what would be the best medication for bi-polar?

Question

i am bi-polar and manic depressive. ive taken many of medszoloft rrozac wellbrutiran and a lot of others. any one have any names of meds i can check into?

Answer 1

I've been on every single one of them. The worst in lithium. I gained a ton of weight, my hair thinned and I was like a zombie. thank God my hair grew back and I've lost alot of the weight. They also take your blood all the time and you have to get an ekg first. Ask your doctor about lamictal. I'm on that now. It's wonderful and no side effects. If you have any more questions feel free to email me.

here's what I've been on besides lith and here are the side effects I have had

Geodon: tongue swelled, couldn't breathe, almost died (turns out this is normal)
abilify: sick, felt like bricks on my head and bad tunnel vision
clonozepan: someone told you it's for bipolar disorder up in the beginning. It's not. It's for anxiety. Didn't work for me.
trazadone: made me very sick
zoloft: gained weight
paxil: gained weight
seroquel: vivid, horrible nightmares, felt sick the next day
risperdal: felt drunk and horrible
That's all I can remember. I'm on lamictal 200 mg and lexapro 30 mg now and it works wonders. Good luck!

Answer 2

Definitely talk to your doctor about this.

I've been on several drugs, including Zyprexa, Risperdal, Wellbutrin, and lithium for manic depression.

I've also been on a host of antidepressants, especially before I was diagnosed bipolar, which invariably sent me into manias. I avoid those now unless I hit a major downswing.

Of everything that I've been on, lithium has been, by far, the most kind to me in the long run. The side effects were miserable for the first month and a half, primarily because I was adusting to the lithium and I didn't communicate well with my doctor. When my levels were straightened out and I started feeling the effects of lithium, it pretty much changed my life.

Lithium is the tried and true treatment for manic depression, but something else might work better for you personally. Drugs affect each person a little different.

Just as important as the drugs, though, is self-awareness. If you detect early on that you are becoming manic or depressive, you can exercise, get out, relax, get more sleep, or a host of other things to help control the mood and minimize the bad effects.

Whatever drug(s) you take, be sure to take them as prescribed and be aware of anything that can affect the functioning of your meds. Lithium, for example, should be taken at the same time or timesevery day, with a stable level of physical activity, a stable and high water and salt intake, and a careful watch on anticoagulants like asprin and ibuprofen and diuretics such as caffeine and alcohol.

I have tried to go off of my drugs before, several times. In the case of manic depression, self-regulation without drugs can work for a while, even years. But I always spiraled out of control again, in spite of my great efforts to control my mods. Discontinuing of drugs for bipolar has an alarmingly high suicide rate.

Answer 3

I too have bi-polar, and I've taken so many meds over the last 6 years that I could open my own pharmacy. I have taken Zoloft and I'm on Wellbutrin XL 300 but recently went on 150's, they seem to work better. I also take Cymbalta 60mg.
But with everyone being different go online and look these meds up for inter-actions with other meds you take. This isn't funny but kinda is, cause as I was writing this to you a commercial came on an it was about depression and gave a website to go to its---www.yourtimeforchange.com. there other websites to see you just need to put in the search engine bi-polar and alot will come up.
Take Care and most of all this is very, very hard to do but try to stay away from STRESS.

Answer 4

Hi, my husb is bi-polar, we have found the meds are not the answer for him. The side effects make things worse. We are finding diet helps. He still has his moments. Find something you love to do. When you use loving emotions and stay away from the people who influence you wrong does work. However when a bi-polar person self medicates e.g. alcohol or drugs it is harder to stop doing them. Anyway high protien and low carb's do help. Put yourself on a schedule/program and do your best to stick to it. When you fall off the wagon, get back up immed! I cant express enough the importance of staying on track. It is a daily exercise to keep your mind/thoughts balanced. Good luck

Answer 5

I've found the best success for me has been Lithium (in the form of Lithobid, meaning it is an extended release tablet) and a non-SSRI antidepressant (I'm on Wellbutrin now). But Lithium has been a miracle for me. It can be a tricky med, though, because you have to get your blood levels just right, or you'll be very sick, and many things can change your blood levels (water intake, exercise, I've even heard the changing of the seasons can affect it). Also, many doctors like to start people off immediately on 900mg of Lithium, instead of slowly starting them on it. I started off on 300mg and worked up slowly to see at what level was it going to make me feel best. I actually function much better with a lower blood level of Lithium (0.7) than most doctors attempt to achieve. Anything above that makes me sick.

Lamictal is the newest, and only other FDA approved medicine to treat bipolar other than Lithium (eveything else is off label use). I've heard really good things about it and my husband takes it with good success. I ended up with an allergic reaction to it, so I had to stop taking it, but it doesn't have very many side effects. It's expensive, though.

Answer 6

Please check with your psychiatrist first before attempting to switch because doing so on your own with a antidepressant can cause you to have a switch phase or cause mania to worsen. I would consider using Depakote. There are some tests your doctor might want to order before administering such as a liver function test, platelet count. Zyprexa can be used with Depakote to help with manic episodes. Clonazepam which is an anxiolytic-anticonvulsant type medication is used for for acute manic disorders and can have abuse potential. I hope I have been helpful and wish you well.

Answer 7

Talk to the doc about Abilify - aka Aripiprozole, it's for bi-polar/manic depressive, and schizo-affective people. My husband takes it and he says it was like stepping out of a 10 year haze. It took awhile to get the dosage right for him though, so be patient....hehehee....be the patient

Answer 8

The best medication is no medication. And I'm being completely serious with you. I have the same two disorders and ADD. && they put me on all kinds of medicine. Every kind they could think of. None of them helped as much as me controling it myself. I just found something to occupy myself. Like drawing or writing poetry and when I'd feel the urge of an outbreak like I wanted to scream and yell I'd go do that thing that kept my mind off of it and express it in my writing or drawing. Which helped a lot more than any of the medicine they EVER put me on.

Answer 9

Lithium and Risperdal are also given to bi-polar patients, but DO NOT take any medication without consulting your doctor.

Answer 10

Try Zyprexa, generic name, Olanzapine. Depakote was one of the drugs that used to treat the disorder. It's used for schizphrenics too, and for those with schizoaffective disorder, a disorder that is sort of a hybrid of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. It treats manic phase, delusions, mood disorder.