Risperidone Detox

[manVSmind]

I've been on risperidone for 6 years for Bipolar, it was too lift my mood out of depression with wellbutrin xl. however the risperidone makes me want to eat all the time. i have gained and lost 100lbs four times within these six years, i have used, topomax, strettera, phentermine, caffeine, diet pills, to decrease appetite, but as soon as i would stop using any of those variables the hunger would come back and so would the binge eating on junk and weight gain. topomax made me lose all the weight but took my memory, had to stop it for school, strettera did wonders for suppressing appetite against risperidone, but i would get a tolerance to it quick and im not ADD.., Phentermine made me drive around all night listening to music and chain smoking cigerettes while losing my hair, caffeine only helped for the day time, but when night time came and the caffeine wore off the increased appetite would come back with a vengence from hell, so i would take trazodome to knock me out before hunger had a chance to get me. like the others it only worked for about three months, until i developed tolerance to caffeine and trazodome. Diet pills would work for only 3 days. My doctor's all point fingers at risperidone. I have been on wellbutrin xl 300mg and risperidone 1mg for six years constantly. I recently decided that this summer i was going to detox off everything and started tapering in january. Im now only on .5 mg on risperidone, no more wellbutrin xl. i plan on taking my last dose on may 10th. Ive tried this before and lasted 24 hours. i wasn't expecting the risperidone withdrawels.i woke up and felt weird. i couldn't sit still, kept fidgeting, then later that night i felt overwhelmingly irritability, and tons of anxiety, ( NO HUNGER THOUGH ). i wanted to claw my face off, it was horrible.. the best way i could describe it was it felt like i was being tormented inside my own brain. But now im ready to face it again.. None of my docs have ever had a patient come off of risperidone. So they don't know anything about the withdrawels, how long they last, or anything. the original Dr. who prescribed me wellbutrin xl and risperidone has been gone for 5 years. My question is, Has anyone taken risperidone for an extended period of time and detoxed off of it? How long were the withdrawels? and did the Increase hunger to binge eat go away once off it?? PLEASE HELP! thank you

[jt07]

I took risperidone for about 8 months, and my doctor just switched me off and onto Abilify. I did not suffer any withdrawals, but of course, I wasn't on it for 6 years. I did not get hungry on risperidone and actually lost weight while taking it.

I have a question: are your doctors on board with your getting off risperidone? What will replace it to treat your bipolar?

[gizmo]

Perhaps it's not so much risperdal withdrawal as the resumption of your bipolar symptoms from the d/c of an AP. it sounds like you need to talk to your pdoc ASAP.

[ManWitPlan]

I'd guess it is breakthrough symptoms popping up. The weight comes off when you stop risperdal though. I have went off rispedal numerous times and would not recommend it. Being skinny and dealing with mental torture all day wasnt worth it for me. But make sure to talk with your doctor to get his approval. I wouldn't come off by myself.

[AirMarshall]

You can withdraw from any or all of your meds. However, none of your symptoms are consistent with toxicity. Therefore you are not "Detoxing".

[CookieN]

I have never been on Risperidone. But I have been on zyprexa for 6 years. I gained a lot of weight and it made me want to eat the whole time.

2 years ago I went to my GP and she run some tests (the 2 hour glucose tolerance test) and found that I had insulin resistance which was causing the weight gain. I was put on metformin, and lost most of the weight. I no longer have cravings. It might not be your case, but I thought it would be useful to share.

If you are not happy with the weight gain, ask your doctor about other options. My doctor mentioned Abilify (antipsychotic) which he considered didn´t make people gain so much weight.

[Alien Navel Cord]

I too was super hungry on risperidone when I started taking it, but fortunately that side effect is starting to die down a bit. I think I gained about 5 lbs on it so far which doesn't sound like a lot but I am small boned and 5'3" so every pound matters.

Anyway, coming off of any medication could cause withdrawal symptoms so you should definitely work with your doctor on this, even if you're not sure they know much about coming off of the risperidone.

[Guest]

I'm coming off risperidone after six years. I tried last year but I tapered down to quickly and had some quite serious withdrawal. I've done it more slowly this time and I am down to 1 mg, which is fine. After I have titrated up on my Lamictal, I will be weaning off the 1mg. I don't know how it will go, I will keep you posted.

[scatty]

I've quit taking risperdal a few times with no withdrawals at all. Just do what your pdoc advises and tirate down slowly if that is what he recommends.

