Still concerned about IQ

Hi all,

I have previously posted about medication and IQ, and this may be a bit of a replicate - I apologize for that.
I am on 10 mg of Abilify (started approx. 5 months ago, before that Risperidone) - and it started well. I thought I was able to think clearer and I expressed my gratitude for this medication. However lately, I started feeling dumber. I process things slower, cannot to same degree figure things out, do not always grasp what other people are saying, my creativity has decreased, my writing skills suffer. I feel like it is a brain fog and I hope it is temporary. It may sound a bit hysterical compared to what other people are struggling with and I wonder how much may stem from anhedonia - lack of joy and little to no emotional expression, etc. Also, I find that my personality has changed to become more introverted. I have done cognitive remediation and I stopped recently (approx. 2 weeks ago). That may also explain why I feel dumber. Also, I sleep a lot - and I may therefore suffer from fatigue - maybe because of worrying.

Back to IQ. I have tried all IQ tests on the internet and the latest test showed a IQ drop of approx. 10 points compared to before I got sick. It is a bit diffucult to compare the test results since the tests are all different and there is a learning curve. My estimate is that risperidone accounts for a 5-6 point drop and Abilify 4-5 points drop. It is also difficult to know what my IQ is now. The only proper way to check this is to hire a psychologist to perform a test.
Moreover, I search the internet for success stories about people who have acheived academical success while being on meds and which particular meds they are. I also search for which med is the best for maintaining a high IQ. It seems like that all meds have side effects such as cognitive dulling and IQ loss. Sometimes I consider not taking the med because it is so frustrating with the brain side effects. I may go down in dosis but then positive symptoms may return.

My questions are:
- what can I do to avoid cognitive decline or IQ loss?
- which med is the best, considering IQ as the most important factor?
- can coffee in combination with abilify harm my intelligence?
- are the lost IQ points and personality likely to come back?

Sorry for venting here. I know that I obsess to much about it. Sometimes it can be a relief to express concerns. I hope that I can support you related to other issues.

Best,
Novembernight

Hello Novembernight: I'm sorry I'm not going to be able to answer any of your questions. About all I can say is that I've been on various psych med's for periods of time over the years. And I feel like I have noticed similar sorts of cognitive declines as time has gone by. To what extent this is related to psych med's versus depression & anxiety I don't know. Realistically I kind-of doubt anyone would really know. I suspect it's one of those things there's really no concrete answer to. I'm also an older person. And so, in my case, I really have to throw that into the mix as well. I'm not on psych med's anymore. Looking back I do think, when I was on them, they kept in sort-of a state of "brain fog". That does seem to have more-or-less cleared since I've been off of them. That's about all I can say...

Hi Skeezyks, thank you very much for your answer. Thanks for caring I agree that it is a tricky question since there could be many factors contributing to cognitive decline. Good to hear that you have experienced that the brain fog has cleared.

I don't think it is the meds. I think it is your schizophrenia. Everything that you explained to me sounds like my schizophrenia. Also, your IQ can change if you obtain a degree because you would be learning more information. Unfortunately, school is very difficult with schizophrenia. Anti-psychotics could make you more sleepy.

Everybody's schizophrenia is different. My brain fog didn't lift until I got off of Risperdone and on Geodon. Abilify is a top contender and can work to fight anhedonia so its a win win for you. I don't think it's known for a cognitive deficit.

Tell me more about your anhedonia. Are you on an SSRI? Did you start to experience it when you started Abilify? Anhedonia can affect your attention span because your not emotionally reacting to said stimulus so its harder to follow. You should be able to follow just cognitively. For example, you might not be moved emotionally by music so much, but cognitively you find it interesting. This is my case. I'm really soring your suffering from this. I wouldn't wish this on anyone. I've heard reports that I can just be a symptom of schizophrenia, but I personally question that.

My psychiatrist questions if I have schizoaffective or just a serious case of bipolar. Her argument for why I don't have schizoaffective is because I don't have a cognitive decline that is usually associated with any form of schizophrenia. But I want to stress that everybody's schizophrenia is different. Like I said, Elyn Saks who was having schizophrenic episodes when she was just a child, is still able to teach at law school. Her college days, where she had her worst episodes, were accompanied with her taking Aristotle wherever she went. Aristotle seemed to be a sort of coping mechanism for her. She was a brilliant student.

