My first week on Vyvanse…….an update

[blackdog]

shutterbug is right, you should talk it over with your doctor. And definitely bring in some support if you need to. I would add to also talk to your pharmacist since doctors usually don’t know squat when it comes to medications.

Certainly don’t take it if you experience really severe side effects. But there is an adjustment period, as we all know, with anything, so if the side effects are tolerable try to stick with it.

For example, a friend of mine takes Effexor for depression. She went through 3 weeks of intense nausea, so bad she could barely eat, and even lost weight. But now she loves it and says that it was all worth it.

By contrast, a psych tried to put me on Effexor many years ago and after just two doses my stomach turned inside out. I literally spent the night on the bathroom floor. The pain was so intense it felt like I had been run over by a truck and had all my ribs crushed. It even hurt to breathe.  I took the rest of her samples back to her and said no way. She, of course, did not believe me.

So it’s all a matter of degrees. Only you know how your body feels and only you can determine what is best for you.

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[ptvlover]

I have been on vyvanse for about a year and before vyvanse I took adderall. Adderal worked well when it came to helping me focus but the side affects were horrible. It gave me the worse headaches I’ve ever experienced and horrible stomach aches. sometimes I couldn’t even get out of bed in the morning because of My headache…. But now I take vyvanse and Ive taken various dosages my lowest dosage was 30mg since then I have been dosed up many times due to my constant inability to focus. my dosage is now 80mg and imstead of just taking it once a day I have to take it twice. I take 50mg In the morning as soon as I wake up and 30 mg at 1 pm. I have to do this because vyvanse doesnt help me for a long period of time like it does with other people.. even when taking the 70mg dose in the morning by the time 12 hits the medicine does not help me focus at all and It is impossible for me to participate In class. taking it twice a day  improved my performance in school dramatically but it also makes it practically impossible to sleep at night so my doctor prescribed me  0.1 mg  of clonidine and it helps me sleep just fine. But my main reason I’m here is because I have little to no side affects with vyvanse except one and it’s when the vyvanse is wearing off I get extremely antisocial and I just want to be left alone. I walk  around looking lost and depressed  and at times I can get really aggravated and my patience level becomes zero. But when I feel this way it’s like I’m trapped in my thoughts and it sucks and it’s very annoying .its like a very bad feeling like I’m usually a cool outgoing fun person but when this happens my mood is just crap and foggy …does anyone else only experience this side effect and does anyone know ways that I can improve my mood when this happens ?  Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

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[lsdcat]

My experience is that any medication for anything is a trade off.  There are always unwanted effects from any drug especially with long term use.  One has to decide if the desired effects of the drug are greater than the unwanted effects.  Sometimes the  condition being treated is preferable to the unwanted effects of the psychiatric drugs, in my humble opinion.  Sometimes the unwanted effects cause permanent damage which complicates and compromises aging.  What was bad when one was young gets worse when one is old.

An example is that I was given Effexor with a Buspar back, and yes, they worked for what they were given to me for, but then my occasional migraines escalated to daily, crippling migraines that actually resulted in losing my job.  Not the desired result. The doctor responded by adding a prescription migraine medication which didn’t help the migraines but resulted in Seratonin Toxicity.  Yikes!

Right now I’m off all of my medications except my thyroid meds and 10 mg X 2 daily of Propranolol for migraine prevention and anxiety because I had an extreme allergic reaction to a new blood pressure medication, Diltiazem. I take BP meds for hypertension due to the stimulant ADHD medication.  I also developed Raynaud’s Syndrome while on the stimulant medication. Studies showed Diltiazem to be effective in treating Raynaud’s.

No one will ever know for sure that it was the Diltiazem or what caused the reaction, so I’ve been taken down to as close to a baseline as possible.  Suddenly, my apartment looks like an unsupervised, very messy 10 year old lives here. I’m saying and doing impulsive and embarrassing things again.  I’ve become physically awkward, probably because of the sharp, sudden moves.  Is this worse than a stroke or heart attack?  I don’t know yet.

I’m trying to pay attention to these things, because I realized that, overall, none of the medications I’ve had in my life really made a positive significant difference in my life or the direction it has taken.  And I’m having to deal with the negative significant differences they have made.

To me, it sounds like Vyvanse is not working for you. I look back now and realize that when I had to keep having a dose upped, or boosters added, that was a clear message that the drug was not working for me.  But, back then I thought doctors were gods and drugs were magic bullets so I went along with them.  I also didn’t know that I could object.

I’m learning to listen to my body, and to use behavioral tools.  I heard the novel idea of using my ADHD traits instead of trying to suppress and rid myself of them.

I’ve not been lucky enough to stumble onto an A+ doctor or counselor.  It seems that most of them are ignorant of ADHD even those who advertise it as their specialty.

I’m considering staying off of any ADHD medication.  The positives of the medication were not all that significant and the negatives have been nasty.  Of course, I am retired and past having to get a degree, or start a family, so a younger person might not take that route.  I would encourage anyone taking the medications to remember the drugs are not a panacea and must be accompanied by vigilence and effort.  And that is a full time job especially for us ADHDers.  I have found that my pragmatism is a positive for me.  Is it working is the key question.

I will shut up in a minute here. Just wanted to say that I have found listening to Binaural Beats to be an effective aid for me.

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[blackdog]

@ptvlover

The depression/irritability as Vyvanse begins to wear off is very common. A lot of people get it. I had it for awhile when I first started taking it. About 3:00 pm every day I suddenly just wanted to sit down and cry.