[manVSmind]

My doctors have been trying to urge me to get off of my medications for a couple years now, they don't think i need it, and that i never did and don't know why my 1st doc put me on this stuff. 7 years ago my parents got divorced and i lost my highschool sweet heart all in the same month, i was depressed for obvious reasons, and just wanted to stay in bed all the time and sleep. my best friend thought maybe i should get some antidepressants to pull me out of it. I went and saw a psychiatrist. She asked me all those questions and diagnosed me with some certain type of bi polar, explaining that i wasn't the wild, wreckless, impulsive behavior bi polar, but the type that uses "mania" for production like school, studying, problem solving, writing, working, and other stuff, ( i have always been a straight A student, working, and being very sociable and functionable) but was afraid that maybe my mood had slumped into the pits and is stuck there. My last half of my senior year she tried giving me all kinds of stuff to take, but i never really took them seriously, if they didn't make me feel better in 2 days i would stop taking them. ( being an idiot i wouldn't tell her that so she thought i would be on these meds for 2 weeks or more with no progress) She finally told me she was giving me wellbutrin xl and risperidone, that she though i needed somthing more agressive since nothing was working ( nothing was working because i wasn't taking it seriously). With in 2 hours after taking them I had enormous energy and everything went back to normal. Except i was getting hungry a lot. so she added topomax. Then the Dr. stopped accepting any insurance carriers. she will only see clients and you have to pay cash> basically she changed her practice to only treat rich people and moved to the higher class side of town. Then it was time for college, and topomax killed my memory, so i went off the topomax, memory came back and so did the munchies. gained 80lbs in 8 months. was eating a lot of calories a day. I didn't see a Dr. for quite sometime, Just had another Dr. the original prefferred send refills to the pharmacy every 3 months without any contact. I left school after my freshman year for a good construction job and settled at that until my bosses urged me to go back to school, trying to convince me to not settle into that employer like they did. I went back to school and left the construction job, which also meant losing my health insurance through my employer, and i lost my private insurance due to them dropping me after having a stomach infection that racked up a hefty bill. so they accidently dropped me after paying my expenses and wouldn't accept me again when i reapplied saying i had too many recent prior claims or whatever.. so i acquired state insurance that is offered for college students, and went to the clinic for a new doc that the state approved. Everyone there at that clinic would tell me i didn't seem like i needed to be there. They said i was more sound minded then they were. My new doc didn't think my symptoms needed to be treated with such an extreme as risperidone. She believed the energy i got from that first day was probably mostly due to the wellbutrin xl, and asked if i wanted to try coming off them. I said no, College was about to start and i didnt want to risk getting depressed again. that doctor was always happy to see me, she would keep me in her office for an hour or more just to talk said i allowed her to have a break. Everytime i would see her she would shake her head and smile and tell me i didn't need to be there. She gave me trazodome for insomnia ( insomnia brought on by excessive caffeine that i was using to lose all my weight.), and i used caffeine and trazodome to lose all my weight, started getting into weight lifting, got in really good shape, and she finally convinced me to go off the risperidone. Thats when i had that 24 hour withdrawel of irritability and anxiety episode > which also were the main symptoms i found on google that was experienced by long term users who go off of risperidone. I went back on it quick, 5 mins later i was ok but i was very discouraged thinking that is the real me, the real me is completely broken and insane, that im not really that guy that deserves all those compliments i was receiving from my doctor.. but one magical pill makes me into a super functional well rounded individual... the hunger came back greater then ever before. I gained 80 lbs again in 3 months, i felt like a fraud. went and saw my doc at the end of the 3 months and her jaw dropped, she barely recognized me, i looked very fat and sad. Told her what happend, and that i was completely insane apparently without the risperidone. She explained to me that what i experienced was just a withdrawal, and she was surprised i had one, she didn't think i would, cuz all her other patients that take risperidone take 4-6 mgs and i was on just .5 for a few years.. She tried to have me do it again but i refused. I was in school i had tests, a job, i didnt want to mess up my gpa or anything. she was very concerned about the weight, thats why we tried strettara, then after had my pcp give me phentermine, and this went on for a almost two years. Both my pcp, a weight management doctor, and my psych doc just kept telling me to just get off the meds. One doctor i asked, explained that one of the things risperidone does is it inhibits the production of a certain dopamine, not all of it, so brain cells develop abnormal amounts of receptors for that specific type of dopamine, the longer your on it, the more receptors form on brain cells as they try to find that missing dopamine, when you go off the medication and that specific dopamine is finally released, theirs an army of receptors ready to grab, which in turn cause to much of that dopamine to enter the cells. too much dopamine causes anxiety, irritability, mania, a whole laundry list of symptoms that are similar to the description of withdrwel symptoms.. The doctor said thats what is causing the " withdrawal" and after awhile the brain cells know that they don't need that much dopamine and start decreasing the number of receptors until finally everything balances out. So ive been tampering slowly, every time i went down i would feel a watered down version of that one night where i experienced withdrawals, then i would balance out. Now im at .5mg and have been for about a month stable. still hungry though.. ( Ive taken nutrtition classes and know how to eat, i still lift weights, and exercise, but none the less my hunger is never satisfied.) In the first year and a half i was on risperidone, while doing construction i went off of it for 3 months. no withdrawels or anything, but me and my gf at the time had a miscarriage, it was very depressing for both of us, which ended our relationship, i was depressed so i started taking the meds again to pick me up- to my dismay they did nothing, but i stuck with it. my depression from that went away after i was over it and had moved on. but i still took the meds. The withdrawel i ended up having later after that doctors presume it was because i was on it now for a longer period of time, they explained the longer your on it the longer the withdrawel from the added receptors. But they were unsure how long that would exactly be because they never had anyone similiar to my case. so im giving it a go this summer. and thats the brief history. Any input is helpful. If I don't make it past 3 months im going back on it, lamictal is also a back up plan incase we discover that i am very bi polar, I will also look into the insulin resistance, thanks guys!

