Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Starting Adderal XR, learning more about drugs

After having my psychiatrist once again go over my chart and test results showing indications of attention deficit disorder and prefrontal cortical dysfunction, he still wanted to postpone putting me on Adderal, an amphetamine stimulant indicated for ADHD. He was glad that we were finally getting some improvement in my mood stability and my anxiety symptoms, and he stresses that stimulants, like Adderal, can worsen symptoms of panic attacks, anxiety, and mood swings. I acknowledge this and explained that if the symptoms got worse, I could likely handle it long enough to know to stop the medication and give him a call. I used the line of reasoning my therapist recommended I use, basically that, why don't we just give it a try and see what happens?

I've only taken my first daily dose this morning. I had a good day, got up early to see my cousin in the hospital, was fairly attentive and engaged in my class, and was able to come home and study for a good 2 hours, and then again in the evening for another hour.

I'll have a better idea of how this medicine effects me within a few days, since it isn't supposed to require a long time to build up in the system. I see my therapist again on Friday, I'll bet he'll want to do a follow up ADD test to compare results. I forget the name of the test, but it is done by me sitting at a computer and responding to things on the screen. It could be letters flashing and I have to press a certain key when a certain letter appears, or having a shape flash on the screen and then try to duplicate it, or read a short story and then later answer questions about it, things like that. I'm making an early prediction that we'll have to increase the dosage to notice a significant positive effect.

In any case, I'm really enjoying my class, I'm developing a much deeper understanding of how drugs, especially psychotropics (both illicit and licit) work in the brain and with individual neurons and their receptors, how the drugs get metabolized in the body, how they are removed from the body, how tolerances are formed, etc.

And thank God for lower Fall temperatures! Reminds me more of home, and makes the bike ride to school that much more relaxing.

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Return to college

Well, I'm officially back in college now to hopefully finish my Bachelor's in Psychology. Yesterday was my first class, called Psychopharmacology, about drug interactions, specifically psychotropics. I'm only taking one class this semester to see if I can handle it. Baby steps. Long term goal is to go all the way to a Doctorate and in the process pull myself out of enough of the disabling effects of my co-morbid disorders to move on in life and start pulling my own weight again. But first things first.

I was really anxious during the orientation period last Friday at the university, but yesterday at class I felt at ease and enjoyed it. I even rode my bicycle there, so I got some good exercise! (didn't have much of a choice though, since the battery in my truck is dead).

Big problem I'm having now is that I am so tired all the time, which I attribute to all the drugs. I'm on Seroquel again, an atypical antipsychotic (tranquilizer). So it's real hard to stay awake at all. I'm still trying to get my psychiatrist to try me out on Adderal, a stimulant, which is what the plan we had worked up called for, and is what me and my therapist have been thinking for quite some time should be a real help for me.


Friday, September 03, 2004

Better eat and drink properly and regularly

Well, I learned the hard way how important it is to eat and drink properly and consistently, especially while on meds like lithium. I ran into a problem were the Lamictal I'm on was causing me to not want to eat or drink, and after a couple of weeks of hardly eating or drinking at all, my lithium levels became toxic for a while and my electrolytes got off balance and I became VERY sick. I really thought I was going to die it hurt so bad. I ended up spending 3 days at the hospital hooked up to an IV to bring my electrolytes back into balance and to nurse me back to where I could start to eat and drink again. I'm still recovering from it, I still have the shakes, a little dizzy, and a very mild pain in my abdomen, but over the next week I should be back to normal and be able to go back on the lithium.

So, my advice to others in a similar situation: even if you feel you can't eat or drink, force it down. Otherwise call your doctor and tell them the meds are causing you to not be able to eat or drink, and they can adjust the meds before you get sick enough to go to the hospital like I did.

Lesson learned!

But, on a positive note, this mishap seemed to improve my attitude and I feel a little more motivation to once again put effort into getting on with life as best I can, both with the small things like helping out around the house more and the bigger things like going back to school.