[Secretum]

I went off my meds for about four days (I ran out and the pharmacy didn't have anymore; they had to order them) and my hallucinations pretty much disappeared. When I started the meds again on Monday, the hallucinations came back.

Now that I think about it, I didn't really have frequent clear hallucinations until I started taking Abilify, the first antipsychotic I tried. I had other psychotic symptoms, but not hallucinations.

Does anyone know if it is possible for antipsychotics to cause hallucinations? I don't think I'll go off the zyprexa, even if it is causing me to hallucinate, because it is so effective against depression and I find depression much more distressing than the hallucinations. I am merely curious.

[Sometimes psychotic]

Withdrawal from APs can cause hallucinations but I've never heard of this happening where going onto them can cause them. For me I had differences between doses where higher doses weren't always better ie 2mg risperidone was better than 3mg but both were better than 0mg.

[Gr3tta]

I have heard of both seroquel and risperdal causing paranoia, audial, and visual hallucinations in people without any psychosis who took them.

[Sometimes psychotic]

Originally Posted by Gr3tta

I have heard of both seroquel and risperdal causing paranoia, audial, and visual hallucinations in people without any psychosis who took them.

Is this when they took them or when the drug wore off?

[OutofTune]

If I remember correctly Abilify at low doses can act as a bit of a stimulant and that can cause hallucinations.

Originally Posted by Secretum

I went off my meds for about four days (I ran out and the pharmacy didn't have anymore; they had to order them) and my hallucinations pretty much disappeared. When I started the meds again on Monday, the hallucinations came back.

Now that I think about it, I didn't really have frequent clear hallucinations until I started taking Abilify, the first antipsychotic I tried. I had other psychotic symptoms, but not hallucinations.

Does anyone know if it is possible for antipsychotics to cause hallucinations? I don't think I'll go off the zyprexa, even if it is causing me to hallucinate, because it is so effective against depression and I find depression much more distressing than the hallucinations. I am merely curious.

Id like to chime in with seroquel aswell. I dont think its as much psychosis but some have being implicated with causing mania. I am on seroquel and there was 2 weeks after starting the drug that i felt sensitised to my environment. I had to be careful but after 2 weeks it all settled down.

[Gr3tta]

Originally Posted by Sometimes psychotic

Is this when they took them or when the drug wore off?

When they took them.

[blackwhitered]

I sometimes got auditory hallucinations right after I took Seroquel, but they were more like hypnopompic hallucinations than my normal voices because it made me tired...

[nbritton]

Originally Posted by Secretum

I went off my meds for about four days (I ran out and the pharmacy didn't have anymore; they had to order them) and my hallucinations pretty much disappeared. When I started the meds again on Monday, the hallucinations came back.

Now that I think about it, I didn't really have frequent clear hallucinations until I started taking Abilify, the first antipsychotic I tried. I had other psychotic symptoms, but not hallucinations.

Does anyone know if it is possible for antipsychotics to cause hallucinations? I don't think I'll go off the zyprexa, even if it is causing me to hallucinate, because it is so effective against depression and I find depression much more distressing than the hallucinations. I am merely curious.

In theory yes, and Zyprexa is certainly one of the ones that could do it. Zyprexa takes a shotgun approach in that it acts on a wide array of neurotransmitter systems. One of those it has a very high affinity for is the serotonin system. From personal experience, I am highly sensitive to drugs that manipulate serotonin, i.g. traditional antidepressants. They have a strong tendency to induce psychosis, mix episodes, and mania in me. This type of response is common among a certain subset of people, and I think you may be one of them. You indicated you suffer from atypical depression which further indicates you may be one of these people who can't take serotonin manipulating drugs.

Furthermore, individuals who have this type of responce are almost guaranteed to suffer from a form of bipolar disorder or schizoaffective disorder, and usually respond very we'll to bipolar medications such as lamotrigine, latuda, and lithium. Wellbutrin is also another viable choice because it is fundamentally different from most commonly prescribed antidepressants and acts on different neurotransmitter systems.

I suggest taking this to your doctor and tell him what's going on, he can prescribe something that's equally effective against your treatment resistant depression and doesn't have these side effects.

[Secretum]

Wow, thanks for all that insight, nbritton! I knew that zyprexa does stuff to the serotonergic system (I actually came across an article on it for work; I work in a neurobio lab, and we do a lot of research on different serotonin receptors. )

Thanks for your suggestions for other meds. I had a reaction to lamictal (lamotrigine), latuda made me really anxious, and wellbutrin didn't help me in any way. I'm too cowardly to try lithium, lol.

Besides latuda, are there any other APs that don't heavily play with the serotonergic system?

Thanks!

[Lillybird90]

I was wondering about that myself My cousin was on them and started freaking out worse than she already was.