[gizmo]

I can't read a wall of text without proper punctuation. It's not that I'm being mean, it's just very hard for a lot of us here on CB to process so much information in one big block.

I've been on risperdal for two years at a dose of 6 mg, and it does not make me hungry and did not make me gain weight. However, other medications I take (depakote) and have taken (zyprexa and abilify) did make me extremely hungry and gain weight.

If you are going to talk about how risperdal affects your brain in such specific details, post medical journal links to back up "one doctor's" explanation to you. Otherwise, you needlessly translate inaccurate information to those people who find this site via google. Remember, us crazies don't wear MD hats.

[Guest]

I have had withdrawals. It wasn't a detox, but I have spoken to a local team of psychosis experts who say that it can happen, the way to avoid it is a very slow taper down over a period of months, if you have been on it for years, take at least six months to taper down, longer he higher the dose. Often the mental health symptoms the drug was treating come back, so it's important to have a plan for how to manage that through life style management and therapy etc. What I experienced was physical symptoms as well as mental health ones, which disappeared when I restarted the med.

That said, this year I have tapered down very slowly with no withdrawal at all. I am in a better place and am healthier generally, but this time it hasn't been so bad.

[Indigo 'n dye]

I can't read a wall of text without proper punctuation. It's not that I'm being mean, it's just very hard for a lot of us here on CB to process so much information in one big block.

Arrrggh! I tried to read it but simply could not make my way through more than the first few lines. WoW to those who did manage to make it through the wall-'o-text.

[manVSmind]

I guess that is pretty long, my mistake, I thought maybe an extensive background would be helpful. Just trying to find answers.

[olga]

I guess that is pretty long, my mistake, I thought maybe an extensive background would be helpful. Just trying to find answers.

Man, it's perfectly okay to write a long response----all we ask is that you break it up into paragraphs. If you hit your Enter button about every 3 or 4 sentences it will make it possible for us to read it.

Some of the members here have ADD and dyslexia and other issues that make reading a challenge. When there are no paragraph breaks, it makes it totally impossible for some of us.

We don't mean to be critical---we just ask that you edit that long paragraph into about 9 or 10 paragraphs.

olga

[Indigo 'n dye]

Something like this... ... ...

My doctors have been trying to urge me to get off of my medications for a couple years now, they don't think i need it, and that i never did and don't know why my 1st doc put me on this stuff. 7 years ago my parents got divorced and i lost my highschool sweet heart all in the same month, i was depressed for obvious reasons, and just wanted to stay in bed all the time and sleep. my best friend thought maybe i should get some antidepressants to pull me out of it.

I went and saw a psychiatrist. She asked me all those questions and diagnosed me with some certain type of bi polar, explaining that i wasn't the wild, wreckless, impulsive behavior bi polar, but the type that uses "mania" for production like school, studying, problem solving, writing, working, and other stuff, ( i have always been a straight A student, working, and being very sociable and functionable) but was afraid that maybe my mood had slumped into the pits and is stuck there.

My last half of my senior year she tried giving me all kinds of stuff to take, but i never really took them seriously, if they didn't make me feel better in 2 days i would stop taking them. ( being an idiot i wouldn't tell her that so she thought i would be on these meds for 2 weeks or more with no progress) She finally told me she was giving me wellbutrin xl and risperidone, that she though i needed somthing more agressive since nothing was working ( nothing was working because i wasn't taking it seriously). With in 2 hours after taking them I had enormous energy and everything went back to normal. Except i was getting hungry a lot. so she added topomax. Then the Dr. stopped accepting any insurance carriers. she will only see clients and you have to pay cash> basically she changed her practice to only treat rich people and moved to the higher class side of town.

