Lamictal for anxiety

Looking for similar experiences/advice!
I have been taking Lamotrigine (Lamictal) 100mg for a little over a year now, which has helped greatly with stabilizing my BP2. While I still experience depressive episodes from time to time, they are not nearly as bad as they used to (I can actually get out of bed lol). Last week I was diagnosed with ADHD, just 10 IR to take twice a day, and increasing dose as needed. The last week or so I have been so emotional. To be fair, I have had a very stressful past few weeks, and have been so so busy with work and school stuff without a break, as well as family and friend issues. I'm not sure if my episode of moodiness (specifically crying spells, anxiety and irritability) have to do with the Adderall or if it's just a mixed-ish episode, bipolar related. I'm going through a lot in my life right now so I know it could be a combination of both. Has anyone has similar experiences with this? Or any other suggestions? I have a psychiatrist follow-up next week and I'm not sure how to approach it. I really struggle with ADHD symptoms, and would hate to not be able to take medicine for it when it's helped me actually focus at work and school.

Important info is in bold. Rest of it are what I am experiencing right now and maybe an idea of having someone close to sleep near or by you. It helps a lot for anxiety and when you wake up in panic.
I've been sleeping next to my parents as lame as that sounds since I become confused and constantly going into panic attacks once my seroquel kicks in. The akathisia is much worse at this time and for hours. I have to take gabapentin a little before my dose to make it somewhat bearable. I'll still be rolling around for hours in a confused and anxious state with what feels like RLS on steroids.
Sleeping next to my parents gives me some peace since I can see them when I feel like I'm starting to slip into a panic attack during my incoherent and panic attack filled phase. I've tried to sleep by my self but I can't stand it as it sends me into full blown panic attacks and just much worst anxiety overall being by my self. It feels like I'm sinking into my bed because my mind is awake but my body feels like it's not there. So I sleep on the floor. It helps me feel grounded.
The worst feeling is my blood pressure drops or at least it feels like it and then tightness and congested feeling of my chest starts once the seroquel is fully working. It feels like I need to manually breathe and it feels like I'm out of breath too. It also feels like I'll die in my sleep from not being able to breathe properly or breathe at all. That's what really sends me in to a panic attack. The inconsistent heart rate and blood pressure doesn't help either.
I will also sit up right in panic sometimes gasping for air or making a sound while sleeping every 20-30mins or every hour or two if I'm lucky. Scared my dad a couple times because of this.
Tardive dyskinesia symptoms have been showing a lot more often too. Woke up several times not being able to control my limbs. Almost fell over once after getting off my bed because I could barely control my legs or arms.
The akathisia during the day started getting worse as days went by. I was desperate because this feeling is horrible. I saw that a good portion of what is used to treat akathisia is already prescribed to me which is clonazepam and gabapentin.
Gabapentin is definitely what works the best. I am also tapering off klonopin and was doing all right with .5mg but now it feels like it's not enough because I am much more anxious than I was a month ago. It still definitely helps with the akathisia though.
Mirtazapine also seems to help a good amount. I'm taking .5mg of clonazepam, 1200mg of gabapentin spread throughout the day, and 15mg of mirtazapine.
Mirtazapine and 250mg of vitamin b6 early in the morning, gabapentin 3x a day, and the clonazepam I take half in the day and half late night. I have to time my doses correctly so I don't experience any akathisia.
Vitamin B6 is supposedly effective but I'm not too sure if it really is.
I also take 250mg of lamictal split into day and night, and 2mg of risperidone which I am tapering off of and will be off completely soon.
I did as much research as I could since it started getting a lot worse soon after I saw my doctor. So I had almost 30 days till I saw my doctor again and I definitely would've gone to the ER. I almost called the ambulance when it started getting bad because I didn't know what the hell was going on. I also didn't know what was going on with me till someone else told me what it was I was experiencing in another post I made which was after I already met the doctor.
It feels like I have to jog around my place without these medications I listed above. It also makes me extremely prone to panic attacks which would occur every few minutes.
Hope this info helps anyone else.
Ask your doc for propranolol and gabapentin. Try mirtazapine. Klonopin should be a last resort.

