Posted by Nickengland on June 27, 2005, at 6:17:52
In reply to Advise about Trileptal, posted by smith562 on June 27, 2005, at 5:45:28
Hi Smith :-)
I took Trileptal for bipolar at a low dose of 300mg a day and found it one of the best mood stabilisers i've taken for my mood - helped greatly for anxiety, sleep, depression and most importantly keeping my mood from going "up". Its pretty good stuff and i'm sure if you swithed the weightgain from lithium would drop in no time. I've taken lithium aswell in the past at a similar dose to you, 400mg and my weight shot up aswell so I know how you must feel..with the dating thing
Unfortnately I had to stop Trileptal as I got this really rare wierd side effect of kidney pains (nephritis) But i'm sure you won't get, i've not heard of anyone else here have this. The only thing people do warn about is to make sure you sometimes have a blood test to check your sodium levels...apart from that its pretty safe.
As you mention you want to switch because of dating again, its probably worth me mentioning this too. Do you have any sexual problems with lithium at the moment?....I have alot of praise for Trileptal for what it did for my mood, but i did find I had some slight decrease in sexual function :-(..Although for some people i think ive read this can be the oppisite or not at all but worth thinking about. Tegretol which is very similar has sexual side effects as well boardering on impotence, but strangely I found the sexual side effects less so on Tegretol..
Best way would be to try Trileptal and see what you think, but as from my personal experience of trying both I much prefer Trileptal out of the 2. For panic and anxiety and even depression I think Trileptal would be good for them too..your more likely to respond to it than it to do harm to you I would have of thought.
Bear in mind though that there could be a trade off - you would lose weight, but may get some sexual problems :-( Also if the lithium is working good now, you could run the risk of the Trileptal not working so good and then a return of your illness etc The old saying "if its not broke, why fix it?" But I completely understand the weightgain is a pain in the *ss!
Hope some of this helps and good luck :-)
Kind regards
Nick
poster:Nickengland
thread:519742
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050627/msgs/519743.html