For me, increasing the dosage was the answer. Now that I am up to 60 mg/day I am fine until later in the evening when I start to feel groggy and get a little dopey.

It sounds like in your case increasing the dosage is probably not a good idea, since you are already having trouble sleeping with what you are taking now.

The only thing I can think of to help with the mood shift is to be prepared for it. You know when it’s going to happen so think about ways to boost your mood at that time. Listen to music, go for a walk, watch a funny show…..anything to snap you out of it. If that isn’t an option, try a cup of coffee or a treat of some sort. And talk to yourself. Tell yourself that it’s okay, just relax, it will be over soon, be patient, don’t snap at that person who is just trying to be nice…..etc.

Also, you could probably overlap your Vyvanse doses a little, take the afternoon one a half hour earlier, so that it gets into your system before the first one wears off. But check with your doctor to be sure first. I know it’s safe to do with other drugs, but I’m not sure about the Vyvanse.

If it is really bad though you might want to consider getting off the Vyvanse. You don’t want to take something that is going to make you feel that way all the time. There are a lot of options you could try and something else might work better for you. Talk to your doctor about it anyway, and maybe your pharmacist too.

Good luck. 🙂

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[angelicdemon]

I’ve been on Vyvanse since the summer of 2010.Didn’t start taking it “correctly” till November/December of 2011.OMG IT’S LIKE HEAVEN! 😀 Still had my hyperness which I would have been depressed if it made my hyperness stop,lol.So the vyvanse made it so I can focus much better while I’m hyper unless i slept really bad the night before.Then my mind is just so off and I cant so anything thinking wise.I now take my vyvanse at 7am ,go back to sleep,and vyvanse starts to kick in around 8-9am to wake me up.I started to take it at 7am since it says that vyvanse last for 14 hours.So it should stop working around 11pm.

I had depression problems and took meds for that but stopped after seeing a therapist.My depression started to stop happening but I still have my anxiety.My anxiety cause me to have trouble sleeping at night at other peoples places.Also having panic attacks kinda often about a lot of different things.So now I’m taking a med called,”Seroquel XR 50mg.”I take that at 5:30pm everyday and if I forget to take it I can’t sleep AT ALL.My hyperness makes it really hard to stay asleep and go into a deep sleep.I’ve even had times where I couldnt sleep at all and stayed up for 24hrs.So yeah Vyvanse and seroquel XR are the greatest meds to me ever :D.

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[blackdog]

@lsdcat

Yikes! is right. Serotonin Toxicity is scary!

Upping the dosage and adding boosters is normal for most people, until they find the right dosage or combination. But in your case it was obviously not what you needed and I am surprised your doctor didn’t stop before it got that bad. And your pharmacist should have caught it too, when you were prescribed so many medications that affect serotonin levels.

You have provided some very good advice on the dangers of taking medication and the need to exercise caution and be well informed.  And not to just go along with what the doctors say if you feel something is wrong.

I think you have made a wise choice to go medication free for awhile and take some time to work things out and find a new approach.

I have also been trying to use my ADHD since learning more about it. I realized I have been trying to be someone I’m not my whole life. So now I am trying to learn to do what works for me. And my house looks like a whole herd of messy 10 year olds live in it, even with the medication. But I am slowly figuring out what works and what doesn’t.

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[lsdcat]

Thank you for the positive affirmations.  The problems as I see it was that the offending doctors were with a huge nationwide HMO, Kaiser Permanente,  and were treating me for the wrong conditions.  When I ran across an article and became alerted to the possibility of Serotonin Syndrome, the HMO seemed to be more concerned with their liability and everyone from the top to the bottom denied that the combination of drugs they had me on would cause Serotonin toxicity.

Another contributing factor was inconsistency in medical care.  I moved a lot, changed jobs a lot, often didn’t have the means to pay.  By the time I was with the HMO, my employer changed HMOs every time their contract was up. Add all that to my poor communication skills and distractibility and that meant I had no long term established or documented medical history.

I had been thinking about asking my current doctor to take me back to a baseline, but the allergic reaction took that choice out of my hands.  I guess I will see what I see.

Again thank you, all of you, for your feedback.

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[Rick Green – Founder of TotallyADD]

The people I know who have tried Vyvanse have had mixed reactions. Which is probably true of every ADHD medication. In fact, it’s probably true of every medication for every medical issue.

The problem one person uncounted was that Vyvanse was, at the time, still considered a medication for children so the doctor didn’t have any guidelines on how much to prescribe for adults. And this person was a pretty big guy. Finally the doctor handed him the information sheet and said, “What do you think?”

Also, a number of members have mentioned Dr. Charles Parker in this stream. And he is going to be doing three full webinars with us later this year, so keep checking the webinar page to make sure you get in. The software that runs our webinars limits us to 100 participants. Here’s the link to check. http://totallyadd.com/webinars/

 

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[Jimi]

Please check out our “Read This First” post for a full explanation of this medication. http://totallyaddconnect.com/forums/topic/read-first-for-information-on-vyvanse/

Also, be sure to register for our upcoming Webinars about medication!
Dr. David Pomeroy with be taking questions on September 2!
Dr. Chuck Parker will be joining us for 3 webinars in October!
Register for Dr. Pomeroy’s webinar now: http://totallyadd.com/webinars/
(Dr. Chuck Parker’s webinar registration will open in September.  Sign up for webinar reminders here: http://totallyadd.com/register/)

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