Hi all,
I was diagnosed about 2 years ago and was put on Lamictal (titrated up to 200 mg pretty quickly) and have been on it ever since. I was also in therapy at the time of diagnosis and stopped therapy a few months ago due to my therapist being the absolute worst. The psychiatrist who diagnosed me actually passed away shortly after my diagnoses (she was very young it was unexpected and very sad) so I have been seeing someone else for the last few months, who is now also no longer able to treat me.
The Lamictal was a godsend for so much time and recently the last month or 2 I just have not felt like myself at all, I feel depressed and gross and nothing is making me happy anymore. Also gaining a lot of weight which is contributing to the depression. Now I am in the process of finding a new psychiatrist which is a nightmare as it is but I also know I need to find a new therapist because that may be contributing to the depression (not talking to someone regularly).
Sidenote: I was also diagnosed with anxiety and ADHD but was only prescribed Lamictal to treat everything all together.
Im wondering if anyone has experience with building a tolerance to the meds if that could be it? Or the lack of therapy? Im just at a loss and I don’t really want to jump to change my medication because Lamictal has done wonders for me thus far. Although thinking of asking to be put on wellbutrin in addition from my next psychiatrist so that I can lose weight and hopefully curb the depression as well. (Would they let me make suggestions like that? How do I basically ask to be put on a medication?)
Any insight or advice is much appreciated ❤️ losing myself here a little bit :(

TL:DR - I'm on 75mg Nardil and added 1mg pramipexole. Motivation is up, but I still haven't between the anhedonia problem. I want to swing at other things than dopamine. What role does norepinephrine play in mood? Should I tackle opioid receptors or nmda, or something else? I'm open to all suggestions.
The long version... Ok. So you may remember me asking about whether I should try pramipexole or not. After a lot of advice saying no, I tried two different antipsychotics at low dose (good lord they spiked my anxiety). I also lack access to decent quality bromantane. Memantine is my only other option on this front, but in order to keep things cheap. I went with pramipexole.
So far it's mostly plain sailing. My mood has dropped pretty badly, which I expected. My sleep is wonky and my patience is a little short. On the other hand, my motivation is real good. Which is very welcome. However, there's still no shift in my anhedonia, which does undermine the motivational aspect.
I'm still unsure on the dopamine front, but the fact it helps my motivation suggests something positive.
Basically, what other neurotransmitters can I swing at? I've tried lamictal and gabapentin before. I've considered Straterra since it binds to kappa opioid receptors? What role does norepinephrine play in mood? I was considering it because I don't want to focus on dopamine anymore. I'm not certain it's my issue.
Thanks for the help and suggestions friends.

Hey yall long story short I'm diagnosed ADHD, Major Depressive Disorder, Generalized Anxiety Disorder and PTSD. I take Lamictal to help stabilize my mood, and guanfacine as well for my PTSD just happens to help (barely at first) with my symptoms of ADHD. My sleep is chaotic, I'm "asleep" for around 6-7 hours, waking up every hour or so. I let shit get outta hand fast, and didn't find out I had ADHD until recently (I'm 28) which is kind of nice, because I finally have an explanation for a lot of the struggles I have and things I tend to do. But it's hard at the same time. I never was disciplined growing up, so I'm just now trying to learn how to discipline myself, get good sleep, eat good food, stay focused, make it into work every day, try my best to keep my blood pressure and anxiety as low as possible, Maintain healthy and caring relationships that go both ways where I'm not just taking. It feels so hard. I'm trying to start small. I feel like having some sort of check list, reminders etc. can help me get everything in order. Sorry for the rant

