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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
[email protected]Shown: posts 1 to 8 of 8. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by sassie on November 22, 2005, at 12:59:17
im currently seeing a new doc, and my wellbutrin-effexor combo is giving me bad side effects and making me really tired and down, so wants to take me off everything and start me on a mood stabilizer, either trileptal or lamictal.
i thought mood stabilizers were only used for bipolar- anyone else with depression/anxiety have good results with mood stabilizers? if so, do you recommend one in particular? thanks for the help
Posted by overtheedge on November 22, 2005, at 13:14:48
In reply to mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by sassie on November 22, 2005, at 12:59:17
I have been on both right now again lamicital, the highest i have been was 150mg, did nothing, then i was on trilptal 900mg, and i had bad headaches from it......now they say i have a Mood disorder...whatever that means, but so far i am still moody. i have my highs and my lows....i also suffer from ana, so they are not to sure of anything......maybe someone can be of more help than i was..... maybe with the lamicital i needed a higher dose, but never got that far.....
Posted by spriggy on November 22, 2005, at 14:08:49
In reply to Re: mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by overtheedge on November 22, 2005, at 13:14:48
I have heard people say Lamictal was a good AD for them- but where they bipolar? That's the real question?
Lamictal seemed to be too activating for me; overstimulating and caused horrible anxiety for me.
Depakote is a mood stabilizer and it seemed to really help me calm down. I describe it as a giving my brain a nice, warm bath.
I think for some people mood stabilizer can almost cause depression or make it worse.
I think it depends on the person, their rx, etc..
Good luck!
Posted by mogger on November 22, 2005, at 15:13:26
In reply to mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by sassie on November 22, 2005, at 12:59:17
Lamictal has improved my life 1000 fold and I have unipolar depression (not bipolar). Don't get discouraged by that fact. Lamictal has literally no side effects for me,
mogger
Posted by jclint on November 23, 2005, at 6:47:43
In reply to Re: mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by mogger on November 22, 2005, at 15:13:26
What dosage do you take Mogger? Did you feel the benefits from the beginning? Cheers, J.
Posted by pseudoname on November 23, 2005, at 7:30:51
In reply to mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by sassie on November 22, 2005, at 12:59:17
20-30 years ago, pdocs often added lithium for unipolar depression when tricyclics alone failed. I got it from several pdocs for my unipolarness.
Same with anticonvulsants. Peter Kramer tells a story (as I remember it...) from when he was a psych resident in the 1970s. His supervisor kept having him give a unipolar guy EEG tests over & over until one finally showed *some* sign, however small & dubious, of seizure activity. Then they used that to technically justify giving the guy Depakote, whereon his depressive ruminations vanished.
A review of published studies 1966-2003 concluded:
"Augmentation of antidepressants with lithium is the best-documented augmentation therapy in the treatment of refractory depression."
—http://www.cpa-apc.org/Publications/Archives/CJP/2003/august/bauer.aspThey never worked for me, however. And my history with lithium caused me to be denied health insurance circa 1989. "We don't sell policies to ANYONE on lithium," I was told.
Good luck!!
Posted by Dani B on November 24, 2005, at 12:21:16
In reply to mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by sassie on November 22, 2005, at 12:59:17
My 14 yr old daughter took Effexor to help with anxiety & depression. It made her tired too. She weaned off this past summer, but when school started, the anxiety returned as bad as ever. she tried Lexapro, but we didn't see any change. We saw a new doc, and she recommended Cymbalta 2x/day, and Trileptal. I too was surprised to find online that Trileptal is for bipolar. I don't think our daughter is bipolar...but what's this talk of unipolar? I've never heard of it. But back to the trileptal...I have since read that it is also used as a mood stabalizer, and I can see that it's working for our daughter. She doesn't seem as edgy, and her fuse isn't as short as it has been. I believe this combination of meds is working for her.
Posted by pseudoname on November 24, 2005, at 12:30:21
In reply to Re: mood stabilizers for depression?, posted by Dani B on November 24, 2005, at 12:21:16
> but what's this talk of unipolar? I've never heard of it.
It's just regular old depression ("major depression") without manic episodes; contrast with "bipolar" which hits both manic and depressive "poles." I just said unipolar to clarify that I wasn't talking about taking lithium for bipolar illness.
This is the end of the thread.
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