Lamictal and anger

[Moody]

Sorry to be posting so much lately, but I am worried and dont know what to do.

I am on day 9 of 25 mgs of generic lamictal. I have been having all kinds of side effects, muscle pain, heartburn, anxiety and sleepiness. I started taking it to try to prevent the mixed state I usually get every summer.

I have been taking klonopin every day, and it helps with the agitation but makes me even more tired and kind of depressed.

For the last 2-3 days I have woken up feeling REALLY REALLY ANGRY. This scares me because I do not normally have a problem with anger. Agitation yes, anger no. I feel irrational and out of control. I am still agitated and have racing thoughts. Taking extra klonopin helps a bit, but then I feel really doped up, depressed, and exhausted all day.

I have tried lamictal twice before, several years ago, and had the anger issue both times. My past pdoc decided to stop the med because of it.

Has anyone had anger as a side effect of lamictal and gotten through it? Or is this a sign that it is not the med for me? Is there another med that can help with the anger? I have not had much luck with AAPs, I have tried Abilify, Risperdal and Seroquel, and they all activate me instead of calming me down.

I would like to get up to a higher dose and give this med a fair chance, but the anger scares me, it feels awful and I am worried I will do something I will regret. I keep getting so angry at my husband even though he isnt doing anything out of the ordinary.

[crtclms]

I haven't had that side effect, but I have heard of it. I've had all the other SEs you list. Lamictal titrations aren't the smoothest, and people have a lot of side-effects on the way up that go away once they reach a therapeutic level.

You need to call your pdoc to discuss this. But if it were I, and I didn't feel like I was a danger, just a bitch, I would wait to go up to 50mg, and see if things worsened, improved, or stayed the same. That is just me, though, and I am not trying to imply you must stay on it.

[apetasticaL]

i'm titrating up on lamictal right now as well, and i have been getting the same racing thoughts and irritation. i think my dosage of an AAP, geodon, is the only thing keeping my skull on straight right now. maybe you should talk to your doctor about an AAP, or raising your dosage of klonopin until the worst part of the titration is over? i understand being worried about what you might do while you are angry. i am kind of worried about my lamictal-irritation and how it will affect my work & interaction with customers.

i agree with crtclms-- you should call & discuss these problems with your pdoc. together, you guys can decide whether you should stick it out on the medication or discontinue in favor of starting something else.

good luck with things, whatever you decide to do.

[scatty]

One time when i was ramping up my l;amictal dose, I was such a bitch that I ruined a family vacation. It went away after a few weeks, though.

[Birdee]

So this is the 3rd time you're trying lamictal? And with the same side effects each time? What's the highest mg you reached before quitting?

1 more question... Have you been prescribed lactimal 3 times by the same doc? Or different docs?

I dunno. Maybe it's not the best fit for you. Personally, my titration up was smooth. Stuff just kept getting better. I don't remember any negative side effects. But every person is different.

[Moody]

thanks for the comments everyone. It is very helpful.

I dont feel like I am a danger, except maybe to my marriage, ha. Yes, I am acting like a crazy angry bitch, mostly with my husband. It scares me because when I am acting like that, I dont notice that I am acting crazy until later when I calm down a little. Usually I am more self aware.

I was prescribed lamictal 2 times in a 2 year period by one pdoc (I think she tried it paired with different meds) and now I am trying again with my new pdoc. Yes, same anger effect all three times, at 25mgs, I did not have the other physical side effects the last 2 times I tried though. This is the first time I have tried the generic, maybe that is why, or could just be that I am older now.

I think the highest I ever got was 50mgs, but not for more than a few days. Not sure, it has been a while, it is possible I never made it past 25mgs. I have tried a lot of meds, so I guess that is why my new doc decided to retry this one.

I will call my pdoc and let her know about this, sigh. I am just scared that she will tell me to drop the lamictal and start over with something else. I am so sick of new meds.

[melissaw72]

I havent had these symptoms from the med that i know of. If is is a symptom, then it I am not aware of it. But I do get very angry at times in general. I am allergic to Green Tea. If I have green tea, then I become hateful (to an extreme point), and want to kill people. Not that i ever would, but it does cross my mind. Everyone needs to be out of the room I am in or I cant handle it. I can handle oolong tea (1/2 green, 1/2 something else), but never can i have regular green tea, even in the bottle drinks like Snapple or something.

