There are several side effects from the Haldol that I’ve been dealing with.

They’re pretty frustrating and annoying all at once.

I know I’ve talked about the drooling.

That’s still happening.

It sneaks out of the corners of my mouth and I have to wipe it off with the back of my hand several times throughout the day.

And I think it’s because of a couple of things.

A side effect from the antipsychotics are major sedation issues, and I’ve been having to breathe through my mouth lately because I feel like I’m not getting enough air through my nose.

I remember being in the hospital last year and the therapist there would always tell us to not be afraid to breathe through the mouth when you need more oxygen.

This is especially helpful while anxious or worked up over something and the hearts beating fast.

Everyone does the “in through the nose and out through the mouth” when really, breathing through the mouth gets much more air into me and I calm quicker.

Well, even my apple watch can tell I’m breathing shallower since the addition of the Haldol and I’m wondering if that’s the culprit for breathing through my mouth and then eventually drooling more because of it.

Though the drooling doesn’t only happen when my breathing is through my mouth.

It happens anytime nowadays.

There’s a couple of other things too.

One is I feel like I could fall asleep at any given time.

any. given. time.

Seriously, I’ll be writing and suddenly snap out of it and open my eyes again.

It’s brutal and relentless.

I feel like I could constantly nap.

I’m always tired.

I still haven’t been able to wake up before 9:30am either.

Before the Haldol I was up at 8am everyday, now, not so much.

I can’t wake up till like 10am almost.

And again, I think it’s because I’m so sedated now.

And not only tired sedation, but an inability to move properly sedation too.

Because another thing is I feel like my feet are almost shuffling when I walk at times.

Especially when I’m tired.

Like I don’t have full control over my walking abilities and something is making it harder to take a full step.

I feel like I can’t take a big step.

Like I’ll fall over if I do.

I have to take smaller steps in order to keep my balance.

It feels like I’m not in full control of my body at times.

And that could go back to dissociation, but I think it’s a side effect, just by the way it suddenly happened since the Haldol introduction.

It’s an odd sensation and I can’t help but feel like I’m shuffling around the hospital again but at home.

There’s also this blurriness that takes over my vision.

I don’t know if it’s because of the sedating effect my medications have or what, but my vision will get blurry and doesn’t stop for hours.

It doesn’t stop when I put my glasses on, everything’s just super blurry.

Reading becomes tedious and I can’t quite make out most words.

The other day I even took my glasses off and held them out against some text and that didn’t take it away either.

I feel like my eyes get so tired that they just stop functioning.

And besides that, my left eye does not work and all the strain is put on my right eye, where the blurriness is.

It’s maddening.

And I’ve always been terrified of losing vision in my right eye.

If that happens I’m totally fucked.

This one is so frustrating because I can’t even write when it’s happening because I can’t read what I just wrote.

I’ve tried eye drops.

I’ve tried just letting my eyes rest and closing them for a few moments.

I do the eye shimmy thing I can do and that used to help and it doesn’t anymore.

And all of these things come and go randomly.

They’ve all been more apparent to me the last few weeks which makes me think that it is due to the Haldol.

Which then, it all is what it is.

I’m not going to change my medication because of these side effects.

I’ve been feeling so much better while on Haldol that I don’t want to risk it with another med switch.

I do think the Haldol is working, and really well at that.

It’s just that side effects like feet shuffling and drooling leads me to think of an institution, which just makes me feel shitty.

But I just need to accept the fact that I have several mental illness diagnoses that I’m dealing with and I might sometimes feel like I’m “crazy”.

And that’s what it is for me.

These side effects make me feel like I can’t control myself without them.

And I can’t.

– Keren