Eliminating a not-so-happy pill
Both my physician and psychologist have recommended that I gradually reduce the amount of Tegretol I take. It's a pill meant to control epileptic seizures, but my past EEG and MRI results show I never had epilepsy and the twitching I occasionally experienced was caused by panic and anxiety. I had cut back from two pills per day to just one a few weeks ago. Beginning next week, I'll take one pill every other day.
I'll order one more refill (per the psychologist's suggestion) so I can have some pills available in case stopping them makes things worse again. With my therapy and the Your Erroneous Zones book, however, I think I'll be fine. The 11-hour workday I had Sunday will help absorb the expense of the refill; it costs about $102, while my other meds cost $15 total. After this month, having the extra $102 in my account will greatly help when my other bills come due.
One odd thing I noticed when I first started taking Tegretol back in 1994 or 1995 was it caused everything I heard to sound about a half-pitch lower. In other words, if a song is played in the key of A, it sounded somewhere between G# and A. Since I've begun cutting back, the music, TV shows and everything else sounds a lot brighter.
I'll order one more refill (per the psychologist's suggestion) so I can have some pills available in case stopping them makes things worse again. With my therapy and the Your Erroneous Zones book, however, I think I'll be fine. The 11-hour workday I had Sunday will help absorb the expense of the refill; it costs about $102, while my other meds cost $15 total. After this month, having the extra $102 in my account will greatly help when my other bills come due.
One odd thing I noticed when I first started taking Tegretol back in 1994 or 1995 was it caused everything I heard to sound about a half-pitch lower. In other words, if a song is played in the key of A, it sounded somewhere between G# and A. Since I've begun cutting back, the music, TV shows and everything else sounds a lot brighter.