Having trouble taking drugs

[DailyDi]

Lately I have grown tired of taking my mental health drugs and struggle to force myself to take them most days. Some days I don't take them at all, other days I literally choke them down. I know it's bad to skip doses and would be worse to stop altogether, but I just don't feel like taking any more pills.

Anyone ever feel like this?

[beallucanb]

 I can go a day or so without it but the side effects of withdrawal catch up to me making me sick and in terrible pain.

I'm  fucked if I do, fucked if I don't take it.

They can't change my pills, I asked thousands of times over the last 25 years I have been swallowing them.

Perhaps they can change your pills or the ingredient in what you take, that is giving you problems.

Call them tell them how you are feeling, they are supposed to be helping you

[Apache Raccoon]

I feel like that sometimes

[foreverdl]

I am on narcotics ,, several every 8 hours . And then they keep me on meds to help me breathe . My COPD, etc. But I can't stop them. I have a new steroid added for my lungs, and the crap list of the side effects are hard to live with. It's like do I want the mega side effects to make me breathe . Or do I want do I want to go crazy with every day seams like a new problem because of it. I do understand what you're dealing with but in different ways . 

[Little Sherri]

10 hours ago, DailyDi said:

but I just don't feel like taking any more pills.

There is a recency effect that can come into play when taking certain medications, where the cure feels worse than the disease, because it's been a while since the person has fully had to contend with the disease, because they've been on the medication. So, people say to themselves, I generally feel "pretty good" or "okay" or whatever descriptor fits, except for all the side effects of the damned medication that I have to take... so do I really have to take it, if I feel okay? However, the recency of the symptoms of the medication may be eclipsing the profundity of the symptoms of the disease, because the medication has been masking those for a long time. 

So, the question comes down to, will the symptoms of the illness, untreated, be worse than the symptoms of the treatment? This equation can also get clouded by a grace period that often comes into play, where the side effects of the medication decline faster than the symptoms of whatever it was treating ramp up, so you enjoy a period where it feels like dropping the meds was the right move, but then, the slumbering bear in the cave wakes up, and once it does, it can't be put right back to bed, even if you start taking the medication again. 

The best bet is to talk to your pharmacist, therapist, or doctor, about what side effects are really vexing you, and, to try to get an objective opinion on if your displeasure with the way you currently feel is a reflection of the side effects of the medication, or if it's actually symptomatic of the underlying condition, and what's happening is, the medications aren't working as well as they used to, which is why you're now becoming plagued by, for example, an inability to enjoy yourself, or irritability, or anxiety, or pain in your lower back that's tinting everything black, or whatever best describes what the medication was supposed to be controlling. Work with your team to tinker with the doses or the types of medication, to allow you to live your best life. Going completely off of them sounds to me, as an outsider, like it's only a short-term solution, because if you've been taking these medications for a long time, despite their problematic side effects, then when you were in a better place, they obviously made sense to you, or you wouldn't have taken them this long. So if you're in a worse place right now, and maybe wouldn't make as good a decision as "Better Place Mikey", then perhaps trust "Better Place Mikey" from a while back, and don't yank him off his meds without taking to someone? 

Just my 2 cents. In any case, I hope you can get it sorted out and feel better. What you do makes a lot of people feel better, so we want the same for you. 

[DAQ]

12 hours ago, DailyDi said:

Lately I have grown tired of taking my mental health drugs and struggle to force myself to take them most days. Some days I don't take them at all, other days I literally choke them down. I know it's bad to skip doses and would be worse to stop altogether, but I just don't feel like taking any more pills.

Anyone ever feel like this?

As I am in the process of some major life choices I was left with a thought that I could not shake while taking antidepressants. "Are my thoughts my own, and how much of them is chemical driven?" Was a hard feeling to shake and I almost stopped them cold turkey because of that and a couple other reasons

 

[PaddedPonyboy]

i feel this way sometimes, some days i do it without second thought but other days i get very tired of it. there are some days where i wish to stop certain medications of mine because i feel i don't quite like the way i feel when i'm on them, but generally when i stop, i tend to dislike that more so i go back on them. it's a tough challenge. the same happens to me with food and water, too, sometimes taking in the necessities is difficult. i wish you the best of luck, it's not easy to deal with

[baby vinny]

i have gone through phases of hating my medicine to now i can't function without it.