As for brain fog, I had some of that when my memory was affected by my year long psychotic episode. It took 6 months for my memory to recover and the fog began to lift. Then I started to show signs of bipolar much further down the road and I had to be put on a mood stabilizer and it took me another 6 months of a mood stabilizer for the brain fog to clear once again.

Extreme stress can effect your short term memory, because the hippocampus, your memory center, is prone to stress. So extreme depression or panic can affect it, but it may also repair if you give it time to repair.

For me, brain fog is when I'm constantly searching my memory, and lining things up so I am consciously aware of them. I have trouble recalling things even immediately after some one has told me.

I've heard other's memory has been going also. I know of a PC pal who blames Seroquel. A schizophrenic's brain shrinks after some time in therapy. It is debated whether the brain shrinks from the illness or the medicine but scans can be seen online. I think a big part of that is due to anhedonia. We are not using our emotional side anymore and so we lose all those emotional memories and connections in our brain over time. Or if the meds cause memory issues, those memories will get weaker and harder to recall until they are gone, meaning some of the brain's capacity is gone.

I know this is not good news. I'm on an antipsychotic myself. The anti psychotic isn't causing anhedonia for me though. My mood stabililzer is the culprit, and without my affective side, my brain doesn't function as it once had. However, like I said, your on Abilify and that is a unique AP, which increases dopamine to your brain by a certain percentage.

If you have further questions I'm here.

I can't answer the questions in the original post, but I know what you mean by "brain fog." I have been on a whole string of anti-psychotic medicines, and some have done nothing while others helped a little bit. I find it hard to take in new information, and hard to recall that information after I take it in. When I talk with my brother, he often seems sharp and clear, and he can recall events and things people said thirty years ago, while I am lucky to remember what I had for lunch that day. I say this like a joke, but sometimes it really worries me. I want to go back to work someday, but how can I work when my head is full of voices and delusions and noise, and it's hard to keep up with other people? What employer wants to hire someone whose best efforts fall short of expectations?

For instance. I have several hobbies which keep me amused, one of which is writing stories. Over the past few years I've written a number of stories. I also attend a writers' critique group, where you submit a story, everyone reads it, and they give you their critique. One guy in the group has told me several times over the last couple of years that my stories have two main problems: they seem emotionally flat, and the plots are so straightforward as to be almost simple-minded. Other people have given me similar feedback. There isn't a lot of this, just occasional, but I'm sure these flaws come from being SZA, heavily doped up, and not at my best.

So that's how it works out for me with brain fog and meds and how all this impacts my life and what I do with my good hours each day.

hi. I take 30mgs/Abilify and a high(ish) dose of trileptal. I understand brain fog, trust me.

The deal is...antipsychotics/tranquilizers are --not-- good for you. Necessary, yes; good for you? Hell no!

My solution has been DIY orthomolecular. Its high dose b-complex, niacinamide, massive doses of C and E, etc., plus stuff I added because...well...I was "out there" for a while, and the Orthomolecular people say that if you've been sick for some time, you need higher doses and more nutrients.

I tolerate the Abilify better now, on the vitamins, than I ever did before. I need 30mgs/daily, so I can take it without twitches, tremor, dysphoria, depression, etc. I also don't have the dreaded tardive dyskinesia (or any tardive disorder, Praise God!), and that's huge. When the "atypicals" were new on the scene, everybody was talking about the Miracle Meds, improved tolerability, the reduction in TD, etc. And now...

...long term analysis shows that patients with mood problems tolerate the newer drugs better than they did/do the old(er) ones, but this hasn't translated into a huge change in the rate of TD, overall. Keep in mind that TD is a "dementing disorder;" people with TD often have lower IQs than before they developed TD, and as a group people with TD don't perform as well on cognitive assessments as people who do not have TD.

So...yeah. There ya go. Vitamins (seem) to have helped me tremendously. I had tics and such from intensive "treatment" before, and I don't now. Miracle? Possibly. I've also been on orthomolecular for over 5 years, so I think that plays a big role, too.

