Posted by dopaminerequiem on August 22, 2007, at 21:53:14
When I first found Parnate, it was a miracle drug. I was taking 120 mg/day for treatment-resistant depression [and I was more than just "asymptomatic" - I was HAPPY!], body dysmorphic disorder [which disappeared completely for the first time in my life, freeing me from the biggest trigger for my anorexia nervosa and enabling me to stay out of the hospital and eat relatively normally for almost a year], and borderline personality disorder [and I found that I had much less mood reactivity, urges to self-injure, abandonment issues, etc.]
It was also a miracle because all SSRIs and SNRIs cause me to wet the bed which is NOT a side effect I am willing to deal with and most mood stabilizers and antipsychotics and benzos have caused this to happen, too - so not only did Parnate "cure" my depression/BDD/much of my BPD, it also "cured" my bladder issues and enabled me to take sleeping meds I NEVER could have taken without it. I have NO idea why this is. It also happened on high-dose Adderall [not an option; behavioral sensitization is apparently irreversible, as even low dose Dexedrine has me paranoid].
It was like the perfect drug. And then the insomnia hit like a tornado, even worse than the last time I'd been on Parnate. And, because each sleeping medication would work and then become totally ineffective, I found myself on this merry-go-round of sleeping meds. And then suddenly, I developed hypersomnia. To this day, I don't know if it was indicative of a depressive episode, being on too many sleeping medications, or a paradoxical response to either benzodiazepine withdrawal OR high-dose Parnate.
Side Note: It has taken me three months to go from 0.5 mg Halcion to 0.125 mg, by the way. A drug I once exalted as the cure to my insomnia turned viciously on me and the prescription is now a chain hanging around my leg.
Anyway, my borderline symptoms certainly came back, prompting my (now-ex-)girlfriend to break up with me, which then induced an unmistakable depressive episode (if the hypersomnia was due to another factor, which is still debatable). Because I was in danger of losing my job - I literally would wake up at 5:00 p.m. and go back to sleep at 9:00 p.m. - I tapered the Parnate to 60 mg, which didn't stop it from happening. And then I sought out Dexedrine from a source other than my doctor. However, when she saw how it improved my mood AND enabled me to wake up in the morning, she wrote a prescription.
She left for her vacation and will be back after Labor Day. When she left, I was taking 60 mg Parnate, 2.5 immediate-release Dexedrine, 5 mg extended-release Dexedrine, 30 mg Librium (down from 60 mg), 0.125 mg Halcion (down from 0.5 mg), 10 mg Ambien, and 25 mg Seroquel.
Parnate seemed to be no longer doing what it had magically done before, despite adding the Dexedrine. I still felt dysthymic, though not in a severe depressive episode anymore. My body dysmorphic disorder returned violently. Mood swings like crazy. Abandonment issues overtaking my life.
I decided to taper off of Parnate so by the time she returned I would have had the two-week washout and could try a SSRI with Dexedrine, since amphetamines have, in the past (albeit at high doses), "cured" my bladder as well. Of course, there was that little problem of stimulant addiction, too, though I am happy to say I am not abusing Dexedrine at all and am having it doled out to me weekly by a family member to prevent abuse.
This was one of the stupidest things I have ever done. Now I am back to being in a severe depressive episode, the Dexedrine is actually worsening my mood swings without anything to "stabilize" it, I am feeling extremely suicidal and totally hopeless and I can't imagine that anyone has ever experienced such depths of self-hatred.
Can I ever be on a medication that will actually last? If I do return to high dose Parnate, can I take Dexedrine with it or would that be too dangerous? If not, then how can I make Parnate "work" again? What about the insomnia/hypersomnia mess?
Or should I forget Parnate and try Nardil (though I am terrified of the weight gain associated with it and will cold-turkey it immediately if the scale climbs too high), perhaps with Dexedrine to prevent oversedation and (maybe) weight gain?
But I am convinced that I need a dopaminergic drug; I know that this is the source of my depression. The only other medication that EVER worked for me was Zoloft, which is profoundly dopaminergic, moreso than Wellbutrin. And I've tried all of the bladder drugs with Zoloft; it just doesn't stop the bedwetting.
EMSAM didn't work. Wellbutrin caused bedwetting. No doctor in the world could make me take Remeron. Tricyclics make me extremely irritable, plus there's the weight gain issue. I was stable on Desipramine, Trileptal, and Seroquel at one point (and was anorexic during this time; it's the one TCA that didn't make me gain weight) but how can one compare STABILITY with HAPPINESS? How can I give up what I know can be possible, the person I know I was meant to be my entire life, the person I was on Parnate, for mere stability?
Does anyone remain on MAOIs for long periods of time? Will I always have to be tip-toeing around sleeping medication and waking-up medication and augmenting medication if I continue to take Parnate?
Please help. My doctor has seen me through so many medication trials. I'm in my mid-twenties and there are no medications left to try. I can't live like this. I just want to be happy again. I just want to look in the mirror and not collapse into tears and be able to go outside without hearing people talk about how ugly I am again. I want my smile to be genuine again.
I can't go back to being just "asymptomatic." Not when I have known true happiness. I thought, for so long, that I was not meant to live a full life, a life like other people, a life of happiness. And then Parnate came along and changed my entire world. I can't go back to flatness, to defining my life by what it is "not" instead of what it IS.
Please tell me how I can try and find a long-term solution. I am not asking for euphoria. If I wanted euphoria, I'd abuse illicit drugs like I used to. I want the kind of happiness that exists without ups and downs, without you really even noticing that it's happening until one day you find that you are an actual human being again and you have no idea how it happened but it feels magical.
Sorry this was so long. I searched and searched for words to convey my desperation but I don't know if I even came close.
poster:dopaminerequiem
thread:777910
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070815/msgs/777910.html