I've recently started quetiepine and it's being upped every day for 5 days I started on 25mg yesterday and today it's 50mg then 100mg then 150mg and so on untill 300mg. The only thing is I'm so tired I can hardly think straight or form propper thoughts and to me it sounds like I'm sluring my words but to others it doesn't and I'm only on 50mg. Is it going to get worse? Or will my body get used to these increases?
The tiredness is just horrible I can't look after my son on my own I'm so zoned out so have had friends and family helping me when my husband is out. I feel unable to do anything and I felt I had achieved something simply by filling the dishwasher yesterday.
Any advice from anyone who has been through this would be lovely
Due to the lower doses mentioned you can only be on the short release version, which, yes, at 25-50-75-100mg will make you sleepy. Interestingly, doses much above 100mg don't tend to cause increasing tiredness.
When you have got to a maintainance dose and the side effects of the drug being novel to your body have worn off, there is the option of going onto the longer release form. This XL [extended release] tablet can come in 150mg, and 300mg tablets and gives you a steady blood level and thus less peaks and troughs in the tiredness throughout the day.
Whatever happens though, a lot of people feel very tired to begin with and this does ease as your body gets accustomed to this medication. When I started on it I was on 25mg at night [increasing every night] and 12.5mg [half a tablet] in the morning, I never did manage to tolerate the morning dose and I am now on the extended release, but the tiredness did decrease the longer I tried it.
Is there any way you could plan your day by doing tasks just before the next dose is due [or just after you have taken it, but before it has kicked in] to try and make as much use of the little time you do have when you are less whacked out?
Thanks I didn't even know there was a short release and long release thing?
I'm very lucky to have friends and family and my hubby who are doing pretty much everything for me ATM. I've also been given 2 weeks off work on sick leave so all I really do all day is watch TV but although I'm so tired and have a fuzzy head I really want to do something other then being stuck inside. I tried going to the supermarket and taking my son to the park yesterday with my friend and it was so hard to stay focused when he was on the equipment or I was trying to pick out stuff we needed that I picked up the wrong stuff. :(
It's just frustrating because I feel so odd but it's kind of my own fault for changing medication so I feel guilty for being so pathetic and just lying around all day.
Also although I feel so whacked out I'm still having weird thoughts which actually seem to be worse then before bevause of my tiredness but I'm abit worried about telling the team I'm under because I mentioned feeling more suicidal due to being tired (tiredness all makes me more depressed) and she just brushed it off.
The htt lady that came last night said she couldn't change my meds I would have to see the pychriatrist again (which is fair) but even the pysch didn't know what to give me she had to call up the pharamasit and ask her. I don't know if I will even be seeing the pysch again? It's all very short term I've only been told about the next 5 days so I don't know if once I reach 300mg I will stay on that?
I guess but changing from quetiapine to quetiapine XL isn't really changing meds, it's just changing the type of tablet. Perhaps explain that it's making you very tired and unable to function, which has huge implications since you have a small child.
No harm in asking. Are they coming to see you today?
Let us go then you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky, like a patient etherized upon a table
- T.S. Elliot
I told the lady last night that I can't care for my son on my own but that I have people to help and she seemed to think that was ok?
They are coming every night to give me my meds so yep will be here tonight, I'm going to try and not be rude, I told her just give me the meds and go so will try and tolerate the person abit longer
Everybody will react different, but Seroquel is a sedative no matter the dosage nor release, generally, such is why a lot of doctors say to take it at bed time. Though, that can complicate things as to make you dependant on taking something to put you to sleep.
But as with everything your body will get used to it and it will not feel as strong. I've been on Seroquel for several years now, dependant on it to fall asleep. But even after all this time it makes me very sleepy and knocks me out.
We save no souls, we break no promises.
Travellers, it is late.
Life's sun is going to set.
During these brief days that you have strength,
be quick and spare no effort of your wings.
Quetiapine IR has a short half-life, whereas quetiapine XL has a longer one. Due to its antihistamine and 5HT2C (as well as other receptors) antagonist actions, it will make you sleepy. But, as said above, the XL will prevent peaks and troughs in plasma quetiapine levels to the strong degree that the IR does, so the sedation will be less profound (although not zero). You will also build up a certain degree of tolerance over time to the side-effects. Look up quetiapine online on the Electronic Medicines Compendium; it will give you information based on clinical trials data.
PM me if you want a PDF copy of the ICD-10or the Mental Health Act 1983/2007. I ALSO HAVE THE DSM-V BOOK and am a pharmacology student.
I have a visual impairment / neurological problems so I need people to type in clear text and no funny fonts. Also excuse any typos, my vision blocks things out.
I have autism and have problems communicating, PMs included.
Just becasue I type well doesn't mean I speak well. I am only part time verbal.
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