Hi all,  

This may be a stupid question but please bear with me.  I see that many of you swear by Lithium.  First, isn't that a mood altering med?  Second, do you notice any change in your mood, personality,ect, while taking it?  I have been a long time sufferer of depression and wondered what affects a drug like Lithium would have on me.  So far, Verapamil is doing the job but with CH, I know that could change.  

Thanks for your input!   Many PF wishes,

Jeannie

The only other application that I know of is for bi-polar disorder, and when it's prescribed for that, it's at like twice the dosage we need.

I find no ill side effects whatsoever. In cycle I take 900mg per day. Right now I'm tapering off of it, and am currently at 300mg per day.

Doesn't affect my mood one iota - just ask my dead neighbor's corpse.

Unfortunately lithium didn't work for me (at 900 mg a day) and neither has verapamil (they had me up to 1000 mg a day and checking EKGs).  If verapamil is working, I personally would stick with that until it no longer worked. Why add anything to the mix, esp lithium. I have struggled with extreme fatigue and concentration issues that worsened significantly while on it but it is hard to say how much of that was actually related to lithium. (I am off it now for 3 weeks and hopefully my hair loss will also improve.)  My sleep has been interrupted for the past 10 months so I am sure that is the major fatigue factor. Had the lithium prevented my CH, I would put up with the side effects as they have taken over my life...:(

I'm lucky in that I haven't had any of the side effects people have talked about from lithium. I'm male, 48, and take 1200 mg a day of lithium when on cycle. I'm a peace officer so I'm limited as to what I can take and still work. My beat partners swear they can't tell any difference in me when I'm on or off the lithium. I get a little lethargy the first 2 weeks, nothng coffee can't defeat, and I pee a LOT for the first 2 weeks. Other then that I have no problem tolerating it. It has been my silver bullet. Gave me as close to a "normal" life as i can hope for.

Guiseppi

I took 900mg of lithium for 2 years before it quit working for me.  I suffer from major depression and schizophrenia and it had no effect on me at all mentally speaking.  I felt real good while I was on it and had no side effects.

I have not noticed any of the side effects....The comb of lith. and verap. is the only thing that keeps the beast from controling me...One without the other is useless in my case...I was in re-emission since nov.-2006 except for a few(strange) hits may-june 2007... The beast has come back to my life this past april (day and night) my doc would not give me lithium this time(they always end up taking me off of it -bad blood),only verap. (no-help) untill last week he saw how often i was getting hit(diary) and gave me a script for the lithium(i wanted to kiss his feet) and i cant wait to see the results ( i dont know if i am making much sense,not much sleep and am afraid of being on the computer long...It seems that if i read or stay on the computer long,i get a hit (i get hit regardless) just trying to avoid it if i can...I wish you many PFDAN and everyone else who suffers from this....Lenny