I suggest not taking antidepressants. If you do some research on antidepressants you will find recovery forums like this one where people are dealing with physical and mental issues after withdrawing from APs. How can we know that we have returned to our baseline if we change our baseline with another medication? How can we know if we are feeling anhedonia or what we may define as anhedonia from the Prozac or from the remnants of invega? There are tons of people out there who develop permanent sexual side effects from Prozac and Zoloft.
When I was on invega and experiencing anhedonia for the first time, my psych wanted to put me on ADs. I had learned from invega that my psych would not inform me of any side effects of meds, so I looked them up. She said that people should not look up side effects because it discourages them from taking the drug (haha). Anyway I still wanted to be good and follow doc's advice, so I decided to go for Wellbutrin since it was supposed to increase dopamine, which I knew was being inhibited. Naturally, since my neurons were blocked from receiving dopamine, all Wellbutrin did was dry out my mouth and make it so I didn't shit for a week. My psych said I needed to give it a month but I refused. I think that the placebo effect works both ways when it comes to ADs, personally.
I saw a medication commercial at the gym for Rexulti. Rexulti is an Antipsychotic. Antipsychotics block dopamine receptors, unequivocally. Rexulti was being advertised to people whose antidepressants weren't working well enough, to help them with their depression. It doesn't make any sense. I see it as a merry-go-round. Is your AP not making you happy? Try an AD. AD not working? Here is an AP. And when both of those in conjunction don't work, you are just shuffled back and forth between all the different "brands" with fancy names which are really just the same thing. That's my personal opinion of the psychiatric wringer that trusting people are put through, based on my experience. Of course, other people have different experiences than mine, and that's O.K.
I did that, I developed an aversion to showers because not did it only not feel good to shower anymore, it actually felt BAD to take a shower. I avoided all of the things that I had enjoyed the most so that I wouldn't think of how I used to feel about them.
Someone mentioned memory and it's sort of a funny thing. You know how you can have good childhood memories that your mind brings up from time to time, and you sort of dwell over them and rub them like a precious stone and then put them away again for later? I lost those on Invega. When I first got on it there was atime when my mind would shuffle through all of them and I would feel nothing. Then my mind started to bring up memories I hadn't thought of in years and years. Then my mind stopped bringing them up at all. Well, recently I think I'm starting to recall some of them. They're the type of thing I can't name off of the top of my head, and they're sort of weird peripheral memories, like the feeling of the damp cut grass in my parent's yard or something, but I'm starting to get that old pattern back. I've also started having good dreams recently, which has been very rare through all of this. 2 years and 2 months off.
There were some discussions of sexual side effects. It can be really really frightening to touch yourself and feel less than you would feel than if you touched your own arm. It can be frightening to try to look at images to arouse yourself and feel absolutely nothing and see nothing but a gross meaningless lump of flesh. That ALL goes away. Give it 1.5 years - 2 years ALMOST fully. I really have to say almost because after two years it is difficult to remember baseline.
You will get back to yourself in all ways.
Me, 3 months prior to Invega:
https://ibb.co/ZMqPnkS
Me, this is either still on Invega or one month off:
https://ibb.co/7nrHzLk https://ibb.co/KVyxhCm It's hard to look at
9 or 10 months off, I was still not feeling well or myself at this time, as you could probably tell from the outfit decisions:
https://ibb.co/mJD8jKp
Around 1.5 years post Invega, feeling good, I could feel alcohol that summer.
https://ibb.co/N1GYk3t
Last month, 2.25 years post invega almost. Feeling fully myself and recovered, no longer concerned about invega at all. (Also, 6 months pregnant.)
https://ibb.co/sgRvn23
Note: I'm still struggling with warts that seemed to easily spread all over my face while on Invega. I struggled with acne as a teen and it did return badly on Invega, of course it didn't help that I struggled to wash my face.
You DO come back. It's hard to believe it when you have lost it all, but you do. Don't give up, and stay true to the self that you know you can still feel inside!
