I woke up this morning and went to take my AM meds. I took the Lamictal, the Klonopin, and the Prevacid. Then I vaguely remember picking up the Dex bottle to take that, but remember far more strongly that at the same moment my husband loudly roared a curse word and I looked over and my son had somehow knocked cough syrup all over the floor (my fault--didn't screw the lid on tight enough. Thank God he didn't drink it, at least; that goes without saying, of course.)

So anyway, I couldn't remember whether I'd taken the Dex. So I didn't want to take it, in case I already had, and I knew it took about 45 minutes to an hour to kick in on average. We had to go into town to get new tires put on the car and go to get stuff for Sam's birthday party. So my husband suggested that I take the bottle of Dex with me and we wait about an hour and see.

Nothing happened. So I took one, and wondered if it was maybe just taking a little longer to kick in.

Nothing happened an hour after that one. Went with my husband's suggestion and took another one, but didn't want to take more, just in case I had in fact taken 4 that morning and didn't remember and it just somehow was taking a long time to kick in or wouldn't work that day for some reason.

It's quite amazing how different I was and now am since I started the Dexedrine. My behavior was rather disturbing--my husband asked something, like what chips we should get for the party, and I'd listen, then immediately forget, ask again, he'd ask whatever he asked, and eventually I'd be able to retain it and respond. I lost the information in a matter of a second. It was creepy to realize (creepy for both of us) what the pre-Dex Chrystine was like, but even when I suggested that perhaps I just was worse today because of withdrawal from Dex or something, my husband said, "No, this is what you were like before, I'd just gotten accustomed to it, and now have come to like this improvement, and though I knew it was bad before, I forgot how bad. This is the old Chrystine. Really." It was kind of scary, to be frank. But it was the status quo for so long, that I guess it didn't seem so strange then. Annoying, but not strange and creepy.

Then at about 6 or so, while at home, it sort of just hit me--now, mind you, I don't know why I didn't feel anything improve until 6 p.m., and don't know why it was so bad, though I know it was a dose and a half, maybe it was also because I took the pills so far apart--and became quite obvious that I had, indeed, taken the 4 pills (20 mg) in the morning and then 5 mg later and 5 mg later than the first 5 mg. I went OCD and cleaned and sanitized everything in our tiny bathroom (we rarely use the master bath, because it's in our room, and we're trying to sell our house, so we figure that it's easier to just use one bathroom and the other one will stay spotless simply from lack of use.) Now, that sounds like a good thing. But when one is sanitizing and tediously sharpening one's makeup pencils in a very calculated fashion so that they all match in length and point severity, sanitizing the container of antibacterial soap, and carefully removing any evidence that one's mascara bottle has ever been opened before by cleaning black out of the little tiny crevices on the inside of the lid, (and those are just a few examples), that's just not normal. Three hours I spent in that bathroom, painstakingly concerned with every minor detail and visual imperfection that would otherwise have gone unnoticed or seemed certainly unworthy of great attention (like when I picked tiny balls of white lint so small you couldn't even see them if you were standing and looking directly at my dark blue bathmat, picking each off by hand, making sure I had each and every one) and now, though not freakishly obsessive anymore (I think I exhausted that in the bathroom-detailing-palooza) I'm rather wide awake, probably because that last pill I took was at about three this afternoon or so.

My kid's birthday party's tomorrow. Hope I don't look and feel like hell.

Hey, BTW, I noticed a good improvement at 20 mg, having upped it on Friday and noticing the improvement on Monday, but also noticed that I have a very sharp dropoff when it wears off. It's not gradual. It's like a migraine in a manner of speaking--I get a warning first (slight appetite increase), then a pretty darn obvious sign that it's definitely wearing off (quite a bit of appetite increase) and then boom! I've gone rather stupid and disoriented so to speak, and can't absorb what I was reading just 5 minutes ago all of a sudden. Literally. 5 minutes, about, and it just crashes. Really weird.

If you think it's because of the fact that I'm taking the BARR pharmaceuticals version of the generic, you'll be happy to know that I've found that Osco (coincidentally it's right across from Walgreens, where I normally go) gives the Mallinkrodt version of the generic. My neurologist still doesn't see that this is really valid, and says he's never noticed it before, but is like, "Ok, whatever, if you want to try what these people told you, go ahead, tell me what happens." I think I can refill the script on the 5th or so, though I won't have run out of the bottle I've got now by then, 'cause he prescribed more in case I kept increasing all the way up to the maximum he gave me (35 mg, no more) and would actually need plenty more than I do at 20.

Man, now I'm just rambling, I think.

I'm gonna go wash down some Xanax with Sprite and go out and smoke. I need to go to bed eventually.

Chrys

Chrys,

Have you thought of getting a pill dispenser thingy with compartments for morning, noon, night, monday, tues, wed, etc? That way you'd know for sure if you took your meds or not.
That is so weird that OCD came out with your extra meds! I wonder why it would cause that? ...makes me wonder what causes OCD .....
*hugs*

I put my daily dose of pills into a seperate bottle first thing in the AM so that I can easily count if I've taken them! I also don't like to take a large amount of a controlled substance out the the house, just in case I lose them or it gets stolen. I'd characterize the "OCD" behaviour as hyper-focusing rather than OCD???

