Has anyone been on Risperidone?

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I've been off Risperidone for nearly a year and I feel much better. This is good but... now I feel bad that I wasted a decade suffering under it without even realizing the cause of the problems until I went off it. In my case the effects were damaging yet just subtle enough that over the years I thought thought they were just a part of myself. Or maybe they were. I'm still not sure.

Did anyone else suffer long or short term side effects? Did it do more harm then good? Did anyone actually benefit from it?
Anyway I wonder why they'd want to put me on a drug normally reserved for schizophrenics.

its easier to just ask who hasnt been on respiridone here.
its possible were prescribed the respiridone purely because its commonly given to people with ASDs, or they might have saw a lot of anxiety and/or meltdowns.

have been on respiridone before and it greatly helped many issues of autism [eye contact for example; no longer processed eyes so was able to do eye contact for the first time,extreme anxiety and challenging behavior around change;lessened] however it didnt help the challenging behavior enough and was sectioned in a intelectual disability secure hospital for four months where they changed the respiridone to a highly potent anti pyschotic haliperidol [US=haldol] instead.

lots of medications are officialy used for things other than their original purpose,am on one medication [tegretol] for several reasons;tonic clonic epilepsy,a mood stabilizer and trigeminal neuralgia [severe facial neuropathic pain].

Risperidone is all licenced (in the UK) for:

(From the Patient Information Leaflet)

However, drugs are often used off licence/at Doctors discretion.

I was on it for label mood and anxiety, but was one of the few people who end up lactating. Other than that, I noticed some headaches bug would gave happily stayed on if it I wasn't made to come off. I am now on Quetiapine.


I was given it for label mood

I was on it to help reduce my self harming and in that respect it worked well. But it made me super sleepy. So I was changed onto aripiprazole ... didn't make me sleepy but my self harm increased again. I quit the aripiprazole about a month ago because it wasn't helping in any way.

It made me sleepy for a while too. That was on 2mg. So they put me on 1mg and I was no longer sleepy. But there was another problem. I started doing very badly at school. I felt like I had no energy. After doing badly at school than doing nothing for two years I went to community college then dropped out for the same reason, I felt like I had no energy. I thought any kind of full time study or work would be too exhausting for me. At first I did nothing but after a while I got an easy part time job.

Until shortly before I stopped taking it, it never occurred to me that Risperadone caused me to have low energy. I thought it was just the way I was. I thought it was caused by aspergers but other aspies have plenty of energy. I thought I had low energy, my relatives thought I had a weak character.

But now I think it was probably Risperadone and I'm mad because I felt like I wasted eleven years of my life. Even though I'm not on it now, it still has an effect on me. I feel like I'm just starting at everything at 26 when I could've been starting at everything when I was 18. I might go to uni and get a real job but would it not have been better to do that younger? When it comes to chances of getting hired, is there any difference between a 30 year old graduate or a 21 year old graduate? Do employers think a gap decade is a sign of laziness?

I just wonder if it wasn't for Risperadone maybe I wouldn't be having a late start in life, not only at work and study but in all other areas as well. Yes it did calm me down but some of the time it calmed me down to the point of apathy.

I have more energy now but still little idea of what to do with it. Being drug free hadn't improved my organisational skills, time management skills or long term planning skills.

I currently am.

I take it for self-harming, irritability, stimming, and anxiety.

I prefer life with Risperidone as opposed to without it.

I'm on it for anxiety.

I'm almost off. I started taking it 9 years ago. Helped with stimming and stuff but destroyed my personality and my happiness.

How do you mean? I found that it dampened my personality. Reduced my presence. I was happy on it but that was only because it made me apathic. I was happy because I didn't care about anything. Even though it mellowed me out it also made me a bit more anxious.

Hi. This does not directly relate to your OP question but I would just like to make a comment on the above paragraph. I can understand the anger/regret you feel for feeling that you wasted many years, but you had better not dwell on that because there's really nothing you can do about it. The longer you think about it, the more time you will waste. You could be feeling that anger/regret much later, but luckily you are only 26. The good news is that at 26 it's not too late at all. You will have plenty of opportunities for employment after graduating from uni at 30 or older. There are many people who start their career late. And if you can persevere and complete a uni degree, that proves that you are not lazy.

Did anyone notice more sensory overloads, when coming off Risperidone? Or an increased memory of your childhood? I've been slowly reducing my dose, over the last year, with %10 reductions. The withdrawal side effects sound worse than the drug's side effects, so definitely go slow if you want to reduce your dose. Did your doctor suggest anything to help you get off Risperdal?

I was on 8mg Risperidone for schizophrenia. It did help me but I relapsed severely when I was 16 (needed 2:1 staffing 24 hours a day in a secure unit as I was extremely paranoid and constantly hallucinating to the point that I just wanted to die and would do anything to die), they put me on 15mg Olanzapine. I've neve been on Risperidone again, but Olanzapine has saved my life, I am on 25mg of Olanzapine and haven't been in the psych ward or secure unit for almost three years now. I can't remember if Risperidone helped me with my autism as it was 10 years ago.

...Thorazine and Melaril f****d ME UP ! !! !! !! !! !! I believe . I'm all f****d up ...

I was put on Risperidone when I was too young to understand what drugs did. It benefitted me in that it controlled my severe symptoms of Tourette's and it was deemed to be worth it by my parents since my symptoms were just that debilitating. It also helped me sleep so that was a bonus. On top of that it helped treat my OCD symptoms when combined with clomipramine. It benefitted me in many different ways.

The only problem I had with Risperidone was that my appetite was bottomless . If my parents didn't stop me and restrict my diet at that time I probably would've consumed 4,000+ calories per day.

Due to the extreme increase in appetite I was switched to Quetiapine which had the same benefits. I experienced the same side effect on Quetiapine as I did on Risperidone but at a reduced severity.

Nowadays my psychiatrist emphasizes that Quetiapine is also important for me as a mood stabilizer. That doesn't really make sense because what I have is major depression. I'm not bipolar. It does enough that I believe I should still be on it but I don't get how it's also relevant to my depression.

Quetiapine can be used as an adjunct for depression.

all meds shoud be reduced slowly, even coming off long term anti histamines can cause some issues.

had come straight off respiridone and had no side effects but was swapped to haliperidol immediately,which is a different type of AP [stronger;high potency,respiridone is medium potency].

am currently coming off the majority of diazepam which is part of a group of drugs that body gets very dependent on, have been on a withdrawal program for nearly a year now,the pyschiatrist wants to make it as slow as possible,if are worried about coming off the AP then ask pyschiatrist for a withdrawal plan to be made.