A question for the doctors

[Bill Murray]

I've been on lots of drugs. I have PTSD so as a user I can see how many of these things can get abused.

Seroquel can fuck you up. I stopped taking it because it fucks you up so much. Once I was in the UK and it blacked me flat out on the tube and I woke up who knows how long later not knowing where I was or how I got there. I don't even know if I was asleep, I just lost a huge chunk of time completely. It also made me hallucinate. I threw in the towel when I was in the shower and saw all the letters on the shampoo bottle jump off and scurry down the drain. Crazy drug that one.

Gabapentin, which I take now, has done wonders for my anxiety. But in large doses I can see how it might mellow you out to a "high" kind of level. I hate feeling high so I have never done it, but I can see it happening.

I've also taking PPI's, I don't know why someone would abuse those honestly. I have esophageal issues secondary to all the shit I deal with so upper endoscopies sometimes result in sometimes meds, sometimes not.

Wellbutrin caused me cognitive issues. I particularly had problems with speech and language recognition. I'd be in the middle of talking and completely forget a word I needed to express something. Maybe that's like being "high" to some people.

I've taken many SSRIs, but had to come off of them because I guess my dosage or my length of use or both caused serotonin syndrome. I was all disoriented and my muscles started twitching like crazy so I was admitted to the hospital for a week to detox them out of my system....which was a miserable experience....but now I am on an SNRI so I guess that must be different enough in some way because I don't have those symptoms. But again, for someone who doesn't need them, I can see how SSRIs could be abused.

Contrave I really don't understand being abused. You can trick doctors into giving you just about anything so when this first came out I had a prescription for it.....bad to give someone with body dysmorphia but all you have to do is conjure up some symptoms (like power slamming high sugar/fat/sodium foods before a blood test that requires a fasting period) and engineer a little unexplained weight gain and bam, you get a prescription. It absolutely does make you not want to eat.....I never felt hungry. But it also makes you constipated as fuck. So not sure why someone would abuse this....well I guess I did actually abuse it, so maybe all these doctors who do have eating disorders.

I've played around with the Seroquel dosage and never really had too much of a response. The most impactful experience was when I was first prescribed it. Low dose of 25mg and I was tripping balls. Head nodding all over the place, slurring my words, very sleepy....it was cool. Since then never anything like it. The shower story is funny, I'd have lost my mind.

I've tried a few different SSRIs SNRIs and the only one I didn't do well on was Lexapro, just made me feel logy all the time.

I've usually had a very good relationship with my GPs and they'd prescribe pretty much anything I'd ask for. Obviously not going to abuse that trust and get them to write scripts that would jeopardize their license.

Worst, or funniest depending on POV, situation I got myself into with pills was a flight from Vancouver to Toronto. I had taken a few Zopiclone and emptied all the hard liquor from the minibar and booked a ticket on the redeye to Toronto. I have no memory of buying the ticket, taking the cab to the airport, boarding the flight or the flight itself....just getting shook on the shoulder by a flight attendant to wake me up when we had landed. I was beyond confused as to WTF happened.

 

[Ellzibette]

I've played around with the Seroquel dosage and never really had too much of a response. The most impactful experience was when I was first prescribed it. Low dose of 25mg and I was tripping balls. Head nodding all over the place, slurring my words, very sleepy....it was cool. Since then never anything like it. The shower story is funny, I'd have lost my mind.

I've tried a few different SSRIs SNRIs and the only one I didn't do well on was Lexapro, just made me feel logy all the time.

I've usually had a very good relationship with my GPs and they'd prescribe pretty much anything I'd ask for. Obviously not going to abuse that trust and get them to write scripts that would jeopardize their license.

Worst, or funniest depending on POV, situation I got myself into with pills was a flight from Vancouver to Toronto. I had taken a few Zopiclone and emptied all the hard liquor from the minibar and booked a ticket on the redeye to Toronto. I have no memory of buying the ticket, taking the cab to the airport, boarding the flight or the flight itself....just getting shook on the shoulder by a flight attendant to wake me up when we had landed. I was beyond confused as to WTF happened.

Were you supposed to be in Toronto? That would be awful if you weren't even supposed to be there.....

I was on 200 mg of Seroquel during a time when I was having a lot of issues with flashbacks, so it was a mighty dose. But the hallucinations were worse than the flashbacks, honestly. Once I started hallucinating I wasn't afraid of the hallucinations I experienced necessarily (the letters jumping off the bottle weren't scary really, and I knew it wasn't real) but I was absolutely terrified of what I might hallucinate that wasn't so benign, if that makes sense. Another thing I saw that wasn't there while taking it was a zombie/homeless looking dude waving from the side of the road when I was a passenger in a car. I told the driver....look out for that guy on the side of the road....was told there was no one on the side of the road....and I was terrified because I wondered what would have happened if I had been driving and the hallucination had walked out into the road and I swerved to avoid him or something and hit someone that was really there. There could be a million things I thought I saw that weren't there that I don't know to this day where hallucinations, and that is what scared me.

