Bipolar, Lamictal, Vivid dreams

Hi gang,

I will try to keep it brief, but i also want to give enough info that people can help me.

I have had very severe depression for years that has recently been re-diagnosed as BP II. I agree with this update. I tried every med and combo for years and finally got pretty stable on a combo of Abilify, Lexapro, and Wellbutrin. This was great and all, but then I wanted to try to get pregnant. I tried to drop the Abilify. Complete disaster. Did TMS. Dropped the other meds. Very helpful at first, but then I started to have issues with hypomania. I could mostly tolerate those. But then I fell into a severe depression. Did more TMS and it wasn't as helpful, so I agreed to try a little Lamictal. I was at 50mg and in the process of stepping up when I found out that I was pregnant. I was doing well and super-happy about the pregnancy, so we left it at 50mg.

Then, as is my typical luck, I miscarried at 7 weeks. This threw me back into a terrible depression. I upped the dose to 100mg but my sleep has been awful. Vivid dreams, restless, and I even fell out of bed once. IDK if this is a result of the Lamictal or the general distress in my life. The dreams haven't been about what happened or anything.

If at all possible I want to stick with the lamictal. I also don't want to add any additional meds. I have done a search and it seems the vivid dreams are a possible side effect, but it isn't clear to me how common. I am also still very depressed and would like to up the dose if possible. Any insight? I see pdoc in a week.

Thanks,
EJ

Lamictal worked OK at the 50 dose but not nearly enough. 75 threw me into hypo mania and 100 seemed to even me out. I did have vivid dreams on it too. almost lucid. I started recognizing paranoia and strange ideas so the Abililify started and it landed at 10 mg. which took care of the super vivid dreams. It cleared up enough for me to recognize my anxiety was out of control leading to my diag. of GAD as well and zoloft and larezapam is taking care of that. I'm pretty stable now.

hope this helps!

I'm right there with you on the lamictal dosage. I upped to 100 mg this past weekend and have had some pretty horrible (and not so horrible but very vivid) dreams. I have a friend who is on a different anti-convulsant (for epilepsy, not bipolar) and they told me that the vivid dreams just come with the territory of taking anti-convulsants and that they still have the vivid dreams after being on it for a number of years. When I look at the potential side effects of my other options, I have decided I'll just try to live with it a while. Maybe I'll get lucky and find it will lessen over time.

Therapeutic range for lamictal is different for each person, but generally to be a mood stabilizer, they go higher than 100. The anti-depressant effects are seen at the lower dosage, but may not be enough by itself to really kick that depression away.

It's totally understandable that you would be feeling down after your miscarriage. I am so sorry you had that loss. {{hugs}} Maybe talk to your p-doc and see if they can tweak what you are on to help you get through this time. I hope you are feeling better soon. <3

I'm on 100 mg., my DH is on 125 mg., for 1+ years. Nether of us get vivid dreams, excluding last night. You may need other medications, make sure your pdoc knows your trying to conceive, so s/he limits meds. to the safest for baby. Also look into if you can do out-patient while pregnant. So they can reduce your meds further and give you the support and medical care you'll need while un/der medicated.

Yes about telling them if you want to try to conceive again while on lamictal. Though I've read it is one of the safer drugs for pregnancy, it seems they usually recommended women take a larger amount of folic acid than most women trying to conceive are told to take. It's my understanding that when they were creating lamictal for seizures some twenty years ago, it was thought that high concentrations of folate (a B vitamin) might contribute to a lower threshold for the seizures and so they made the drug have anti-folate properties. Though there aren't yet official studies on lamictal's safety during pregnancy, I believe they think women who do not supplement their folate intake during the first trimester have a slightly increased risk of the baby developing birth defects like cleft lip and palate. Because many women don't realize they are pregnant for a number of weeks, their doctors may want them to be taking a certain amount of folic acid while trying to conceive. If I recall correctly, moms shouldn't breast feed while on lamictal though because it is a drug that carries over into the milk.

When or if you are ready to try to conceive again, definitely talk to your doctor about these things so that they can help you decide what will be best for your circumstances. <3

Until then, take care.

Oh yes, I have thoroughly discussed this with all my doctors. I consulted 3 pdocs and 2 OB's before deciding to go on it and try to get pregnant. The pregnancy was very intentional, although it happened a little more quickly than I anticipated.

I was deciding between Lamictal and Abilify, but there was much more data on Lamictal so I went with that. There was a pregnancy registry with (I believe) 20 years of data that suggested no increased risk for birth defects. Nothing like that exists for Abilify.

Thanks for all your help and support.

Best,
EJ

I don't have any solutions, but my brother experiences heavy lucid dreaming on Lamictal and Effexor.
For me, it comes and goes regardless of what I am on - I am mostly mixed.

In case anyone was wondering, I talked to a pdoc (not my "main" pdoc) that is both a pdoc and a sleep specialist. He said that it would be rare for Lamictal to be causing the sleeps disturbances I described. He suspects it is more related to stress.

I'm going to see my regular pdoc on Wednesday and see what he thinks. Last night was maybe a little better. I do keep having dreams about people I knew in high school (over 15 years ago). The strangest thing was that the people I dream about were never friends or people I knew well. They are not even FB friends and I haven't given them a thought for over 15 years! Very strange!

Best,
EJ

Every time my dose of Lamictal changed, I experienced very violent and very vivid dreams. It was terrible. But they only lasted about 2 weeks or so before they'd disappear. But while they were happening, they were the worst and most disturbing dreams I have ever had.