If you only have two minutes
Copy exactly two lines. That is the whole route.
I want to discuss a medication change because: …
Before I change anything, the person or service I will contact and the question I will ask are: …
Those two lines are a complete route. You may stop here.
What this lesson is for
Wanting to stop is not a betrayal of anything. It is one of the most common experiences in bipolar treatment and one of the least often said out loud, usually because saying it sounds like an announcement. This page exists to turn it into a conversation instead of a decision made alone on a Tuesday.
Two chairs, and neither gets to be the whole decision. One holds what you want relief from — an effect, flatness, cost, burden, stigma, feeling well, feeling unheard. The other holds what you still want treatment to protect. Both can be entirely true at the same time, and a page that forces them into a single verdict is no use to anybody.
You leave with the reason you want change, what you still want treatment to protect, what you need to know first, and who you will ask.
Only in the video
Three things are only in the video, and this is the chapter to watch rather than skim.
- The risk of stopping, said plainly and more than once, in a tone that is neither a warning finger nor a shrug.
- Why a confident one-line rule about a missed dose can be dangerously wrong, worked through instead of stated.
- The question that most changes a stopping conversation, held open until the end and then paid.
This Program does not recommend a medicine, compare doses, select a treatment, or tell you to start, stop, restart, taper, change or combine anything. If you're considering a change, contact the professional who knows your situation before you act — and if it's urgent, use an urgent route.