bpcyclist, I'm glad you brought up the metabolic syndrome issue. I neglected to mention in my post that my cholesterol has been high for a long time, most surely thanks, in part, to Seroquel. Sometimes, but not always, my triglycerides are quite high, too. Luckily, I have not been pre-diabetic since my Depakote and Invega days, over 8 years ago, when at my highest weight. My blood pressure has luckily been mostly normal all along, perhaps thanks to the propranolol I've taken for 11 years, for tachycardia.

I'll admit that at 600 mg and higher, my blood work results do tend to be worse. Watching my diet carefully seems to help lower my triglycerides, but it doesn't do as much at lowering my cholesterol. It's a stubborn bugger! It's easy for me to forget about my high cholesterol and triglycerides, because I haven't suffered any consequences from them...yet. My GP will not put me on a statin because he considers me to be still "low risk" at under 50, and with normal blood pressure, etc.

Diabetes is pretty prevalent in my family. It would be extra bad for me to eventually get it, because I already have mild kidney damage as a result of past Lithium usage. I need to be more vigilant about eating a healthful diet and exercising more. So easy to say, and less easy to do, especially because I don't think of myself as being that overweight. On that note, I have had high cholesterol, while on Seroquel XR, even when I was less than 10 lbs above my normal BMI. I know that weight doesn't always matter.