F24, 66kg, 165cm. I have had a slew of neurological symptoms. I'm so tired of experiencing this. I have balance problems, I have fell while walking 10 times this year. I also almost fall when just standing. I have memory loss and mild confusion. It's not THAT bad... but in 2013 I had a two month episode of intense confusion, I didn't know how to take a bath or go places, I forgot how to go places I went to my whole life. My parents didn't take me to the doctor because they said I was dramatising my symptoms. Back then, I had vomiting and lost a lot of weight, couldn't keep food down. No fever, no flu-like symptoms... just intense confusion and inability to hold food down. Now I have tremor, sometimes intense arm weakness to the point of not being able to hold up my arms. I had mood swings (not too severe) for which I was prescribed lamictal and it helped. Aside this, I'm diagnosed with insulin resistance and take metformin, and take oral contraceptives for polycystic ovaries. I had a MRI and EEG and they were mostly normal. I have dropped my phone too many times and broke it once, had to get a new one because I get so much arm weakness. I also had anxiety which went away completely with lamictal, but I don't think that's what it is prescribed for. Now this is a weird one, during sex I get muscle tightening and something I would describe most similarly to myoclonus. I told doctors this, and they said this is vaginismus. But it's not there... it's a whole body thing. Basically got told my muscle twitching and tightening is psychhological. But I don't have any sexual trauma. I'm fine but my body does that... I almost broke my legs from falling so much and I'm sick of dealing with this and my doctors just tell me well walk more carefully.
Edit: Forgot (of course I forgot..) to mention I have intense blurry vision, and sometimes I see perfectly. It comes and goes. And for a month in 2020 I had tics. I never had tics before and after... I couldn't stop swallowing my saliva. It wasn't something I could control.
Edit 2: In 2016 I had tongue weakness, I couldn't talk for a few hours. My parents thought I was faking it. I always have very high eosoniphils or neutrophils, I can't remember which ones of these 2.

I was wondering if anyone out there can share their experience coming off this medication after taking it for MANY years.
I didn't have any negative experiences with this med - I've just had multiple psychiatrists (and a therapist) tell me within the last 2 years that I'm not bi polar 2 after all, and that I don't need the med.
Plus I have fibromyalgia, have had for seven years, and in an effort to just be on less medication/put fewer things into my body (let alone "things" I don't need), my doc has be going off lamictal and one other psych med (quetiapine aka Seroquel). I have been off lamictal for just over a week after being on it since it came out in 2010 and had been tapering down from 200 for about 2 months. I am down to 25mg seroquell down from 100. About a year ago I started to take trazodone bc I was having really bad sleep. Now it has replaced quetiapine.
Because I gradually tapered off lamictal and quetiapine at the same time, it's hard if not impossible to tell what's causing what. My symptoms? The most insane fatigue I have ever felt in my life. Barely able to function. Yes, chronic fatigue is a stymtom of fibromyalgia, but this is on another level. I did have some pretty bad separation anxiety when my boyfriend went on a a trip. But other than that, the process has not been dramatic (obviously the fatigue is dramatic, but nothing emotional is happening to me).
Everything I've read online is basically like once the med is out of your system you're done/good. But this medication has been in my system for 14 years. This has to be a huge shock to my system (doctor doesn't agree). Is it fair to assume that I'm not going to feel normal for a while?? 14 years is a long time!!

Can I hear about positive experiences please? For anxiety and depression I’m a bit nervous to start tonight as 30mg I’m on Lamictal 100

My anxiety and depression hit in college after I'd had anxiety before, massively increasing with the onset of depression. Now that I have lexapro and lamictal to keep my feelings from dipping into those deep lows for no reason, now I am left with severe anxiety and the maladaptive coping habits that keep me depressed. The idea is that I need to work on new habits and find a way to manage my anxiety. It is possible that I will be able to live a normal life with controllable anxiety (and some depression) that will both improve as I get myself into the world. I'm 34.