But to your example, drug amnesia is the worst side effect of any medication, in my opinion. I also do not sleep unless I am forced to. Meaning, I get tired, I want to sleep, but I will physically fight against it, because I cannot control my environment when I am asleep and that is utterly terrifying. So I took a merry journey down the Ambien, Lunesta, etc. highway as well. All of these things absolutely will "make" you sleep....eventually. But if you fight them, you will literally have hours of time where you are doing things you cannot control and you absolutely cannot remember. Apparently, during Ambien/Lunesta amnesia, I am fond of calling up people for booty calls at 1am. Obviously this is no bueno, and I reportedly acted completely lucid during such occurrences. I don't remember one single thing about any of the times that happened. That is unsettling and dangerous for obvious reasons. So now I take Amitriptyline and Gabapentin at night which helps, and then just try and force myself to sleep.

All of these things completely soured me on psychiatrists, and psychiatry as a whole (sorry Rick James). I felt like they were all just throwing drugs at me to see what would happen. I think that psychiatry is different than other medical areas. An oncologist can treat cancer even if they have never had cancer. But I no longer believe a psychiatrist can treat anything mental they have no first hand experience with. Its why the best addiction counselors are former addicts. So now I just rely on my GP, only address the anxiety/depression aspects of what I deal with, and just manage through everything else with coping mechanisms I have devised over the years.

 

[Jltnov22]

I have been on Seroquel before and took 12 at one time, thinking it would kill me in my sleep. I had all kinds of shit happen...hallucinations, complete loss of time, couldn't stand up without swaying all about, slurred speech, etc. I was pulled off it because it was fucking with my liver. I am also, now, on Ambien and Lyrica (pregabalin). I find the Ambien to be hit or miss on its effectiveness. Sometimes I'll fall asleep and sometimes it seems to have no effect whatsoever. I did try taking 9 of them once to try and put myself out but they only made me do things that I don't remember doing. Got sent to jail for DWI because I had mistakenly taken an Ambien that I thought was my antianxiety med and tried to drive to my psychiatrist appointment. Only thing I remember is being cuffed. The rest is all a blur. Don't remember the drive to the jail, being booked, or being in jail. I do remember making my one call though. The pregabalin is for side effects of other meds I take (antidepressants, antianxiety, antipsychotic) that cause restless leg syndrome. I suppose it works but have never tried overdosing on them. I have come to the realization that nothing I take will kill me so I have given up. I now take things one day at a time.

 

[Bill Murray]

Were you supposed to be in Toronto? That would be awful if you weren't even supposed to be there.....

I was on 200 mg of Seroquel during a time when I was having a lot of issues with flashbacks, so it was a mighty dose. But the hallucinations were worse than the flashbacks, honestly. Once I started hallucinating I wasn't afraid of the hallucinations I experienced necessarily (the letters jumping off the bottle weren't scary really, and I knew it wasn't real) but I was absolutely terrified of what I might hallucinate that wasn't so benign, if that makes sense. Another thing I saw that wasn't there while taking it was a zombie/homeless looking dude waving from the side of the road when I was a passenger in a car. I told the driver....look out for that guy on the side of the road....was told there was no one on the side of the road....and I was terrified because I wondered what would have happened if I had been driving and the hallucination had walked out into the road and I swerved to avoid him or something and hit someone that was really there. There could be a million things I thought I saw that weren't there that I don't know to this day where hallucinations, and that is what scared me.

But to your example, drug amnesia is the worst side effect of any medication, in my opinion. I also do not sleep unless I am forced to. Meaning, I get tired, I want to sleep, but I will physically fight against it, because I cannot control my environment when I am asleep and that is utterly terrifying. So I took a merry journey down the Ambien, Lunesta, etc. highway as well. All of these things absolutely will "make" you sleep....eventually. But if you fight them, you will literally have hours of time where you are doing things you cannot control and you absolutely cannot remember. Apparently, during Ambien/Lunesta amnesia, I am fond of calling up people for booty calls at 1am. Obviously this is no bueno, and I reportedly acted completely lucid during such occurrences. I don't remember one single thing about any of the times that happened. That is unsettling and dangerous for obvious reasons. So now I take Amitriptyline and Gabapentin at night which helps, and then just try and force myself to sleep.

All of these things completely soured me on psychiatrists, and psychiatry as a whole (sorry Rick James). I felt like they were all just throwing drugs at me to see what would happen. I think that psychiatry is different than other medical areas. An oncologist can treat cancer even if they have never had cancer. But I no longer believe a psychiatrist can treat anything mental they have no first hand experience with. Its why the best addiction counselors are former addicts. So now I just rely on my GP, only address the anxiety/depression aspects of what I deal with, and just manage through everything else with coping mechanisms I have devised over the years.

No, while I traveled to Toronto regularly I had no reason to be there at that time. Didn't have any carry on or checked baggage, just me dressed in pants & sports coat (thank christ I didn't go in my jammies), my blackberry and wallet. I wandered around the airport for a bit trying to make sense of things, had breakfast, bought a charger for my phone, emailed the people in Vancouver I had meetings with that day to reschedule and then bought a ticket to fly back. I was kind of a shit and expensed it all.

Wow, booty calls while zoned out....ya that can't be a good thing.

I've had both good and bad experiences with psychiatrists and psychologists. Of the former a couple have been utterly useless while another was very committed to getting behind some issues with medications. Of the latter the worst have been couple councilors.