Do try to be careful in your selection of drugs. For me, Abilify is the best thing out there that I've tried. That's true of a lot of people, but some people get akathisia from it, so..that's a downside, or can be. Abilify doesn't raise prolactin (big plus) and it can help with low mood'/depression (big plus), but everyone is different, plus Abilify is odd because it works differently at different doses within the FDA-approved range.

Antipsychotics/tranquilizers/neuroleptics can also cause "tardive dementia." Its a scary thing; basically, the drug results in a measurable loss of IQ, etc. Usually, it happens with movement disorders, but one can get less smart w/o a movement disorder. Scary, right? And yet...a lot of us need a tranquilizer. This is why I'm doing Orthomolecular. I need the pharmaceuticals, but I want to keep as many brain cells as I can.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for response. I am diagnosed with delusional disorder, so I should not suffer from negative symptoms - and I don't. But I guess that the illness could still affect my mental condition so I am not feeling as sharp as before.

Thanks for reply and info. I am not on any SSRI. No, it started when I was on risperidone but I am not sure if it is anhedonia because I feel motivated to do things. I just feel bored and restless, and then I do not enjoy everyday duties e.g. conversations, dinner with guests, etc. as I did before I got ill. I do not feel I have anything clever to say and I feel a bit like a zombie, i.e. not as excited and emotional as one could be. However, I do feel excited and emotional by listening to music.

Thanks for info. I take some vitamin B supplement and I guess that it helps me to some degree but I might try to go "all in" with supplements e.g. C vitamin. I have some movement problems with my right foot that cannot bend sometimes but I am not sure if it belongs to any of the symptoms. I guess that it would be very clear to me if I had any of the listed problems. Also, the iq loss would be quite noticable.

Hi Novembernight, everyone is different as they say... For me all of the Antipsycotics do level out the highs and dull some creativity. For me it is a personal choice as how much you want to remove from you natural personality and creativity. I sometimes am comfortable being artificially passive, apathetic and a little dumber. Then after a day or a month a little voice (not literal) in the back of my head says hey you are so much more than this. At that point I get depressed that I am not as smart or quick when taking medication. The medications by design are a chemical straight jacket or lobotomy. They level you out and make you acceptable to the general public. I am afraid and probably you are also that a day will come that I don't recognize that I am a little dumbed down and will just think it is my normal self. I can empathize with you and wish I had some magic words for you. Ultimately you are the one who decides how medicated you are and need to be. That is unless you get involuntarily committed to a hospital. I wish you the best of luck and the clarity to make informed decisions about your life now and in the future.

Much of IQ tests are just remembering the heuristics to thought. So it requires a good memory and a decent recall of mathematical and logical heuristics. If you want to keep the mind stimulated I suggest going to a philosophy forum like ilovephilosophy.com. It will keep the brain cells warm. Or read a good challenging book. I wouldn't worry to much about a standard iq test. To be honest, some times I feel as though my head is filled with cotton. However, once I come into contact with some mental friction I don't stop. Look for things you find interesting and sprout from there. Whenever I do anything I listen to music in the background for added emotional response. It's slight but helps. I'm happy you've found some relief in music. Cling to it. Discover new music as much as you can! That's the key. The only key I've found is alcohol...

Here is an article suggesting that neuroleptics boost intelligence, although it's not clear to me if they mean that they do so while the patient is taking them or if it is a lasting effect. (The answer to that question is probably embedded in the article somewhere, but I don't have time to read all of it.) http://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu...eview_of_t.pdf

Hi Iman, thanks for your reply. I can really relate to what you are saying. I am also comfortable sometimes with being apathetic because I am not what I used to be. So by being apathetic I can feel I can hide that I am dumber. What's the point when you feel you have lost your old self. Maybe it is better to explore a new side of myself. I am also afraid that one day I don't recognize that I have lost certain IQ points but then I might be in a different place in life, where I can say that it does not matter. Thanks, I hope you also find inner peace.

The link now doesn't seem to be working, unfortunately.

Could be your mental illness messing with your IQ. Mine dropped 8 points. It use to be 128 before I got sick. I don't think meds necessarily decrease IQ scores.

I don't know. It is just easy to blame the meds. Sorry to hear that you also experienced an iq loss.

I think you'll be okay. I think you're on the best medication out there right now. You should read about "meta cognition" and read lots of books