My son just left Home after 5 months of Hospital and Rehabiliation

Family
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My son is now back on 6mg Paliperidone and he will take his second 234mg shot ( Invega)
he is also taking Depako (divalprox Sodium) 500mg for mood stabilizer,
Gabapentin for side effects and benadryl as needed.

The Hospital will release him next week Thursday but he has been telling me that Paliperidone will enlarge his breast ( boobs).
does your son notice any breast enlargement?

I want him to come home and be close to me. Currently, at the hospital, he was hit by few times by other patients who has severe mental Symptoms

I am just hoping that he will not give me hard time about taking his meds and keeping up with his injection.

He said that he will take Seroquel.
it will be hard to enforce the oral meds based on the hsitory in the past 18 months.

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Does anyone know used Seroquel for schizophrenia? is it effective

I it has 6.3/10 rating

Invega has 6.8/10

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Yes, itā€™s somewhat effective, but only in high doses. Low doses donā€™t do much. Weā€™re planning to switch to Zyprexa.

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@Doctor - that could be a great switch.

I think I told you Seroquel even at 900 mg/day did very little for my son.
When they switched him to 15 mg Zyprexa a day, we saw enough to know it would work in about 48 hours, although he had not been psychotic for long when we tried it - maybe 2 weeks. Iā€™m sure that if youā€™ve been psychotic for longer, it would take longer to work.

My son has been on anywhere from 5 mg to 25 mg of Zyprexa depending on his symptoms & how much he was smoking. Thanks to Mom2 I looked it up, and males who smoke may need up to 50% more Zyprexa than if they didnā€™t smoke.

It was a good med for him for 9 years, and I guess we canā€™t ask for much more than that.

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Yeah, Iā€™m taking your advice, so thank you so much once again! :smile:

One question though ā€“ how stable was your son like with that pill? How was his life? Did he have relationships? Go to school? Have a job?

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My son was always anxious socially way before he had his first psychotic break.

He was 18 when he started taking it. He finished his senior year in high school and actually had a couple teachers he liked that year. That was rare for him.

He also applied for quite a few jobs during that time. However, he was way too honest on his applications so never got a job offer. Heā€™d put down that he thought it was fine to smoke pot, and that if other employees were stealing that heā€™d mind his own business and not tell. He thought it was an opinion poll or something.

If he had taken the Zyprexa consistently, I think he would have done much better, but he had lots of times where he would get stable, then not take it or take less than he should because he was sure he could manage his symptoms - recognize when he was getting sick and go back up to the recommended dosage. Thatā€™s when he had near-perfect insight.

It worked for him for a long time with him doing that, but it finally either got away from him or he got way sicker.

Bear in mind that he also came out of his first two psychotic breaks with absolutely no medicine because we just couldnā€™t get him in to see the right person while he was sick and we chose to not hospitalize him. In hindsight, that could have been a huge mistake.

He did not want to keep taking it because he said he felt dead inside when he was taking it, that he couldnā€™t enjoy anything, even music. A lot of people have that complaint and think it should be used to treat acute psychosis, then once someone is stable they should be transitioned to something else with less side effects. No one would argue that itā€™s a great emergency drug that can snap people out of psychosis quickly if it works for them.

He also slowly gained a lot of weight on it, more from inactivity than increased appetite. When he stopped taking it completely, he lost 60 pounds in 3 months and went from 200 to about 135/140, which is as thin as he should ever be. The first few years he was on it, he didnā€™t really gain more than 5 or 10 pounds, then it started creeping up.

EDIT: I should give you a more precise answer. On Zyprexa consistently, he did very well, a little bit better than his previous baseline, but he has other issues besides his psychosis that makes it hard for him to socialize and work.

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67

I see. I think the weed and the off and off the meds is what affected his progress. I got mine off the drugs, he knows itā€™s a deal breaker so he wonā€™t go near them. I just wish that he would get better to the point of going back to college and studying something and eventually get a job.

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I think the right meds will help him.

If the Zyprexa doesnā€™t make any changes after you try different dosages and a couple months have passed, try something else.

There are a dozen or so different anti-psychotics out there and everyone reacts differently to them. Iā€™ve personally seen how well the right one at the right dosage can work, so I wouldnā€™t give up hope no matter how frustrating it can be to keep trying one thing after the next.

And, some people need a combo.

Iā€™m personally wondering if my son will need something added. The Invega seems to work wonders for his paranoia & any hallucinations that he was having, but the delusions are persisting. People keep telling me here and elsewhere to give it 6 months once they get him on a dosage that doesnā€™t give out on him, so thatā€™s the plan.

Iā€™ve also read that some people are on Invega & using Zyprexa to get rid of the delusions.

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Happy birthday Doctor! I hope you enjoy your day!

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Yeah, I hope for those to go away too.

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71

Thank you very much!! :slight_smile:

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72

Yes, Happy Birthday, Doctor! :tada::gift:

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73

Thank you very much!! :smiley:

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74

:star2: :ribbon: :sparkles:Happy Birthday, Doctor :sparkles: :ribbon: :star2:

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Happy Birthday Doctor - hope you have a good one!

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76

Thank you so much!! :smile:

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77

Thank you very much!! :smile:

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I agree than Zyprexa is more effective in short period of time than other meds. on year ago, My son was hospitalized and he was given 100 mg of Zyprexa a day then dose was increased to 20 mg. then to 40mg within 5 weeks.

After he get out of the hospital, he was stable in terms of behavior. started helping me around the home but showed symptoms Like: being scared and wanted to go with me daily to work and stay in a secure building and also he was hiding his face whenever we drive. He was also showing uncontrolled movements (leg jiggling). I thought that was not really good that he was so scared and leg jiggling. I asked him to make an appointment so the dose would be reducedā€¦ but he refused to take the meds and left home and drifted to California where he was hospitalized in Standford for about 2 months and they tried various meds and he was put at the end on Paliperidone oral pills (6mg) with Lithium as mood stabilize

Then, he came back to Live with me in Arkansas and after few weeks, he wanted to stop the meds again claiming that he would cause breast enlargement and other side effects. I threaten that I put him in hospital if he does not take meds and called police on him after we fought one day .but again he manage to escape again travelled back to California last September and was hospitalized there in January for 10 days after I filed a missing police report and he was found homeless.

After 10 days of Hospitalization, he was released to take a greyhound to come back home. He did not make it and called me from El Paso, Texas. then I get another greyhound ticket but since he was not on meds during his trip and was not stable enough , he assaulted a female on a Greyhound station and now he has been in a Hospital in Texas for 6 weeks.

The hospital gave him one shot of Paliperdone and he has been taking oral meds of 6 mg and Depoka for mood stabilizer. he will get another shot on March 15.

I am going to get him with a friend next week but he keeps on saying that he does not want to continue Invega shots because of Breast enlargement and he wants to take Seroquel. I am arguing with him on the phone every day.

It seem like it will be a constant war between us. it is very hard to enforce meds with him since he does not think he is sick and he is constantly worried about side effectsā€¦

So how long does it take for Inveka to be effective ?
after 6 weeks of 6mg on Paliperdine pills and an inveka shot and he still does not think he is not sick? then he may really need zyprexa for 2 months so he can be convinced that he is sick!!

this is really frustrating. and I wish I can keep him there for a while but he has been hit several times by other patients.

I will bring him back home and hope my roommate can convince him to stay on medsā€¦

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79

Happy Birthday Doctor. best wishes

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Thank you so much!! :slight_smile: