Hey there. I also have bipolar (technically Type 1 because of mixed episodes and one full-blown manic episode, but functionally I'm more Type 2), and I (foolishly) also love me some good ice, so I have a few thoughts/experiences to offer.
1) I'm on a fuckton of meds, and have never experienced negative interactions with meth. Yeah, meth acts on serotonin more than other amphetamines do, but not as much as do e.g. serotonergic psychedelics, MDMA, or tramadol, so serotonin syndrome shouldn't be a huge concern. And so long as you don't take your Xyprexa simultaneously with the meth, it won't kill the high. For comparison, I'm on low-dose Prozac (tapering off cause it doesn't do shit for me since getting on proper bipolar meds) and a fairly high dose of Seroquel nightly (which, as blight12 mentioned, conveniently doubles as a kill-switch to sleep through the brutal comedown, if Xyprexa works like Seroquel and knocks you right out 15 minutes after you take it). I'm also on the anticonvulsant Lamictal (no effect), the beta-blocker Inderal (which slows my heart rate so it actually benefits me on meth), and the benzo Klonopin (also very helpful on meth to smooth out the anxious side and ease the comedown if the Seroquel knockout is undesirable at that time).
2) That said, especially since your meds shouldn't interact with the meth, DO NOT GO OFF YOUR MEDS TO GET HIGH. It is never worth it, both because the vulnerable mental state you'll be in will prevent you from enjoying the high and make the comedown that much more devastating, and because psych meds often lose their effectiveness if stopped and restarted-- so if you've been fortunate enough to find meds that work for you, they may not work anymore and you're back to square one. Personal anecdote: years ago, before I had been properly diagnosed and was only on an SSRI (Lexapro), I stopped taking it (without telling my pdoc) because I wanted to trip and try MDMA--but I never even got the chance, preoccupied as I was with spiraling into an abrupt suicidal depression and being involuntarily committed to a psych ward. I will never again go off my meds without my doctor's orders; after that, I'm nervous to come off the meds even when it's medically necessary, namely when I decide to get pregnant and later breastfeed my child, although I know I must for the health of my baby.
3) I'm not going to forbid you point-blank from doing meth--nothing we say can stop you if your heart is set on it, and I'm hardly in a position of moral superiority or a model of harm reduction here, as IV meth is one of my favorite drugs when I have the money and time to indulge. Since you say you want to do meth 'again,' you've evidently done it before--do you remember how it makes you feel? The extreme euphoria and wicked crash of meth is uncanny in mimicking the experience of bipolar disorder--and in my experience, just feeling those mood swings, even artificially induced, brings me right back to the bipolar mindset that is my brain's default mode of functioning, and re-establishes and strengthens the neural pathways of emotional extremes, instability, impulsivity, and poor judgement that I, even with meds and therapy, must fight to change into the positive, logical, rational, and controllable modes of thinking that define a healthy mind and remission of bipolar symptoms.
TL;DR--even staying on your meds, the meth high will remind your brain how to be bipolar, and primes you for instability and entering a depressed or hypomanic episode after even one use. I say this from experience--my serious Type 1 manic episode began at the same time I was having my first meth binge; while it's definitely a chicken-or-egg scenario (did meth activate latent erratic actions and psychosis? or did the impulsiveness of mania compel me to do more and more meth?), the link between the two is clear. And I'm already feeling the effects of the two+ week binge I just finished--even though I'm off the meth I still feel like I'm tweaked out, talking too much and needing less food and sleep, which are of course hallmark signs of a hypomania that was already beginning to emerge but that meth has unquestionably exacerbated. My lows have been lower, too, full of guilt about my drug abuse and lying to my friends. Before the last few weeks of pure willful hedonism (simultaneously binging on heroin, although oddly, smack is less addictive and destructive to my mind & life than meth), I'd been sober for four months, and already I feel like the stability, self-control, and self-respect I've gained are slipping in the face of these mood extremes. I know myself and my disease well enough to admit I'm heading down the wrong path, so I'm stopping my meth use for the next few weeks at least, while I recover my coping skills, self-care, and mindfulness in therapy. (You are in therapy, yes? It's the single most important thing you can do for yourself.)
Oh yes, one more tidbit: just because you're Bipolar 2
now doesn't mean that you're immune to psychotic mania, or that you can't be reclassified as Bipolar 1 in the future. It's already known that the longer bipolar is left untreated, the more irreversibly severe the episodes become, and something similar can occur if you willfully engage in behaviors that trigger delusions or psychosis--meth, for instance. And once the door of meth psychosis is opened, it doesn't really close; it doesn't take much meth use now for me to start hearing entire conversations in the hallway between people who weren't there, having detailed discourse with voices it turns out only I could hear, looking in the mirror of an empty room and seeing the completely lifelike reflection of my mother standing just behind me. Even during my 4 months of sobriety, far away from meth, all it took was a sleepless night and a missed dose of Seroquel for me to experience visual and audio hallucinations--something I
never had before my meth abuse. Just keep that in mind.
Thanks for reading, and congratulations for finishing, hah. Hypomania is a hell of a drug, eh?
Keep us posted, and I wish you well.