I am bipolar type 2. My anxiety and especially social anxiety is very debilitating and a little more crippling than the depression which is also severe. I take lamictal at night and it seems to help me sleep. However I was wondering if taking it in the morning instead of at night would be better for the social anxiety? Does anyone have experience comparing how night/day time use affects anxiety? I have titrated up to 100mg over the last 4 weeks. I appreciate this community. ❤️

Hi everyone,
I’ve been with my partner (27m) for almost 10 years. We got married last June. We got together before he got his diagnosis, which he finally received in 2021 for bipolar 2 and cyclothymia.
Before he was medicated he had a lot of depressive episodes for months at a time, particularly in winter, and would have sudden, aggressive outbursts over very minute things. He got so much better whilst he was on his medication, his mood was stable and he was more relaxed, didn’t have any sudden outbursts and we were getting on better than we ever had. I believe he was on 200/250mg lamictal for his bipolar and 150mg sertraline for anxiety.
I noticed he started acting differently in November last year, around 5 months after our wedding and a few weeks after his birthday. He’s always been pretty introverted, but suddenly he was meeting up and talking to friends he hadn’t seen for years, staying out late without keeping in touch, taking much more care of his appearance and becoming more vain. His memory became awful and he kept forgetting things, he also began skiving off work and neglecting his job responsibilities, as well as chores etc around the house more than usual and was listening to music constantly and always on his phone.
As the months have gone on, he’s become more and more distant from me and tells me to my face that he thinks I’m boring now and we no longer have anything in common, even though the only thing that’s altered in terms of his hobbies is how much he listens to music and goes to concerts, he’s also started running 5k every evening.
He then began saying we should have an open marriage and see other people, which is extremely out of character. He says this is the best and happiest he’s ever felt in his life, and I’m just putting him down - he’s got a very inflated sense of confidence at the moment and says he’s finally feeling like himself.
I suspected he was hyper manic as he was acting very out of character and then discovered he was altering his medication and reducing his dose. I told his doctor who had him assessed at a psychiatric facility, where they somehow concluded he wasn’t manic despite his odd behaviour.
As the months have gone on his behaviour has gotten worse, he still goes out for an entire weekend without properly keeping in touch, he’s started saying that he feels nothing towards anyone and like he’s a sociopath — saying he could stab someone and not feel anything, doesn’t feel empathy towards others etc. he’s also began having angry outbursts again over very small things and will be verbally abusive towards me. He’s now reduced his lamictal to 100mg and completely come off his Sertraline, and says he plans to come off his lamictal completely very soon. I've informed his doctor of this and they said they'll try and get him seen by a psychiatrist.
Every time I try and talk to him about how he’s feeling he just shuts down, he insists he isn’t manic or going through any sort of episode but I’ve known him for 10 years and have never known him to act like this. I feel like he despises me and he tells me he resents me and isn't sure if he loves me anymore as he doesn't feel anything towards anyone at the moment. He keeps saying we should get a divorce as we're too different now and I can't accept the 'new version' of him, which he says is here to stay.
I don't know what to do. I'm getting no support from his doctor or family, and I still feel in my heart that this is some kind of episode and isn't the real him. I'm worried if we separate he'll later regret it, even though he says he feels more like himself than ever. I love him so much and don't want to split up, but I don't recognise the person he's become.

In the beginning of april, I had this situation due to stress that made me react out of the ordinary for a week. Irritable, no sleep, impulsivity, suicidal thoughts, rapid speech ... I was only able to get to meet her almost one month after.
When she asked me how I felt, I told her I felt good, better. And she told me she thinks it's a difficulty of adapting. My father, who I have a complicated relationship almost died and I had back to back several stressing things happening at my job.
You can see on my previous post that i went to the emergency because of suicidal thoughts last week. They gave me clonazepam and told me to rest for a week.
I'm scared to not be believed because I told her I felt better, but I felt better comparatively at the beginning of april. The "I would not be suffering if I wasn't there" that was always in the back of my mind transformed into "I could just jump in front of that car" last week. I'm scared she thinks I'm lying.
My life is pretty good. I have a kind supportive boyfriend, a good job, a supportive group of friends, a family, and my brain is not able to see past the negative. It's just not able to rhink positively and just wants to get that done with.
I'm on lamictal 200 mg Seroquel 25 mg to sleep Pregabalin 200 mg for anxiety Temporary clonazepam 0.5 mg

