I have had to take extra Zyprexa recently. And because I was breaking down and taking it during the day- the hunger was incredible. I thought I would pass out from hunger at work. I wanted to eat everything I could get my hands on- my lunch, food that patients had brought in, all of the chocolate covered almonds in my purse and an energy bar.
So last night I just took more at night. I hope that will avert taking it during the day. And hopefully the hunger won't be so bad taking it all at night.
My psychiatrist raised my thyroid hormone slightly. I don't know if that is doing to do the job. The one thing I wonder about is switching from Zyprexa to Seroquel XR. I was on Seroquel at one time, but the short half-life was an issue. I wonder if the XR version will be too sedating during the day. Or, alternately- because it has a shorter half-life than Zyprexa, if it will wear out by the end of the day. I don't know which is better for depression, Zyprexa or Seroquel, although that probably depends upon the individual.
This depression has to go.
1 comment:
XR was allegedly designed for (and my sample of one agrees) people who needed a higher dose of Seroquel but were too sedated on it to tolerate what they needed. I read about it a month or so before it came and started BEGGING to go on it ASAP. Dr. Brain said no at first because she has a rather reasonable rule that unless I'm cycling out of control we do not use meds she hasn't tried on other people first on me because I'm so sensitive to meds. But after I kept begging I started it and after a brief dosing error (it took 3 regulars to get the same dose that 2 XRs covered and I took too much for a couple of days despite her warning me not to do that) about a week into it I suddenly was less sedated. Much less sedated. And then within a few weeks I was able to back down to 300 mgs instead of the 600 I'd been on. I stayed there for a long time, several years, until I started Emsam and needed more sedation. Now and for the last year since I went on the extremely high dose I do break one of the tablets so it is immediate release (which isn't really that great at getting me to sleep faster but it might do something) and then take the other 75% as timed release.
I've never had any issue with it wearing off or being overly sedating although in general now that I'm on a lot of sedating meds and the Seroquel is at a very high dose I'm pretty sedated in the morning. But I don't think that can be blamed on the Seroquel when I'm taking 2 mgs of klonopin, 400 mgs of gabapentin and 25 mg of topimirate along with it (plus valium PRN for sleep). And it also is related to not falling asleep easily even with all that sedation.
I don't know. I've found XR to be a very easy to tolerate drug, much easier than regular Seroquel was. It also has seemed to be more effective for me. A few months into XR I was doing so well that I was able to slowly wean off of the huge dose of Depakote I'd been on for years.
So it is worth considering as far as I'm concerned. I tried Zyprexa when I had akathesia really severely and it did nothing for me even at 10 mgs so who knows if you'd respond like I do, but for me XR has been the best there is.
JMJ
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