if you've ever taken psych meds, or know anyone who has, you know there's often a lot of trial and error involved. what works for one person might have absolutely no effect - or worse, a deleterious effect - on someone else. or it might relieve your depression but have unwanted, even unbearable side effects. to add insult to injury, the patient often has to wait 4-6 weeks to determine if a drug is having any positive effect (whereas the negative effects usually make themselves known more quickly).
i take psych meds. a long time ago i was ashamed of that, but i'm not anymore. and i recently started a new one that was intended to kick up the positive effects of another - a booster, if you will. and it did, actually, and i felt better than i had in a long time. as we increased the dosage last week, however (gradually, as you do with almost all these medications), i developed akathisia, which is just a fancy word for feeling as though you're going to jump out of your skin. it's uncomfortable, bordering on painful, just to sit still. my meditation practice went out the window, as you can imagine, and that was one of the only things keeping me sane. not to mention that pacing around my house constantly was more than a little annoying too.
so i talked to my doctor, and there were essentially two options: 1) stop taking the drug that was causing the akathisia (duh), or 2) add yet another, extremely low-risk drug to control the akathisia (a beta blocker, often prescribed for high blood pressure). i didn't like either option, but ultimately i went with option 2. i now am taking five prescribed medications. so yeah, feeling like a walking pharmacy. there's a bad song in there somewhere.
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