I started having hallucinations about one year ago and had my first psychosis 7 months ago. Seroquel had way too many side effects and I stopped taking it after 10 days. I tried Fluoxetin for 5 days - insomnia. Had to stop that as well.
Symptoms:
hallucinations (auditory and visual), paranoia, SEVERE depression (lying in bed all day, contemplating suicide), agoraphobia, panic attacks, anxiety, really bad feeling in my stomach, bad sleeping rhythm (no insomnia though), cognitive problems (problem listening, concentrating -> the more people were talking at the same time, the worse I felt)
physical: hot flashes for no reason, dizziness, tinnitus, dry skin, dry eyes, itchy scalp (I used/use different antifungal shampoos, which help a little)
5 months ago I started taking
fish oil (1.44g EPA / 720mg DHA), 5mg lithium orotate, 500mg green tea extract (over 90% polyphenols), 5k I.U. vitamin D, 250mg magnesium
improvement was very small: I could leave the house again, but would get panic attacks, paranoia improved a little. All that took at least 2 months.
I've been undergoing cognitive behavioral therapy for a couple of months now with a great therapist and started the following regimen 2 1/2 weeks ago, which changed EVERYTHING!
Changed my fish oil to
2g EPA / 240mg DHA. Change was immediate. In two days, depressive symptoms decreased by at least 50% and I feel better
I added:
N-Acetylcystein. Felt worse for two days ("what did you say? what again?" "what do you mean?"). Then, I saw significant improvement.
1g Sarcosine + 1.5g D-aspartic acid -> will soon change to pure sarcosine. Should be there in 3 weeks (hopefully, if I don't get any problems with customs -.-) No idea if it does anything since I take so many supplements
1g curcumin phytosome (in a study, it helped as much as fluoxetin with major depressive disorder)
2mg methyfolate (saw improvement. Have been taking it for a couple of days now)
improvements:
depression - IMMENSE!
hallucination - improvement
cognitive symptoms improved a lot and I'm a lot more sociable (stopping to say hello to people that I don't know all that much)
hot flashes decreased a lot
don't sleep all day anymore, but still get tired throughout the day and half to take a nap
still have dry eyes, skin and itchy scalp
side effects:
skin improved first, now it's getting drier :(
itchy pimples on left arm since today o0
No idea what the cause is. Methylfolate is what I added last. I'll continue taking everything for now, though, unless it worsens. I still take lithium, D, magnesium, green tea extract.
I think I'm getting my life back and am quite optimistic after such a long time of undescribable suffering.
What do you guys think?
I still worry quite a bit about how other people saw me because I was so sick. When I see a certain person who saw me at my worst, except for my family, it can still trigger hallucinations. Certain places where I was when I was very psychotic can also trigger symptoms.