Bipolar Disorder Medication
While bipolar disorder has no cure, there is bipolar medication that can help the patient manage this disorder. In fact, since this disorder is a lifelong problem, it must be managed for the long-term in order for the patient to live a normal and fulfilling life.
In addition to taking medication, someone with a bipolar disorder will need to go to counseling in order to deal with this disease.
For the most part, a combination of medications will be used as treatment. While many people do not like to take pharmaceuticals, there is little evidence to show that any alternative treatments work for bipolar illness.
The bipolar medications used for treatment are called mood stabilizers and they do just that - stabilize your mood so that you do not have depressive or manic episodes. Some of these medications include carbamazepine, lithium, valproic acid and lamotrigine.
Just like any medication, these have their side effects as well. Lithium can cause memory problems, nausea, diarrhea and weight gain. The higher the dose the better the chances you will experience one of the side effects, however low doses can many times not have any side effects at all.
The anticonvulsant medications like carbamazepine, lamotrigine and valproic acid can cause electrolyte disturbances as well as weight gain and can also act as sedatives making the patient tired.
Like the disorder itself, bipolar medication works differently on different patients. Therefore, your doctors may have to try out a few different types before they find one that works good on you. This can be problematic, of course, due to the episodic nature of bipolar disorder which will make it hard to determine if the medications are having an effect. For this reason, it may take quite a while for your moods to become stabilized on any kind of medication so don’t get disheartened if you don’t have immediate results.