Sufferer Newly diagnosed, abilify, and seeking advice, im pretty crazy, open to questions

[Friday]

Anyway I want to know what' the best CPTSD meds then

The good news? This isn’t bipolar disorder. You won’t need to be on meds the rest of your life to deal with PTSD*. With PTSD, meds are short term, like crutches, while your leg heals. You get your life back, or probably more accurately, get a new life.

Which does lead to the bad news... There aren’t any meds “for” PTSD. Meds treat the symptoms. Anxiety, depression, emotional instability... while you do therapy. Therapy is what treats PTSD. The meds just help you get there. People take different things depending on what their biggest problems/symptoms are.

* Some people who have other disorders like Depression? Will stay on meds long term. Others will keep rescue meds around to use a few times a year as symptoms crop up.

 

[Deleted member 45777]

At least I'm not bipolar or schizophrenic like my mom who is both... that affective one or whatever...

She gave me abilify cuz I have all the symptoms it covers AND there are studies on Abilify for PTSD.

There are clinical trials for Abilifiy FOR PTSD

The trials did really well..

 

[Deleted member 45777]

I already started psychotherapy with a PTSD expert and private therapist through UCI.

We had a very intense first meeting.

I go weekly now and will go for years..

 

[EveHarrington]

There is no “best” medication for PTSD/CPTSD.

Finding a medication that works for you is a total crapshoot.

And then of course for many of us, we need a medication cocktail as no one drug can do it all.

You add in trying to maximize benefit while minimizing side effects——öy vey! It can be a nightmare!

Finding the best med combination can take years. There are no tests to figure out what is wrong.......

You could be....

deficient in dopamine
deficient in seratonin
deficient in norepinephrine

.....and it could take some time to figure out which antidepressant helps you best.....of course, there are no tests to tell you what neurotransmitter is out of whack, so it’s just one big guessing game!

And that’s only for antidepressants.

Throw in mood stabilizers and antipsychotics and anxiety meds and nightmare meds and sleep meds.....and you can see how it becomes extremely complicated, extremely fast.

I don’t say this to discourage you. I say this to let you know that you may have a long road ahead of you in terms of finding the right medication, and this is completely normal.

I’m currently on three meds, one for anxiety, one for nightmares, and one for mood stabilization.

 

[Deleted member 45777]

I have taken:

Lithium (1800 mg a day)
Depakotye (1200 mg a day)
Latuda (80 mg)
Lamotengrene (400 mg a day)
Seroquel
Zoloft

Only shit that ever hit was Latuda.

Mood stabiizers do nothing for me
Antidepressants are hit n miss
Antipsychotics seem best but still hit n miss

Medical doctor thought I was bipolar for years
I had lithium toxicity at one point

But PPO UCI said I have CPTSD

 

[Deleted member 45777]

Oh I also have taken
Trazadone
Xanax
Adderal
And more

Ima pill popping animal

 

[Deleted member 45777]

I technically have personality disorders too tho

But she said

"You can out grow your personality disorders"

 

[mumstheword]

I used to smoke a lot. I smoked loads for the better part of 21 years. Then I gave up for 6.5 years. Symptoms got really bad so I've resorted to using a little weed again.

I sure feel for you, the horrors and terrors you've endured. I really hope you find some relief.
I can understand the rage. You have every right to be pissed the f*ck off. You've had an utterly shit deal.

Writing it out has helped me though, a lot of things I can't put into words yet, but the stuff I can, it's helping to get out.

 

[Deleted member 45777]

Thank u mums!!

I used to smoke a lot. I smoked loads for the better part of 21 years. Then I gave up for 6.5 years...

Means a lot!

 

[mumstheword]

You're welcome @Melanie. :-) Anytime (as long as I'm not too symptomatic).

I'm heading into inpatients soon for a 3 week stint. Lots of group therapy and trauma focused yoga and stuff like that.

But if I'm around I'm happy to share and do whatever I can. Life can totally suck but at least folks around here get that.

I'm sooo much healthier than I've ever been though. It really does ease with time, lots of cognitive therapy and body-based therapies, for me since I stopped relying on drugs for that time. It all helped.
I did TRE a couple of years ago for about a year. Heard of that? Trauma Release Exercises. That helped when talk therapy wasn't doing much for me; plenty on YouTube about it.

 

[Fadeaway]

You are not alone! No one here may 100% identical story to yours but I guarantee there is a least one person here per trauma you have listed here. Many things you have mentioned are pretty dang common here. I have spent hundreds of hours googling trying to stories like mine with no luck, but here I have who have been through what I have been through, people who get it and made me feel less alone. I know you find that here too. In fact I just found another person who can related to much of what I have gone through by the story you just shared.

Of course you are angry! It isn't fair that you have been through so much. I am not a big fan of the concept of forgiveness, but I guess forgiveness means different things to different people. While I never put in foster homes, I was put in family placement with the person f*cked my mom up so bad she couldn't be a mother to me. I do know some pretty bad first hand accounts of people who did experience some horrific things in foster homes so there isn't much you could tell me that I wouldn't believe.

I wish there was an easy fix and a magic pill I could tell you to take but like others have said, it doesn't exist.It sucks, it is hard, and it seems so unfair that we have to work so damn hard to just be able to function with basic daily life and will probably never be able to have the kind of normal happy lives most first world people are born into. Life for most of us will always have elements of struggle than non PTSD folks won't get, but there is hope. I have had periods of time in my life where my symptoms were pretty much gone and with the work you do in therapy, you'll get to experiences those periods of time too. There is no magic pill but there are tons of little things we can do to help make life more bearable.

 

[Deleted member 8714]

Anyway I want to know what' the best CPTSD meds then

None. It's completely individualized. I've found that nothing really works on me after I take it for awhile. I've tried antidepressants, anti-anxiety meds, sleep medicines, and a medicine for nightmares. The side effects of some were worse than the symptoms so I stopped taking them.

I technically have personality disorders....

But she said, "You can out grow your personality disorders"

I had a therapist who discovered during his training to become a therapist that he had a personality disorder. He worked on himself in therapy and when he graduated from school no traces of the personality disorder could be found. He was diagnosed by a psychiatrist before and after his healing. So it is possible to heal from personality disorders.

I'm sorry you went through hell as a child. Therapy will help you with the PTSD/CPTSD.

Some of us have been in therapy for years. I'm one of those; 29 years and still going. I started when hardly any therapist knew that childhood abuse caused PTSD. The first therapist I saw told me I had the worst PTSD she'd ever seen, and I hadn't even told her a thing that happened to me. I've been through many of the things you wrote about. Though I was never in the foster care system, I've read horror stories about it, and heard more on the news, especially in my state where there were massive problems in the foster care system.

For years, I searched the internet looking for someone who experienced what I've gone through like @Fadeaway did. I've yet to find a single person who experienced my childhood horrors and traumas. Here on myPTSD I don't feel as isolated in that way. The support I've received from those on this site has been something I couldn't find anywhere else, and I've used several support forums before landing here.