Risperidone withdrawal

Hi all i'm disco and i'm male 45 from the UK.

I have been schizophrenic since 2010 after years of drug abuse, culminating in me being sectioned in spring 2017 after my illness caused me to stop eating (i nearly starved myself to death).

Was forced to take paliperidone depot 150mg/month (the maximum doseage) when in hospital which started to work after a few months.... the psychosis went and i started eating.

...and i kept on eating, gained loads of weight to the point now where im overweight. i got moved onto oral risperidone recently, 6mg daily. had sexual function side effects. this, together with the weight gain, has made me decide to quit, almost cold turkey (i went down to 3mg daily for about 2 weeks, then to nothing).

its now just over a week of cold turkey. i didn't realise they're would be withdrawal symptoms, wish i'd known. the insomnia was bad at first but i slept ok last night. my stomach churns. i feel a bit spaced out/dizzy.... but considering i quit almost cold turkey i'm doing ok.

i have no psychotic symptoms. if they return i'll be straight back on the meds. my family/psychiatrist dont know ive quit, feel bad about lying to them.

reading the other topics in this forum, it's obvious that alot of you are struggling with psychosis. i feel for you having been there . i don't think my psychosis will return as im not in the same situation which made it appear all those years ago. i'll be straight back on the meds if it does though.

update on my withdrawal process (day 9 after going cold turkey):

new symptom today! ... lovely diarrhoea

still feeling ok though, a bit dizzy, spaced out, but ok

Honestly man, I'm going to tell you from personal experience, quitting any psychiatric medication cold turkey is going to put you in a world of hell. I don't know how bad everything is for you, but it's not going to get better. The best thing to do at this point is talk to your doctor about it. I quit Ripserdal and Lexapro cold turkey, years apart, and each time I went through hell. Talking to my doctor about it, he helped me ween off the Risperdal, and I'm back on the Lexapro and started taking it again.

Hi Tyler thanks for the reply .

im not going through hell to be honest (day 10)... ive quit heavy use of benzo's before now, cold turkey, didnt sleep a wink for 6 days, anxiety through the roof, that was worse than what ive experienced up to now, and i got through that.

time healed me and i believe it'll be the same this time, i just need time, let the withdrawal happen and fade away as my body adjusts.

apart from the symptoms mentioned i feel ok. if i get my delusions back i'll be straight back on the meds or if the withdrawal symptoms get too much i'll restart the risperidone and taper the dose this time.

so it's been 6 or 7 weeks since i quit my meds. BUT last night and today, after feeling generally feeling ok, i started having new symptoms of anxiety/impending doom/physically feeling #######5. i recognize these symptoms as being very similar to a few years ago when i was untreated.

so i think my schizophrenia, to a limited extent, is back.

im having no delusions which is good. im debating whether or not to go back on my meds.

###$ schizophrenia.

Well, roughly 2 years after stopping my meds i thought i'd post an update.

My schizophrenic symptoms did come back full force. It took quite a few months of being med free for the symptoms to come back but they sure did. Not a nice experience at all.

So after much stress to my family and re-engagement with mental health services i went back on meds in sept 2020, risperidone 8mg daily. Within 4-5 weeks i was symptom free again.

I'm still symptom free today although i now have very high prolactin in my blood due to the risperidone. My libido is very low and its hard to perform sexually. My psych in response has dropped my dose to 6mg daily, they will retest my prolactin levels at a later date.

Even though i'm experiencing sides, atypical antipsychotics are really useful drugs imo. I'll never go off my meds again.

Welcome back! I'm glad to hear you've decided to keep taking them. It's for the best, but I sypathise with the side effects. I'm older (thus I'm not exactly in my prime already) and I'm just on a maintenance dose of Escitalopram for anxiety, and I'm feeling sexual side effects associate with it, most notably orgasm is rather difficult to achieve, regardless of my libido. To me, it's worth it, after dealing with things without assistance for so many years. It's a trade off.

hopefully you'll be able to find a good balance between keeping the schizophrenia at bay, while still being able to enjoy sexual pleasure.

Just would like to update where I'm at now. I'm still taking risperidone and it's still keeping me sane. I was also diagnosed with ADHD in 2010, rediagnosed in 2023 and I'm taking ADHD meds right now too. Fun fact : if you are ADHD you are 5 times more likely to develop schizophrenia during your lifetime.

My mental health is good. I've been improving gradually since 2017 (apart from the blip when I stopped taking risperidone for a short time in 2020) but I think for the 1st time in my life I can look back and realise why things probably happened, why my schizophrenia probably developed, the things i've done wrong and done right.

I don't want to be 1 of those people who say an illness such as schizophrenia is a good thing, because it most definitely isn't. The experience was awful. A living nightmare. But I am a better person having come through the worst times and got better. I've learnt so much about myself and other people. I have real empathy now.

To those who are ill, I wish you the best and hope that you take meds and that they work for you like they did for me. If you can recover from your illness you may find there is alot about life you can still enjoy.

At the worst point in my illness, I was near to death through starvation and locked up in a psychiatric ward. I prayed to a higher power (even though I'm not religious) that I'd recover, and I did soon after. Make of that what you will (I'd still say I don't know if there's a God, I do think there's more to life than we know though). Please look after yourselves and be kind to others.

Very glad to hear you're still doing well! I covet good reports and hope that you'll be an inspiration for anyone who reads this thread. My best wishes towards you and hope your Christmas is merry!