I am in a bad spot in my life and I would just watch movies all day and whatnot but I am not depressed. I have anxiety but not depression
I find it very very hard to wake up. It is not like “I don’t want to live I don’t want to wake up” but rather “I am so sleepy I need to sleep more”
Also, I am studying in the day so when I have to wake up I always delay it because I think I am getting less sleep and my work wouldn’t be productive.
I am now sleeping at 2 AM or so. And wake up at whopping 2 PM…
I don’t really remember when this started but for the record I started to take Lexapro recently and I’ve been using Lamictal for almost a year now.
Please help ;-;

34 year old Female, 5'7", 160 lbs
Past medical history includes: diverticulitis, uterine fibroids (3), iron deficiency anemia, menorhhagia, brain aneurysm, depression, anxiety
Medications include: aspirin 81mg, lamictal 100mg
Non-smoker
Started having weird gastric symptoms. Acute, pinching pain under sternum with an odd, rubbing sensation (like rubber balls). Sharp aching pain in lower left abdomen. I feel like I'm being poked all over what i think are my intestines. It feels like i have a finger inside my abdomen poking me all over, sometimes it hurts and sometimes it doesn't. Recently it started to feel like something is poking from inside my stomach and outward to the abdominal wall (although this is not visualized). Started feeling like something is pushing my bellybutton (which may be attributed to developing interstitial cystitis after 2 back-to- back UTI's. This was fairly recent though and my abdominal symptoms started occurring months ago. )
I also have yellow to green stool, diarrhea and stomach aches often, and i do not feel like i fully evacuate my bowels.
I do have a strong family hx of colon and gastric/esophageal cancer.
Asked my FM doc and he was having a very rough day. Didn't really answer my questions and referred me to GI but i won't see them for months. Any ideas? Thanks

i strongly plead with you to not read this if you have severe anxiety/paranoia about medication like me. i do not want to trigger anybody. i won’t name specific medications except the one i’m currently afraid to start.
hi everybody. i (f20) was recently diagnosed with bp2 6 days ago. i am kinda unsure if this an accurate diagnosis, but i definitely have issues with my mood. i have depressive episodes that are so severe it becomes incredibly difficult to care for myself, and it’s made me drop out of college. i have also had VERY sparse periods of time where i might’ve been manic? not sure. i can provide more context about my “mania” if you ask in the comments.
anyways, i have always had massive anxiety about medication. i’ve been on like 6 different medications, mostly SSRIs/SNRIs, and other than two (both were horrible for me for different reasons), i have never been able to consistently take something for long enough to see if it actually works because i get insanely anxious/mildly paranoid about side effects.
i’m currently in outpatient therapy because i literally cannot take care of myself or live life at all. i was prescribed an SSRI my first month there. i took it once, it made me have the worst anxiety of my life after the first dose (it felt like i was having an anxiety attack but for an entire day and i was inconsolable) so i never took it again.
i lied and told my psychiatrist that the SSRI “wasn’t helping me despite taking it every day for two weeks”. she ended up prescribing me a new medication that i wont name for the sake of not triggering anybody, but it was an SNRI. it took me two weeks to actually try it. she was practically pleading with me to take the damn meds. so i took it. i got serotonin syndrome 24hrs after my first dose. it was fucking traumatizing.
of course, all this did was fuel my anxiety more. it’s not just anxiety anymore. it’s full blown paranoia.
the SNRI made me “manic” which i i am probably in denial about because i have some textbook symptoms… i haven’t been able to sleep for more than 3-4 hours a night for weeks, im highly irritable, and have the absolute WORST racing thoughts. the past 3 weeks have totally blipped by. my irritability gets so bad it makes me want to self-destruct. this, among other symptoms, was what prompted the bipolar diagnosis last week. so of course my psych prescribed me a mood stabilizer: Lamictal.
the nurse at my OP facility asked if i started it on friday, to which i said no. he was pleading with me to just try it. i reluctantly told him i will give it a shot and i picked it up from the pharmacy today, and i’ve been a fucking mess. i’m so scared to take it. i am going to really try to force myself to, but idk if i can do it. the paranoia is soo strong, and if this doesn’t work, i really don’t want to fucking try any more medications. which i know would be very bad if i’m truly bipolar…
idk i’m just not feeling very confident that i’ll ever be able to reach stability at this point, especially with my lack of willingness to try/stick to meds. my mood swings are kind of dangerous at this point. i feel like i’m barely getting by with my healthy coping skills at the moment, and im so scared that this new medication will make my mood worse, because if it does, i’ll probably need to be placed in inpatient.
it’s been very difficult to keep myself from self-destructing lately, and i’m scared it’ll make my mental health worse, or i’ll get very sick/die in some horrible way with this new medication. i just don’t have any hope or faith at this point and i honestly can’t say for sure if i will be starting the medication tomorrow… please idk what to do