Gregster: (On my stupid OCD comment)

Yeah, I know, it was more hyper-focus, and anyway, it was wrong of me to carelessly toss around a serious psychiatric diagnosis to describe the characteristics of my behavior during that span of time. It was, in fact, quite abnormally obsessive and compulsive of me, but I shouldn't have actually said I was being like a person with OCD, because I should not disrespect those who truly have that disorder.

Gregster & E-Girl: (On Pill Containers)
Yeah, I have repeatedly voluntarily used or been told to use a compartmental container of some sort for my meds. The problem is that I have so many meds that generally, I can't find a container to fit them all into, and even when I do, I usually have to buy two of them, believe it or not! It's nuts (oh, crap, shouldn't have carelessly tossed that word around either.) You know what I mean. Between the vitamin supplements and Neurontin (which I usually skip), which are both/generally/all horse-pill sized; the Prevacid; Lamictal; Klonopin; off-and-on Singulair; Allegra; Xanax; (which is generally PRN but during a period of stress that is predictable, like the family drama this last Christmas, it's used in a three-to-four-times a day regimen to try to ease as much anxiety as possible), and now the Dexadrine; not to mention the Guafenisen (which I haven't really needed along with my other asthma meds since I started on the Dex for some reason,) I have to use literally two of the largest pill containers available. And half the time I forget to refill them from absentmindedness or laziness or busy-ness. Oh, yeah, and I'm supposed to be taking Vitamin B-12 injections in my thigh every single day, and syringes and glass bottles of course do not fit into pill containers!

Another problem is that I've found that when I go to take my meds, if I open each bottle, I can shake however many of each of the various pills into the cupped palm of my hand to ensure that they won't fall onto the floor and my son will not take them having mistaken them as candy, which he did once with my Prevacid and scared me (of course, I gave him ipecac before I called Poison Control, which was stupid because you're not supposed to do that anyway and when I talked to them they told me the Prevacid wouldn't have hurt him anyway. Poor kid just spent three hours in the bathtub puking and crying 'cause mommy did something moronic. Not a good moment in my parenting history, that's for sure.) However, if I put them in pill containers, in the compartments, it's harder to get them out and more likely to lose my grip or drop them somehow; thus, it's more dangerous because, as I said, the kid might quickly (they're amazingly fast when motivated) pick it up and eat whatever it is that fell on the floor--hopefully not a seizure med or Dex.

Generally, one is filled solely with vitamins, since there are at least five each AM and more each PM. The worst ones are the Fish-Oil gelcaps. I hate those. They're nasty, and if you burp, holy hell, it makes you want to puke.

The vitamin junk is supposed to help my memory by the way, but never did much of anything. Well, the vitamin B-12 shots may have helped a little, but not dramatically, so we're not really solidly sure on that.

Like I said, though, this Dex stuff really suddenly rocks, and just as I thought a year ago that we'd never find anything to stop my seizures, I was also sure that we'd never find anything to really help my memory. But now we have.

Separate subject:

There are a couple of somewhat unrelated repercussions: my mom and somewhat overweight--ok, my husband laughed when I said "somewhat"--friend are a bit worried about the 7-10 pounds or so (maybe 11 or 12, actually) that I've lost in the three or four weeks (when did I join the forum again? It was like right after I started on Dex, I know that) I've been on the amphetamine I was initially panicked about taking, whereas a friend said, quite bravely, "Damn, they should have put you on this earlier--you're thinking better, yeah, and that's cool, but you're getting skinnier, and your leg-butt-ratio--no offense, Chrys--is looking a lot more even in comparison to the rest of your body." (Guess I had chunky thighs and a big ol' @ss in comparison with the rest of me.) I saw my neuro and he was pretty happy with the weight loss, and reassured me that it wasn't too many pounds lost in too short of a time period; he's been telling me that getting within the mid-range or slightly below mid-range of ideal weight for my body type/height would likely lessen my seizure activity for *******' ever & never shuts up about it and brings it up at every *******' appointment. I'm (well, not currrently, but was typically) at the upper limit for "normal" for my height and build before I would slide into the "obese" category.

Guess the most obvious part is the fact that my size-6 jeans, (I know that sounds skinny but on a chick that's 5-feet-tall it's not real skinny) which I was sort of squeezing into with lovehandles hanging out the sides of the waistline, embarrassing but true; (maybe I was just trying to insist that I didn't need pants that were any bigger than the ones I wore pre-baby) are kind of baggy at this point and there is no longer flab hanging out the sides; us when I leaned over to pick up my kid my friends were like "God, Chrystine, everyone can see your underwear in the back. Get smaller pants, for Christ's sake, ghetto girl."

I'm not on too high of a dose--though I had that freakiness last night, I'm ok now--I'm just losing weight for some reason that I don't understand. I'm making myself eat even though I'm not hungry. All we can conclude is that the Dex is speeding up my metabolism and burning those calories I'm making myself remember to ingest.

Does that make any sense?

Chrys