Hi Mallivelli,
"am in India and doctors am consulting dont understand the relation between respidon and diabities/liver. they are just ignorant of the facts of respidon. when i say am fat because of respidon they say I can show you people who are not with the same medication. They do not even try to see that respidon is causing damage to liver."
I am sorry you are being treated this way. That must be hurtful also.
I'm not a doctor, but I also researched the newer class of anti-psychotics as I've been placed on them as well. I think the Risperdol is suppose to have the least effect of them all on weight gain. When I was put on Olanzepine ("Zyprexa") after I had had a breakdown, I put on 30 pounds quite quickly, then the weight gain seemed to level off (which frustrated me, because I worked all summer to get myself into good shape, I exercised, ate right etc. and was proud of what I accomplished)
What the Olanzepine made me do is feel like I had a "second stomach", I'd eat a meal, and then I would experience hunger pains. And I couldn't resist eating again, but looking back I wish I knew how to understand that and how to resist over-eating and just stay with the healthy meals.
I'm on Seroquel now to help me sleep at night, and it also does a great job for me in preventing nightmares, or being overly affected by them-- I am so grateful for that, believe me! I didn't gain any extra weight from it, it didn't make me more hungry either, so that was a benefit. Seroquel is also heavily sedating of the new anti-pscyhotic class of meds. The Risperdone though is suppose to have less of an effect on weight, but the other thing is that people are all different and have different responses to medications, e.g. like various side effects.
I was also concerned about the Seroquel re: weight gain and rising of blood sugars. What I lucked in, is that I was able to access a program for healthy eating. What foods I can eat to help me feel full. What foods can help flush out cholesterol fats, what foods to eat for healthy fats.
I love East-Indian foods (I'm in Canada, and I really love that part about our multiculturalism here-- the great foods, the different ethnicities bring to us here-- awesome!). There are some challenges with things like using the Ghee in curries, etc., because it's quite high in the less healthy fats, which can contribute to weight gains)
Would it be possible for you to access some nutritional counselling (e.g. via a dietician) that can help reduce the effects of weight gain in a healthy way? There's all sorts of cool tricks to eating a healthy diet-- I learnt I could eat more even, and gain less weight if I was eating the right foods! Also the importance of eating regular meals, not skipping meals, because that not only creates anxiety for the body, it also doesn't help with metabolism-- better to eat regularly, and eating the right foods in balance.
I benefited from attending some nutritional classes, which also helped motivate me and make it easier for me to learn and practice newer healthier eating habits.
If you can't access nutritional counselling by a dietician who is specialized in teaching health food choices to help reduce blood sugars, one thing you can do is check things out on the internet. Look for websites like, Canadian Association of Dieticians, Canadian Diabetes Society-- try to find ones that include nutritional advice and meal planning.
The other thing you can do is to try to improve exercise. It's suggested that for healthy weight loss, to do about 30 minutes each day of aerobic activity, e.g. even going out for a walk. If you are working, you can think about driving less, taking the bus less, leaving more space for walking to and from work?
It's really challenging to make new habits and routines, but if you stick with it for 21 days consequatively, it becomes a habit and that means less anxiety about having to motivate yourself because it already then becomes a habit. It also means, working hard to practice new habits for at least a month, till the new exercise and healthy eating routines are down.
Don't be discouraged. There are ways to help mitigate against the effects of medications. The other thing that is difficult is that often there are genetic predispositions to things like Diabetes, but we can do the best we can to help change things. If it's type II diabetes, changes in diet toward healthier choices can help improve things a lot, there's lots of hope to keep those sugar/glucose levels down.
It's do-able, don't give up hope. From what I've read, the Risperdone is the better choice of anti-psychotic med for having less effects on weight. I've also found that having more sanity of mind, it's still more important even than other health issues, because it has such a dramtic effect on my daily living. For me, it's definitely worth it to be on the meds and deal with the other health issues as they come up.
Me I deal more with heart issues, so I'm not as familiar with diabetes, blood sugars/glucose reducing diet. But check around and see what you can find on the internet. I've noticed that American and Canadian sites are quite similar. Diabetes is a big wow, and it's increased exponentially across the world. It's also challenging getting a healthy diet going when sometimes the cheaper alternatives are things like "McBurger" food places. Best to keep to simple foods, raw foods, vs. prepared foods, as the prepared foods/fast foods tend to have high sodium content (bad for my heart) and high sugar content.
I hope this helps a bit.
~ Nishkaa