i tried posting this in the bipolar subreddit but it got taken down, understandably so. strongly plead with you to not read this if you have severe anxiety/paranoia about medication like me. i do not want to trigger anybody. i won’t name specific medications except the one i’m currently afraid to start.
hi everybody. i (f20) was recently diagnosed with bp2 6 days ago. i’m also diagnosed OCD and GAD. i am kinda unsure if the bipolar is an accurate diagnosis, but i definitely have issues with my mood. i have depressive episodes that are so severe it becomes incredibly difficult to care for myself, and it’s made me drop out of college. i have also had VERY sparse periods of time where i might’ve been manic? not sure. i can provide more context about my “mania” if you ask in the comments.
anyways, i have always had massive anxiety about medication. i’ve been on like 6 different medications, mostly SSRIs/SNRIs, and other than two (both were horrible for me for different reasons), i have never been able to consistently take something for long enough to see if it actually works because i get insanely anxious/mildly paranoid about side effects.
i’m currently in outpatient therapy because i literally cannot take care of myself or live life at all. i was prescribed an SSRI my first month there. i took it once, it gave me the worst anxiety of my life after the first dose (it felt like i was having an anxiety attack but for an entire day and i was inconsolable) so i never took it again.
i lied and told my psychiatrist that the SSRI “wasn’t helping me despite taking it every day for two weeks”. she ended up prescribing me a new medication that i wont name for the sake of not triggering anybody, but it was an SNRI. it took me two weeks to actually try it. she was practically pleading with me to take the damn meds. so i took it. i got serotonin syndrome 24hrs after my first dose. it was fucking traumatizing.
of course, all this did was fuel my anxiety more. it’s not just anxiety anymore. it’s full blown paranoia.
the SNRI made me “manic” which i i am probably in denial about because i have some textbook symptoms… i haven’t been able to sleep for more than 3-4 hours a night for weeks, im highly irritable, and have the absolute WORST racing thoughts. the past 3 weeks have totally blipped by. my irritability gets so bad it makes me want to self-destruct. this, among other symptoms, was what prompted the bipolar diagnosis last week. so of course my psych prescribed me a mood stabilizer: Lamictal.
the nurse at my OP facility asked if i started it on friday, to which i said no. he was pleading with me to just try it. i reluctantly told him i will give it a shot and i picked it up from the pharmacy today, and i’ve been a fucking mess. i’m so scared to take it. i am going to really try to force myself to, but idk if i can do it. the paranoia is soo strong, and if this doesn’t work, i really don’t want to fucking try any more medications. which i know would be very bad if i’m truly bipolar…
idk i’m just not feeling very confident that i’ll ever be able to reach stability at this point, especially with my lack of willingness to try/stick to meds. my mood swings are kind of dangerous at this point. i feel like i’m barely getting by with my healthy coping skills at the moment, and im so scared that this new medication will make my mood worse, because if it does, i’ll probably need to be placed in inpatient.
it’s been very difficult to keep myself from self-destructing lately, and i’m scared it’ll make my mental health worse, or i’ll get very sick/die in some horrible way with this new medication. i just don’t have any hope or faith at this point and i honestly can’t say for sure if i will be starting the medication tomorrow… please idk what to do

