I’ve been fortunate to have never had to deal with psychological issues personally but I’ve had friends that have. I’m glad you seem to be doing well now. Interestingly, I am currently taking Duloxetine for back pain. The original dosage was too strong for me, it knocked me out for hours when I took it. Now I’ve cut the dosage in half and only take it at bedtime when being knocked out is a plus. No nightmares, though, fortunately.
I very rarely have nightmares in the classic sense. For just over two decades, I owned my own business and it was a very stressful job. I’ve moved on now, but during the final few years before I sold it, I would have what I called work-dreams. Basically, it was like a really bad day at work. The absolute worst possible, yet realistic, work disasters I could imagine would occur in these dreams and I would wake up as stressed as if they had actually happened. Luckily, I was eventually able to self medicate with tiny doses of cannabis gummies.
By the way, psychiatrists are not the only ones who fail to mention side effects. I have a number of medical issues I’m being treated for with a variety of drugs. I’ve taken to looking up all of them when they’re prescribed so I know what to watch out for. Most of my physicians don’t mention possible side effects unless they are very common ones. I suspect that they worry that people will be more likely to suffer the side effects if they know about them due to a version of the placebo effect so they just don’t bring it up unless asked. I always ask now.
The abnormal dreams only hit 1 in 10 people, the somnolence about 23% at the dosage i received. There are many people out there that do not understand that statistics say nothing about any specific person - but i have had mathematics and statistic courses during my university time, because molecular biology (and most other sciences) needs statistics to produce actual results. Out of the thousands of patients they have, i would’ve been one of those who understood these facts, and i would’ve never declined any medication just based on the chance of side effects.
And they would not even have to actively inform me about them, but one of the 4 psychs i had there over the years should have reacted the moment i explained that i avoided going to sleep because i had so much fear that i would have another of these nightmares. These dreams were brutal, filled with fear, violence, death and gore (rated 18+ for sure). I don’t ever watch such stuff, but my dreams still were able to produce it. I never before had such graphic dreams, and the worst of them took days to shake off, because i could remember them so well.
One of the sleeping meds i was prescribed “funnily” was preventing me from sleeping - my nose became so stuffy that i only could breathe through my mouth. So i was laying there, half-conscious, fearing the dreams and being held awake by my nose. Fun times.
Not actively informing to prevent patients from just not taking the medication is one thing, and possibly needed in some psychiatric conditions. But not informing when their patients suffers severe side effects from the meds they prescribed and instead trying to suppress these effects with ineffectual additional medication is something i can’t forgive. This medication was planned to be taken until the end of my days - if its a medication for something acute, i would just deal with it. But giving up a good nights rest for the rest of my life is not an option.
I’ve had a lot of different medications too in my life, and most doctors at least told me to watch out for the most severe of them (Lamotrigin e.g. can lead to very bad, potentially deadly complications in some patients). And most of the time i was pretty lucky - i tend to not have side effects or they are negligible. The only other case where i had to discontinue the med was Aripiprazole, a.k.a. Abilify. Mentally, my mood was fucking great - i loved it and really liked how positive i became. But i wasn’t able to sit or stand still anymore, even on 1/2 tablet of the smallest available dosage per day. I was running around in circles for hours and couldn’t stop, because sitting still was torture.
It’s good advice to always ask for side effects, i will do that for sure going into the future. I just hope i can find a psychiatrist that i can build a working relationship with, because currently i wish every one of them an itching rash on their butts that doesn’t go away.
I’ve been fortunate to have never had to deal with psychological issues personally but I’ve had friends that have. I’m glad you seem to be doing well now. Interestingly, I am currently taking Duloxetine for back pain. The original dosage was too strong for me, it knocked me out for hours when I took it. Now I’ve cut the dosage in half and only take it at bedtime when being knocked out is a plus. No nightmares, though, fortunately.
I very rarely have nightmares in the classic sense. For just over two decades, I owned my own business and it was a very stressful job. I’ve moved on now, but during the final few years before I sold it, I would have what I called work-dreams. Basically, it was like a really bad day at work. The absolute worst possible, yet realistic, work disasters I could imagine would occur in these dreams and I would wake up as stressed as if they had actually happened. Luckily, I was eventually able to self medicate with tiny doses of cannabis gummies.
By the way, psychiatrists are not the only ones who fail to mention side effects. I have a number of medical issues I’m being treated for with a variety of drugs. I’ve taken to looking up all of them when they’re prescribed so I know what to watch out for. Most of my physicians don’t mention possible side effects unless they are very common ones. I suspect that they worry that people will be more likely to suffer the side effects if they know about them due to a version of the placebo effect so they just don’t bring it up unless asked. I always ask now.
The abnormal dreams only hit 1 in 10 people, the somnolence about 23% at the dosage i received. There are many people out there that do not understand that statistics say nothing about any specific person - but i have had mathematics and statistic courses during my university time, because molecular biology (and most other sciences) needs statistics to produce actual results. Out of the thousands of patients they have, i would’ve been one of those who understood these facts, and i would’ve never declined any medication just based on the chance of side effects.
And they would not even have to actively inform me about them, but one of the 4 psychs i had there over the years should have reacted the moment i explained that i avoided going to sleep because i had so much fear that i would have another of these nightmares. These dreams were brutal, filled with fear, violence, death and gore (rated 18+ for sure). I don’t ever watch such stuff, but my dreams still were able to produce it. I never before had such graphic dreams, and the worst of them took days to shake off, because i could remember them so well.
One of the sleeping meds i was prescribed “funnily” was preventing me from sleeping - my nose became so stuffy that i only could breathe through my mouth. So i was laying there, half-conscious, fearing the dreams and being held awake by my nose. Fun times.
Not actively informing to prevent patients from just not taking the medication is one thing, and possibly needed in some psychiatric conditions. But not informing when their patients suffers severe side effects from the meds they prescribed and instead trying to suppress these effects with ineffectual additional medication is something i can’t forgive. This medication was planned to be taken until the end of my days - if its a medication for something acute, i would just deal with it. But giving up a good nights rest for the rest of my life is not an option.
I’ve had a lot of different medications too in my life, and most doctors at least told me to watch out for the most severe of them (Lamotrigin e.g. can lead to very bad, potentially deadly complications in some patients). And most of the time i was pretty lucky - i tend to not have side effects or they are negligible. The only other case where i had to discontinue the med was Aripiprazole, a.k.a. Abilify. Mentally, my mood was fucking great - i loved it and really liked how positive i became. But i wasn’t able to sit or stand still anymore, even on 1/2 tablet of the smallest available dosage per day. I was running around in circles for hours and couldn’t stop, because sitting still was torture.
It’s good advice to always ask for side effects, i will do that for sure going into the future. I just hope i can find a psychiatrist that i can build a working relationship with, because currently i wish every one of them an itching rash on their butts that doesn’t go away.