Then it was time for college, and topomax killed my memory, so i went off the topomax, memory came back and so did the munchies. gained 80lbs in 8 months. was eating a lot of calories a day. I didn't see a Dr. for quite sometime, Just had another Dr. the original prefferred send refills to the pharmacy every 3 months without any contact. I left school after my freshman year for a good construction job and settled at that until my bosses urged me to go back to school, trying to convince me to not settle into that employer like they did. I went back to school and left the construction job, which also meant losing my health insurance through my employer, and i lost my private insurance due to them dropping me after having a stomach infection that racked up a hefty bill.

so they accidently dropped me after paying my expenses and wouldn't accept me again when i reapplied saying i had too many recent prior claims or whatever.. so i acquired state insurance that is offered for college students, and went to the clinic for a new doc that the state approved. Everyone there at that clinic would tell me i didn't seem like i needed to be there. They said i was more sound minded then they were. My new doc didn't think my symptoms needed to be treated with such an extreme as risperidone. She believed the energy i got from that first day was probably mostly due to the wellbutrin xl, and asked if i wanted to try coming off them. I said no, College was about to start and i didnt want to risk getting depressed again. that doctor was always happy to see me, she would keep me in her office for an hour or more just to talk said i allowed her to have a break. Everytime i would see her she would shake her head and smile and tell me i didn't need to be there. She gave me trazodome for insomnia ( insomnia brought on by excessive caffeine that i was using to lose all my weight.), and i used caffeine and trazodome to lose all my weight, started getting into weight lifting, got in really good shape, and she finally convinced me to go off the risperidone.

Thats when i had that 24 hour withdrawel of irritability and anxiety episode > which also were the main symptoms i found on google that was experienced by long term users who go off of risperidone. I went back on it quick, 5 mins later i was ok but i was very discouraged thinking that is the real me, the real me is completely broken and insane, that im not really that guy that deserves all those compliments i was receiving from my doctor.. but one magical pill makes me into a super functional well rounded individual... the hunger came back greater then ever before. I gained 80 lbs again in 3 months, i felt like a fraud. went and saw my doc at the end of the 3 months and her jaw dropped, she barely recognized me, i looked very fat and sad. Told her what happend, and that i was completely insane apparently without the risperidone.

She explained to me that what i experienced was just a withdrawal, and she was surprised i had one, she didn't think i would, cuz all her other patients that take risperidone take 4-6 mgs and i was on just .5 for a few years.. She tried to have me do it again but i refused. I was in school i had tests, a job, i didnt want to mess up my gpa or anything. she was very concerned about the weight, thats why we tried strettara, then after had my pcp give me phentermine, and this went on for a almost two years. Both my pcp, a weight management doctor, and my psych doc just kept telling me to just get off the meds.

One doctor i asked, explained that one of the things risperidone does is it inhibits the production of a certain dopamine, not all of it, so brain cells develop abnormal amounts of receptors for that specific type of dopamine, the longer your on it, the more receptors form on brain cells as they try to find that missing dopamine, when you go off the medication and that specific dopamine is finally released, theirs an army of receptors ready to grab, which in turn cause to much of that dopamine to enter the cells.

too much dopamine causes anxiety, irritability, mania, a whole laundry list of symptoms that are similar to the description of withdrwel symptoms.. The doctor said thats what is causing the " withdrawal" and after awhile the brain cells know that they don't need that much dopamine and start decreasing the number of receptors until finally everything balances out. So ive been tampering slowly, every time i went down i would feel a watered down version of that one night where i experienced withdrawals, then i would balance out.

Now im at .5mg and have been for about a month stable. still hungry though.. ( Ive taken nutrtition classes and know how to eat, i still lift weights, and exercise, but none the less my hunger is never satisfied.) In the first year and a half i was on risperidone, while doing construction i went off of it for 3 months. no withdrawels or anything, but me and my gf at the time had a miscarriage, it was very depressing for both of us, which ended our relationship, i was depressed so i started taking the meds again to pick me up- to my dismay they did nothing, but i stuck with it.

my depression from that went away after i was over it and had moved on. but i still took the meds. The withdrawel i ended up having later after that doctors presume it was because i was on it now for a longer period of time, they explained the longer your on it the longer the withdrawel from the added receptors. But they were unsure how long that would exactly be because they never had anyone similiar to my case. so im giving it a go this summer. and thats the brief history. Any input is helpful. If I don't make it past 3 months im going back on it, lamictal is also a back up plan incase we discover that i am very bi polar, I will also look into the insulin resistance, thanks guys!

[manVSmind]

UPDATE.. It has been 43 days since i've been off risperidone, been on risperidone for 6 years.. which also mean 43 days off all meds since 6 years.... feel normal.. never had one symptom of withdrawel, no mania, no depression, no nothing.. better then i was on them! It boggles my mind, I give all credit to God for this one.. My doc family, everyone was expecting a hard time. I prayed intensely before I started this. not a religious man, but have a close relationship with God. I hope no one has to go through a risperidone withdrwel, I did before in 2009 and it literally broke me.. But now i feel like I did 8 years ago before any meds were needed. thank you guys for your time.