i strongly plead with you to not read this if you have severe anxiety/paranoia about medication like me. i do not want to trigger anybody. i won’t name specific medications except the one i’m currently afraid to start.
hi everybody. i (f20) was recently diagnosed with bp2 6 days ago. i am kinda unsure if this an accurate diagnosis, but i definitely have issues with my mood. i have long depressive episodes that are so severe it becomes incredibly difficult to care for myself, and it’s made me drop out of college. i have also had VERY sparse periods of time where i might’ve been manic? not sure. i can provide more context about my “mania” if you ask in the comments.
anyways, i have always had massive anxiety about medication. i’ve been on like 6 different medications, mostly SSRIs/SNRIs, and other than two (both were horrible for me for different reasons), i have never been able to consistently take something for long enough to see if it actually works because i get insanely anxious/mildly paranoid about side effects.
i’m currently in outpatient therapy because i literally cannot take care of myself or live life at all. i was prescribed an SSRI my first month there. i took it once, and it made me have the worst anxiety of my life after the first dose (it felt like i was having an anxiety attack but for an entire day and i was inconsolable) so i never took it again.
i lied and told my psychiatrist that the SSRI “wasn’t helping me despite taking it every day for two weeks”. she ended up prescribing me a new medication that i wont name for the sake of not triggering anybody, but it was an SNRI. it took me two weeks to actually try it. she was practically pleading with me to take the damn meds. so i finally took it. i got serotonin syndrome 24hrs after my first dose. it was fucking traumatizing.
of course, all this did was fuel my anxiety more. it’s not just anxiety anymore. it’s full blown paranoia.
the SNRI made me “manic” which i i am probably in denial about because i have some textbook symptoms… i haven’t been able to sleep for more than 3-4 hours a night for weeks, im highly irritable, and have the absolute WORST racing thoughts. the past 3 weeks have totally blipped by. my irritability gets so bad it makes me want to self-destruct. this, among other symptoms, was what prompted the bipolar diagnosis last week. so of course my psych prescribed me a mood stabilizer: Lamictal.
the nurse at my OP facility asked if i started it on friday, to which i said no. he was pleading with me to just try it. i reluctantly told him i will give it a shot and i picked it up from the pharmacy today, and i’ve been a fucking mess. i’m so scared to take it. i am going to really try to force myself to, but idk if i can do it. the paranoia is soo strong, and if this doesn’t work, i really don’t want to fucking try any more medications. which i know would be very bad if i’m truly bipolar…
idk i’m just not feeling very confident that i’ll ever be able to reach stability at this point, especially with my lack of willingness to try/stick to meds. my mood swings are kind of dangerous at this point. i feel like i’m barely getting by with my healthy coping skills at the moment, and im so scared that this new medication will make my mood worse, because if it does, i’ll probably need to be placed in inpatient.
it’s been very difficult to keep myself from self-destructing lately, and i’m scared it’ll make my mental health worse, or i’ll get very sick/die in some horrible way with this new medication. i just don’t have any hope or faith at this point and i honestly can’t say for sure if i will be starting the medication tomorrow… please idk what to do

I have extreme anxiety, to the point I can't hardly leave the house except to work. I also have depression. The anxiety also causes health anxiety. So my psychiatrist really wants me to try Lamictal. I have had genesight test done a d it's in my green category and my gene test says I'm a low risk of SJS. So right now she had me on 0.25 xanax twice a day for a month to help the anxiety while the Lamictal gets in my system. I am terrified to take Lamictal! I'm worried about tremors or hallucinations or HLH syndrome. Is this medicine really that great for anxiety? I just want my life back!!! Please share success stories and what I can expect. She is actually starting me at 12.5 mg (yes I know it doesn't come that low but we are halting the tablet).

