Posted by TonyZ on February 28, 2008, at 13:23:40
At first I will cut to the chase of what I am currently taking and then following I will explain the details. I am having a rough time as I am sure we all are:
Current meds:
sam-e 800mg (sadenosylmethylionine - a natural compound produced in the body)
valium 10 mg/ day
lithium 600 mg/ day (just started 2 days ago)
seroquel 200mg /day (just started taking 8 days ago... dosages were 50,100,100,150,200,200,300,200mg)
lunesta 2-3 mgSleep has been a big issue while I slept ok last night. I am very nervous about the combinations of meds. My doc felt the sam-e wasn't working so after increasing the dosage for a while he added other drugs.
Given I've only been on the seroquel for a few days what is the best way to taper off??
For those that have the time or interest to read the whole story here is the recent history. Suffered a seris of major depressions over the years and typically responded well to the tricyclics although given the side effects I would prefer to avoid that route now.
Sam-e had appeared to be effective in treating me for the past 2 years. (That is all I had been taking) The dosage was 1200mg. I started to experience anxiety and fell quickly into a deep depression, valium had been effective in the past and that was presecribed at 10-30 mg/day. After taking it for a month at an average dose of about 10mg / day, doc said I could just stop it cold. I don't think this is right. While taking the valium increased sam-e to 1600 mg/day. Then added deplin which is a synthetic folate - I mentioned something about the concern that excess folate could interfere with the natural production of sam-e in the body so he substituted cerofolin which contains b vitamins and some other stuff and also added geodon first at 20mg then dropping down to 10mg because I complained of lack of sleep. Although there may have been a few incidents where I felt better I was not comfortable with the mix and thought the geodon would be causing too much agitation. Doc simultaneously cut the sam-e in half to 800mg substituted seroquel, which makes me feel uncomfortable and fuzzy but had initially seemed to help with sleep.
Recently doc gave me a choice of upping the seroquel and adding lithium or stopping the seroquel cold and adding the lithium. I only bumped the seroquel to 300mg for one night added the lithium and with the lunesta got maybe 1 hour of sleep, although at the end of the day I did feel a bit better and had less brain fog but this was near bedtime.
So complaining about the lack of sleep doc said to keep everything the same except increase Lunesta from 2 to 3mg - it is very hard to split this small pill - so I probably wound up with a bit less than 3mg but sleep was good.
Today I am foggy and concentration is not as good as it was last night.
It is hard to tell if it is the reduction of the seroquel to 200mg (but I slept better) or just the combination of the meds. Doc dropped the sam-e because he thought it wasn't working and I probably complained that I wasn't getting any better, but I am wondering if that was a good strategy.
So for those have taken the time to read this far I thank you and ask about tapering off the seroquel given that I have only been on it for a short period of time, what is the best way ? Again here are the dosages taken each day 50,100,100,150,200,200,300,200mg. I am thinking of dropping 25-50mg a night if I can figure out how to split the pills.
poster:TonyZ
thread:815161
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/wdrawl/20080220/msgs/815161.html