Hi. Ever since Thorazine came out and it was used on people with non-psychotic problems ("antipsychotics" are really just powerful tranquilizers, so they're used...to tranquilizer, LOL), there have been indications that going off these sorts of tranquilizers can leave you with more severe problems than you had before taking them.

This is definitely true if you took a high dose or took it for an extended period of time. Abilify is weird. I'm on a lot of it for Bipolar I. Anyway, the research they've done on it shows that even low doses have a profound effect on the D2 receptors, which is what every single "antipsychotic" targets.

Most "atypicals" are "atypical" because they keep the D2 blockade low(ish). This means that a normal dose of, say, Zyprexa might block 70ish% of your D2 receptors, while an equivalent dose of Haldol might block 80ish%. This is important because once the blockade % goes high enough, you start get twitches, spasma, depression, etc. The other thing that makes most atypicals "atypical" is their action on serotonin receptors. By blocking some serotonin receptors, the "atypicals" sometimes help mood and anxiety and also reduce some side effects.

Now...to Abilify. Even at low doses, like 5mgs, you're blocking 40ish+% of your D2 receptors. At my dose--30mgs (I'm trying to reduce, btw)--it seems that a lot of times...there's 100% D2 blockade. Abilify has some weak dopamine receptor stimulating activity, so it can occupy the D2 receptor (blocking off normal dopamine) and then stimulate the same receptor, weakly, so even with the high level of D2 blocking, there's not much in the way of twitches, spasms, stiff gait, etc.

Point is...Abilify is potent, and strange. It blocks the D2 receptors hardcore, like an old school tranquilizer, but its also got action at serotinin receptors, plus the D2 stimulating activity.

So....yeah. Even if you were taking a low dose, big chunks of your dopamine receptors were blocked from receiving normal dopamine. With other meds in the mix, things get more complicated...not only do those drugs affect the brain (obviously, lol), but there's also drug-drug interactions to think about. You may have been taking 5mgs Abilify, but with drug-drug interactions, you might have been affected as if you were taking 10mgs.

There is some good news. Abilify has a long half life, so even if you just stop taking it, it hangs out in your body for a while, doing a sort of self-taper (kind of...). Abilify doesn't result in the same "up-regulation" of D2 receptors as most other tranquilizers. When most tranquilizers block the D2 receptors, the brain makes new ones ("upregulation"). When the tranquilizer is stopped, you get normal dopamine action, and there are new D2 receptors, so there's often a "rebound psychosis" or a "super-sensitivity psychosis," as another poster mentioned. Tranquilizers can suppress psychosis, but they also make people more prone to biologically-rooted psychosis. Fun, huh?

But Abilify doesn't cause as much "upregulation" as the other tranquilizers, probably because it weakly stimulates the same dopamine receptors it blocks. So...in theory, at least, tapering and stopping Abilify should be less of a problem (in terms of psychosis) than with other tranquilizers. Not easy (trust me...), but not as difficult.

I didn't mean to ramble. Hope this helps.