{"id":4410,"date":"2011-10-23T18:05:47","date_gmt":"2011-10-24T01:05:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/?p=4410"},"modified":"2018-05-15T09:59:21","modified_gmt":"2018-05-15T16:59:21","slug":"bipolar-disorder-medication-woes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/bipolar-disorder-medication-woes\/","title":{"rendered":"Bipolar Disorder Medication Woes"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve been on my medication (Lamictal<\/span>– generic Lamtrigine<\/span>) since 2005.  Unfortunately,  the Lamictal<\/span> has stopped working three times  in the past six years. Well, it hasn’t stopped working exactly- if it did I would be suicidal pretty quickly. I should  say that it is not working as well as it usually does. <\/span><\/p>\n

All medications have an average\/recommended dose as a guideline for prescribers. But this is only a start.  People have such different brain chemistry that the dosage can be all over the place.<\/span><\/p>\n

My problem is that I’m on the highest dose as possible for the Lamictal<\/span>. 700mg. When the lower dose stopped working last year, my prescriber<\/span> and I upped it to get me out of a really serious rapid cycling depression. (A few mood swings a day- waking up crying in the middle of the night, etc. )<\/span><\/p>\n

And now it’s happening again. I can’t raise the dose. I use the management plan I write about in my books- I use it 24 hours a day to keep myself going. I do well with my work, have a good time with friends, take a lot of walks with my hiking buddy Sheri and try to remind myself that IT”s AN ILLNESS and it lies to me- just like it lies to all of us. I have a good life.<\/p>\n

I know that going through this helps me understand what this illness does to people.  I always remain positive that I will keep finding new ways to stay stable.<\/p>\n

 I’ve been through this before and know I can get through it once again.  Isn’t this an odd illness? I can understand cancer, broken bones, pneumonia, concussions and so many more physical injuries- but bi-polar disorder is just so weird!<\/p>\n

Julie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve been on my medication (Lamictal– generic Lamtrigine) since 2005.  Unfortunately,  the Lamictal has stopped working three times  in the past six years. Well, it hasn’t stopped working exactly- if it did I would be suicidal pretty quickly. I should  say that it is not working as well as it usually does. <\/p>\n

All medications have an average\/recommended dose as a guideline for prescribers. But this is only a start.  People have such different brain chemistry that the dosage can be all over the place.<\/p>\n

My problem is that I’m on the highest dose as possible for the Lamictal. 700mg. When the lower dose stopped working last year, my prescriber and I upped it to get me out of a really serious rapid cycling depression. (A few mood swings a day- waking up crying in the middle of the night, etc. )<\/p>\n

And now it’s happening again. I can’t raise the dose. I use the management plan I write [ Read More ]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4410"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4410"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11637,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4410\/revisions\/11637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}