For the last few months I’ve been having periods of depression that last 2–3 days at a time. I get them about 2–3 times a month I think. They’re not terrible depression, but enough for me to not want to be around anymore (don’t worry, no plans or anything, just general not wanting to be around).
I’ve been on the medication merry-go-round plenty of times before. In fact I’ve tried almost every single antipsychotic (or med used as an antipsychotic), which makes my list about 35–40 strong, and probably 10–15 anti-depressants. Usually the medication has side effects so bad that I can’t stand them and have to go off the medication. A handful of medications have worked. My general pattern is that the medication works for anywhere between 1–3 years, and then it stops working, or the side effects just become intolerable (like I gained 100 lbs due to Zyprexa and Seroquel). Anti-depressants have never worked for me at all, only anti-psychotics.
So I’ve been on Latuda for maybe 7 or so years now and have been pretty stable. A few times we’ve had to increase the dose. When this latest round of depressive episodes started, we increased my Latuda to the max dosage.
We decided not to try anything before the convention, because I didn’t want to be dealing with side effects at the convention. But when I got back, I had a 4 day depression. So I figured it was time to try something.
I talked with my psychiatrist and with my past history of meds, she suggested we re-try some of the ones I haven’t been on in a long while to see if my body has changed enough that the side effects aren’t so bad. I refused to try any that would make me gain weight.
She said the top two contenders she was thinking of were Vraylar and Lamictal. Vraylar was the med I tried right before Latuda, so that was only about 7 years ago. It made me SO dizzy. But maybe if I had stuck out the dizziness longer I might have been able to make it work. But we never got to a therapeutic dosage, because I got super dizzy within the first two weeks.
Lamictal is a medication I tried over 20 years ago, before I got a service dog. It worked GREAT for 9 months. I was hypo-manic (which means I’m very happy and excited and productive, but not to a dangerous level) for the entire 9 months. I had all kinds of fun and dyed my hair hot pink and did the research for and published a paper in a science journal. But 9 months in, I developed Stevens-Johnsons-Syndrome (SJS).
SJS is a life threatening rash of your mucous membranes. It literally causes a rash on your lips, mouth, nose, and any other mucous membranes on the outside and inside of your body and can kill you. Luckily my case was mild, I realized what it was right away, and was able to stop the medication before there was any permanent damage.
I’ve been told by numerous doctors since then that it’s safe to re-start Lamictal and watch for the rash, and just stop it right away if you get it—that you might not get it even the second time you try the drug.
The psych nurse told me it was my decision which to try, and I couldn’t decide, so I called Brad. He said since we knew Lamictal had been effective and we had never even gotten to the effective dosage of Vraylar, that we should try the Lamictal first.
So I have the pills and will start tonight. I’ll keep a good eye on any rashes that might develop, and if they do I have to go to the ER (not urgent care). At least thanks to Tamara, I know which ER not to go to!
We’re starting at a really low dose. Normally people use this dose for 1 week, then go up to the next step. But we are going low and slow and will do this really low dose for a whole month. The doctor said I may notice a change with it as an add-on to the Latuda (that I’m staying on), but we’ll keep slowly increasing each month until we get to whatever dose works for me. The normal effective dose is 8 times what I’ll be taking this month.
Wish me luck in improving my depression! I hope something works soon because it’s no fun for me, Brad, or Tamara when I get depressed.
Below are a few pictures I took of Felix and a video of him at the office. He is wearing a pink vest with a purple wing patch Deanna and Allison got for me.
