A new theory

It's the melatonin. And I'm an idiot for not listening to myself, and listening to my step-mother.

I have taken small amounts of melatonin in the past. I had hoped it would help with sleep. I liked the fact that it seemed protective against breast cancer- and I haven't had kids, so I an at higher risk. And more recent research suggests that it may help protect against tardive dyskinesia.

The problem is, every time I took it, my mood didn't seem as good. I felt more depressed. Every time I told a psychiatrist, they told me that melatonin didn't cause depression, that in fact it was good for depression. But I still stopped it each time I tried it. Plus, it didn't make me sleep.

So now my step mother found an article that found that 5 mg of melatonin reduces antipsychotic weight gain. And she is really pushing it. I tell her about my fears of depression, but she says that she never heard that, and that I should try it.

Then two weeks ago I reconcile myself about going back up on the Zyprexa. I know I am going to gain back the weight I just lost. I am still not sleeping without klonopin, which I don't want to take. So I decide, why not? And I add 3 mg of melatonin (way higher than anything I have ever taken in the past), to my mix. And now the depression- a really anxious, irritable, depression- is back. I decide it is just a bounce out of the hypomania that I was in. But maybe not- maybe it was the melatonin.

Unfortunately I just took my meds- and I just took my melatonin. But that is the last I will take of it. Afterall, I still needed the klonopin to sleep. It didn't get me off of that.

With an n of 1, there are always too many variables to really figure out what is going on. Just best guesses. And my guess is that the melatonin is not a good thing.