I've been suffering with anxiety and depression my whole life. It would always come in episodes and they were usually short lived. I was put on zoloft as a teenager and functioned very well for many years. I went on and off it until I decided to stop psych meds altogether. I was also on a klonopin and had to wean off that. For the last 8 years I've been unmedicated. I would get very bad episodes that would last a few days to months. I thought I just had anxiety. It turns out that what I was experiencing was "agitated depression" or a mixed episodes. They could happen randomly or be triggered by stress or most often a drug reaction. I get delusional anxiety and feel like I want to crawl out of my skin, my thoughts race, I am hyperparanoid, I hate everything, can't eat or sleep. I feel worthless and daydream about dying.
I didn't know what these were until now. I only get mixed episodes. I never feel euphoric mania or straight up depression its always mixed.
I reached out to try to get help but the last 3 drugs I've tried all threw me into a worse episode. (Buspar, celexa, and now lamictal) lamictal was 3 weeks ago and had caused the worst episode of my life which I'm still in. I
Idk what to do. Do I go to inpatient? Do I take an antipsychotic? (Never tried one but I'm very scared to) Do I try to get on benzos and zoloft again because it helped befoe? Do I just wait it out and try to not self destruct?
What will inpatient be like? Can they stabilize me quickly or am I stuck there for weeks?

So this is my first time ever posting to Reddit, and I’m not even sure if this has to do with my Abilify but I need peace of mind and this is the only community I have been able to find that relates to me and my mental struggles. Just a heads up this will be a long post, but I wanna make sure I cover all of the details so I can get the best feedback from yall and y’all’s experiences.
I have been on and off Abilify for about 6yrs now. I would be on if doing great, but then I would decide to get off because I feel much better and don’t like being medicated. Just to add context before continuing I had my baby girl last year and am currently 7 months postpartum without any sign of postpartum depression so far.
I started getting random anxious thoughts that I couldn’t control such as what if my father passed, or even me and I leave my kids behind? This started towards the end of March. My psychiatrist put me back on my usual abilify, except this time he excluded my lamictal which I thought was weird. He lets me start at 2.5 of the abilify and increase to 5 slowly due to my horrible akathasia I usually always get with Abilify. This has worked and I have been able to avoid the restlessness in the past, but this time didn’t work. Started the abilify around March 25th and by late April I was restless.
I had some classes I needed to complete online but couldn’t sit still, so I took some of my 5mg Adderall I had left over from last year without telling my psychiatrist because he prescribed them to me back then. I was fine and they actually kinda helped me sit in one place and get my work done. I did this for about 4-5 days and then stopped.
About 2 days after stopping the adderall my anxiety became unbearable. I started freaking out about death and depersonalizing. My fight or flight was on an almost constant loop to where I felt like I had to get up run away and escape but from what? Life?
Fast forward to now he has me taking 2.5mg of Abilify every 3 days and 20mg of Propanolol twice a day as needed for anxiety. I feel better than I did when this all first started, but I’m tired of viewing my life as if these are my last days for some reason. Telling myself I’m going to miss my kids when I die and stuff is driving me crazy but I can’t stop the thoughts. I guess my question is has anyone else experienced this? Is it because of my abilify or am I crazy? Please no negative stories I don’t think I can handle them right now I’m sorry lol

I need something that will do what it did that doesn't contraindicate with Seroquel.
Anxiety is all time back with a side of nasty mean voices bombarding me with imposter syndrome and just anger. Every bit I was able to shift out of my system for the last five months is back.
I'm wondering - Lamictal helped with the angry before...can't go back but is there something new to stop this?
(Update - I won against the voices. Made it to graduation. Was not an imposter. I belonged. Saw some great kids graduate. All the voices were wrong and so they shut up.)