my general practitioner doctor I see for regular wellness visits EVER mention that this was a possibility to me. That a long-term health condition could come from taking a medication they prescribed to me. I actually saw two psychiatrists in the time period that I was taking this antipsychotic: the initial prescriber and then a different psychiatrist after I moved to another state. Talk about informed consent…

(Content warning for saneism, which is discrimination against people who are perceived as anything deviating from the average societal standards of being sane of mind… such as experiencing any form of psychosis.)

The wildest thing about this is that I do not technically even have a disabling long-term psychotic disorder! As in, nothing that has psychosis as its primary symptom. The frequency and severity of my psychosis symptoms are extremely correlated with my overall stress levels. I am actually in the best mental health state in my entire life now, and I have not experienced any psychotic symptoms at all for months.

It’s been maybe 9 months since I stopped taking Vraylar, and I’ve had only two days where I experienced ANY psychotic symptoms. I have complex PTSD (among other mental health conditions, which feel a little too personal for me to comfortably share publicly). C-PTSD commonly has mild psychosis as a symptom. With adequate treatment and significant progress toward recovery, the psychosis symptoms can actually go away. For me, they have.

I regularly experienced hallucinations and delusions for the majority of my life, since about the age of eight. With the help of a couple of damn good therapists and a whole lot of personal mental health work, I have learned how to navigate the world in a functional and successful manner, even while tolerating and coping with my psychotic symptoms. Which means… I probably never needed to be on Vraylar to begin with. The psychosis was never disabling, just unpleasant and something I could even ignore most of the time.

But, unfortunately, my psychiatrist was terrified to hear I experienced any amount of psychosis at all. It didn’t matter how much it affected my daily functioning or quality of life, nor how well I was able to emotionally cope with it after years of having those symptoms. She put me on a VERY risky and damaging medication because of saneism. And that cost me so fucking much.

You should always be honest with your doctors, right? Give them the full details and context of your symptoms so they are fully informed before making any healthcare decisions for you. But if you don’t want to take antipsychotics, just DO NOT tell them you have psychosis. I am so serious. I believe that every single person with any amount of psychosis reading this post needs to fully internalize this message. You are in control of what information you give your doctor. Be cautious and intentional about what you share. Decide before the appointment starts whether you will disclose your psychotic symptoms.

Do RESEARCH about antipsychotics and their potential long-term health effects before ever mentioning psychosis to any kind of medical professional. There is a good chance that a doctor (psychiatrist or not!) will prescribe you antipsychotics if they catch even a whiff of psychosis.

If you’re okay with that, then that’s fine — do what is best for your overall health, even if that means prioritizing mental health over physical health. Genuinely, take care of yourself in the way that makes sense for your personal goals of long-term wellness. Some people can learn to live with their psychosis. Some people are too distressed by their psychosis to have a personally acceptable quality of life. Whether or not antipsychotics are the right choice should be entirely up to the individual patient whenever possible. Of course, I do know that there are extreme situations where medical intervention is required, but I do think that most antipsychotic prescriptions would not fall under that category.

If you do spend the time to look up what there is to know about various antipsychotics, weigh the pros and cons, and believe that taking one is genuinely the best choice for you — and of course for some people it is; the drugs were developed for a reason, after all — then at least look at various options and pick out the one that seems the safest.

I desperately wish I could send a message to my younger self to PLEASE thoroughly research ANY new medication I am prescribed BEFORE letting it enter my body AT ALL. I am now so anxious about any new prescription I am given and read all about it immediately after the appointment ends. This was so avoidable, and now I’m stuck with it permanently.

Having psychosis means we have to be careful about who we tell. That is, if it’s a possible choice. I understand that many psychotic people cannot hide it, and there is no shame in that. But if you can hide it, that’s really helpful, because you can decide if it’s worth sharing before actually sharing that information — like to a doctor. When a symptom or diagnosis goes on your medical chart, everyone else who sees that chart (like any other doctors within the same medical system) will know you have that symptom. Having medically documented psychosis can severely affect how seriously doctors will take your future health concerns. Be careful, guys. Be safe.

I saw a comment on your blog that says 'the way you eat does not cause diabetes'...are you able to expand on that or provide a source I could read? I've been told by doctors that my pre-diabetes was due to weight gain because I get more hungry on my anti psychotics and I'd like to fact check what they've told me! Thank you so much!

Pre-diabetes was rejected as a diagnosis by the World Health Organization (although it is used by the US and UK) - the correct term for the condition is impaired glucose tolerance. Approximately 2% of people with "pre-diabetes" go on to develop diabetes per year. You heard that right - TWO PERCENT. Most diabetics actually skip the pre-diabetic phase.

There are currently no treatments for pre-diabetes besides intentional weight loss. (Hmm, that's convenient, right?) There has yet to be evidence that losing weight prevents progression from pre-diabetes to T2DM beyond a year. Interestingly, drug companies are trying to persuade the medical world to start treating patients earlier and earlier. They are using the term “pre-diabetes” to sell their drugs (including Wegovy, a weight-loss drug). Surgeons are using it to sell weight loss surgery. Everyone’s a winner, right? Not patients. Especially fat patients.

Check out these articles:

Prediabetes: The epidemic that never was, and shouldn’t be

The war on ‘prediabetes' could be a boon for pharma—but is it good medicine?

Also - I love what Dr. Asher Larmie @fatdoctorUK has to say about T2DM and insulin resistance, so here's one of their threads I pulled from Twitter:

1️⃣ You can't prevent insulin resistance. It's coded in your DNA. It may be impacted by your environment. Studies have shown it has nothing to do with your BMI.

2️⃣ The term "pre-diabetes" is a PR stunt. The correct term is impaired glucose tolerance (or impaired fasting glucose) which is sometimes referred to as intermittent hyperglycemia. It does not predict T2DM. It is best ignored and tested for every 3-5yrs.

3️��� there is no evidence that losing weight prevents diabetes. That's because you can't reverse insulin resistance. You can possibly postpone it by 2yrs? Furthermore there is evidence that those who are fat at the time of diagnosis fair much better than those who are thin.

4️⃣ Weight loss does not reverse diabetes in the VAST majority of people. Those that do reverse it are usually thinner with recent onset T2DM and a low A1c. Only a tiny minority can sustain that over 2yrs. Weight loss does not improve A1c levels beyond 2 yrs either.

5️⃣ Weight loss in T2DM does not improve macrovascular or microvascular health outcomes beyond 2 years. In fact, weight loss in diabetics is associated with increased mortality and morbidity (although it is not clear why). Weight cycling is known to impacts A1c levels.

6️⃣ Weight GAIN does NOT increase the risk of cardiovascular OR all causes mortality in diabetics. In fact, one might even go so far as to say that it's better to be fat and diabetic than to be thin and diabetic.

Dr. Larmie cites 18 peer reviewed journal articles (most from the last decade) that are included in their webinar on the subject, linked below.

[schizophelia]

Tomorrow I start Vraylar. I hope it helps.

[stabbysideblog]

11 antidepressants??????? 11???????? :0 are you going to be okay?

NO I MEANT 1 ANTIDEPRESSANT ANS 2 ANTPSYCOTICS

[frickfrackitback]

Thank you, Vraylar+antidepressant commercial, for reminding me to take my meds!