[Birdee]

Moody,

50mg is the highest dose you titrated to. And then only for a few days, right? So you've never been able to reach therapeutic level so far. I'm at 100mg, morning and night. So a total of 200mg per day verses the 25mg that you're on now. That's a big difference. And it has calmed my anger down a lot.

Before I started it, I was the angry, fly off the handle at nothing at all, bitchy bitch of all bitches. If you crossed me, you'd suffer my wrath. And I didn't even realize I was that way until after the Lamictal kicked in. My family commented about how much my anger calmed down. Before then I didn't really think I had anger issues... poor family!

Have you had problems with angry outbursts before starting lamictal?

I don't have a lot of experience with meds, Moody. But I'd tell my doc if I thought a med was making me batshit crazy. And if my doc wanted me to stick it out until I reached therapeutic level, then I'd try. If the anger gets to be too much, then it's too much. No harm. No foul. At least you tried, right?

[Moody]

Yeah, I have never even been close to a mood stabilizing dose, I think thats why my new pdoc wanted to try it again. I really would like to get up to at least 100mg to see what happens. My old pdoc took me off it right away because she was afraid I was getting manic.

No, I have never had anger problems, that is why it scares me. Depression, agitation, grumpiness, anxiety, heck yeah, but no crazy rages.

I feel much better today, still racing but not angry, so maybe that is a good sign. Everyone's input has been very helpful. When I asked my pdoc if it was normal for people to feel angry or agitated when starting lamictal, she said no. Sometimes I wish doctors would read these boards!

I will let my pdoc know what is going on, but I will also let her know that I would like to try to press on to a higher dose to see if things improve.

[ccamel84]

I don't have experience with anger from Lamictal but I do with another drug. You might not even be able to compare the two but just wanted to say my anger calmed down a lot after awhile from the other drug. I hope things have calmed down for you more.

[VioletB]

In looking back at an old blog post, I see that I asked my friends if they thought I had an anger management problem some 5 years ago. I was extremely irritable, fly off the handle and irritable unmedicated. I find that Lamictal has upped my tolerance almost all the time to things that would have made me lose my cool before. A clear situation happened to me the other day before seeing t-doc in the office with the computer system being down and patients piled up and nearly out the door. I would have ripped everyone a new one before, and now I was able to stay rational and cool. I told the t-doc it was a miracle, and she (not interested in my drug situation) was like, I don't know, that seems normal (she never saw me before drugs).

[Jacquelyn Carmichael]

I have bi-polar disorder and I have had severe irritability while on this drug. Like right now I want to punch my mom in her face so bad right now, and I want to beat my sister into the pavement. I don't know why I've been thinking horrible things like this I want to get off of lamictal it makes me so violent! I have been an asshole to ALL of my friends I can't control myself in situations I would normally be able to remain calm in. I need to get off this drug ASAP before I end up in jail.

[melissaw72]

Do you think it is something other than the Lamictal that could be causing your anger, etc.? In my post about the green tea, my point in saying that was to point out that there can be other things that could cause symptoms similar to ones a med could cause.

[werehorse]

I was lucky and didn't really have any side effects starting lamictal, except some initial increased itchiness. It's been a really good med for me. But I have read on here that the titration up can be difficult and that once you get to a higher dose things settle down.

[cutelildeadbear]

So for those of you who have been on a therapeutic dose, once you are there the irritability, anxiety and anger issues might go away? This is my biggest fear with trying Lamictal because I am extremely irritable and have anger issues to begin with (the whole reason that I went to the doc in the first place). We are considering Lamictal, but I'm thinking of asking for Abilify to counter the activating effects until I get to the therapeutic dose.

[chipmunk]

I have been on it for about a year and a half, and I have noticed that at 100 mg I am just less volatile. Things that would have sent me into a rage I can now talk myself down out of or even laugh about. I am just calmer, more zen.

I originally topped off at 75 mg (didn't want to take more than I needed) but moved up to 100 when I started having breakthrough symptoms. The difference between the two doses was quite noticeable.

[laursmd]

I had periods of scary fly off the wall rage which included thoughts of punching random people in the face, drowning my dogs,.etc. It was really terrifying. Pdoc added Abilify, that made it way worse, ended up delusional on it. Trileptal was great for anger, but gave me a rash. I am going from 25 to 50 mg Lamictal today, and for me, even though its caused some word finding difficulties, it has significantly improved my brain-mouth filter.