Mental Illness 101

[naamah_darling]

A friend encouraged me to post this in a longer format to my journal so that everyone can see it. To that end, if you find value in it, consider linking to it. You have my permission to link!This is all stuff that I wish people had said to me just before and after I'd been diagnosed as bipolar: very basic advice for dealing with the time right

Comments

[elialshadowpine]

This is amazing. If I hadn't said it before (and I'm sure I have), you're awesome and I adore you. :)

I've had a lot of experience with meds, some of those being psych meds. A couple comments I'd make are

1) When looking up side effects online, be prepared that what you find are frequently going to be worst-case scenarios. Drug companies have to list nearly everything for liability purposes, even if it's crazy rare. People are going to post on review sites, forums, blogs, etc, with their negative experiences. Most people don't take the time to say, "Hey, this drug works great" or even "This drug worked fine", they go to vent or warn other people. There are some side effects that are common and will be documented as such (such as sex drive and SSRIs), but there's a lot of side effects that are very very rare, and worry about the rare ones generally isn't a reason not to try the medication, unless you are high risk for some reason.

2) If you start to have negative side effects that AREN'T documented... talk to your doctor. Don't stick it out more than a couple weeks (and for some things, not even then) hoping it'll get better. TALK. TO. YOUR. DOCTOR. I have virtually no memory of about a year of my life from when I was on one medication. This is not a common side effect; I can actually find no evidence that anybody else ever has had this side effect. But it happened, and I noticed that I was losing my memory when I was on it, and instead of talking to my doctor, I stuck it out, hoping it'd get better. It didn't, and I have permanent effects from it.

[terrie01]

While the title is cringe-worthy, "The Feeling Good Handbook" by David D. Burns, M.D. has a very nice appendix with information on antidepressants. It lays out side effects, drug and food interactions and other basic information.

[snowcoma]

This. So much this. I heard so many horror stories when I went on Effexor XR (Venlafaxine ER). I understand that people were trying to help me, but it ended up being a huge source of irritation and stress. I knew the potential side-effects, and had dealt with bad medication effects before (both my own, and the many, many, many reactions my mother had to a wide variety of medications. I discussed everything with the doctor, knew what to look for, and was completely fine.

It's now three years later, and my new primary care physician ran down a list of over twenty potential side-effects with me, and I was able to say "nope" to all of them. Now that I'm on new medication for my bipolar, it continues to be just fine. So I will toss this out there for other folks:

I have had a great experience with Effexor, and as long as you're smart and know to contact your doctor if anything goes funky, you'll be just fine trying it. Go Team Crazypills!