Tardive Dyskinesia

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Just wondering if anyone else at WP suffers from tardive dyskinesia. TD is a movement disorder, where your body moves in ways you can't control. For me it affects my limbs as well as my face. (If you've seen the movie "The Dark Knight," think of The Joker's facial movements - that's TD.)

This may not be the best forum (if so my apologies) as TD isn't itself a psychological condition. But since it's a side effect of psychiatric medications* it kind of goes hand-in-hand with those conditions.

For me this has had a significant negative impact on my life. I feel like I can't trust my own body. I have accidentally injured my wife a couple times - thankfully very minor things but it worries me that something worse might happen. Of course I've injured myself too which is no fun. I have dropped things because my hands could not maintain the grip required to hold them. I've winked at strangers, which is all kinds of uncomfortable because that gesture is socially coded as flirting. I can't stand having my picture taken, because I know that the photographer is staring at my face twitching through their lens - the last time I had to be part of a group picture I spent fifteen minutes afterwards sobbing, crying bearded grown-man-tears.

So, anybody else share this special hell?**

* Specifically dopamine antagonists; this includes tricyclic antidepressants, neuroleptics / anti-psychotics (this means risperidone - that s**t is toxic!) and oddly enough some anti-emetics (drugs to stop you from vomiting).

** Not the one reserved for child molesters, and people who talk in the theater. That one's two doors down, on the left.

When I took Saphris, I had acute dyskinesic-like symptoms, where my tongue kept trying to stretch out on its own, with the tip going out of the mouth, which puckered up by itself, and the back of the tongue stretching to the back of the mouth. I could resist it somewhat, but it would always happen. It made talking very difficult. This was accompanied by horrific akathisia, a feeling of inner restless torment, which I associated with the other symptoms.

Taking 75 mg of Benadryl solved the problem of both for me.

EDIT: And, yes, I had really bad akathisia on the Risperdal, too, but not the dyskinesic-like symptoms.

I'm not a medical professional but it sounds to me like what you describe was precisely acute dyskinesia, so you probably don't need to qualify it as 'dyskinesic-like'.

The 'tardive' qualifier in TD just means "delayed onset" as it takes anywhere from months to years to show up. Unfortunately it lasts long after the causative drug is ceased, and may be permanent. In my case it's been nearly 12 years since I've taken psychiatric medications (i.e. since the very second I had a choice in the matter) and the side effects thereof are still with me today.

I too associated my akathesia and dyskinesia symptoms together. But my akathisia did stop after I stopped taking meds. Then about a year ago I got sick and couldn't stop vomiting, and against my better judgement went to a doctor for the first time in close to a decade. They prescribed me an antiemetic which did help with the vomiting, but it gave me wicked akathesia (to the point where it was impossible for me to work) and kicked my up-to-that-point-pretty-well-managed TD back into high gear at the same time. So I definitely think the two are linked.

Benadryl definitely helps! I have also used Cogentin (which is like Benadryl's older brother, who has a car and a fake ID) as prescribed by my neurologist for these symptoms. But like Benadryl it's very sedating, so I only used it during the worst of my relapse. Actually I think any CNS-acting anticholinergic (i.e. acetylcholine blocker) would help with these symptoms - but again I'm not a medical professional, just one of their (former) guinea pigs whose had to learn a bit about what they've done to me in order to try to fix it.

I still get akathetic 'flare-ups' fairly often but it is not nearly as bad as it was.

I was lucky, as soon as the TD started, while I was on Respiridone I stopped taking it. It took me about a year to get rid of TD, but I was lucky in that I was only on the Respiredone for a short period.

I did get flash backs, but only in the feet. (The respiridone shuffle) (Nightmare to try and sleep on that stuff)

One positive I saw with respiredone was sex...well worth it, for guys, and may actually be interesting for girls too? Of course, it's a one off thing you can try maybe once every ten years, or you may end up with TD, and besides, as I said, it's impossible to sleep while on Respiridal.