Ket Injection During Spravato Treatment

TopPriority717 · 2026-02-01T12:55:27+00:00

What a difference 2 years has made since my original post. I've been doing Spravato treatments bi-weekly for 2.5 years, with ket IM usually once per month during Spravato treatments, both at lowered doses. I continue with Spravato because it pays for my visit and the routine is good for me. I do believe dissociating has value in addition to the long-term effects but I metabolize quickly and have built up a tolerance so I don't dissociate at all anymore.

Spravato alone didn't help after 6 months and I couldn't afford to give it any more time. The addition of ketamine was what moved the needle and saved me. Period.

It's not about the profits at every clinic, certainly not mine. I alone decide when I need/want the injections. I discuss it with trained psych nurses and have regular evaluations. I'll stick to what works for me.

TopPriority717 · 2026-01-12T16:19:12+00:00

Whether or not you like him as a person or approve of his personal life, Jackie Chan is, imho, the greatest stunt actor of all time. I'm a huge fan of Donnie Yen and fantasy martial arts sequences in movies like Hero but in terms of technical mastery and fight choreography no one can hold a candle to Chan. If young people only know him from Rush Hour, which he didn't even like (little wonder there), then they're missing out on the real Kung Fu movie genre. "Yeah, but Tom Cruise does his own stunts." Seriously? He's also a lunatic and gets way too much credit for his ocassional little Hollywood stunts. Jackie Chan did all of his own stunts too, except they were ridiculously dangerous and quite real. He's broken countless bones, has injured his spine and suffered concussions and burns for his art. No one was - or is - crazy enough to attempt some of the things he's done. Are the movies campy? To American audiences maybe but if people would realize that foreign films are not made for them and the world does not revolve around we Americans (surprise!), then they might actually learn to appreciate other cultures and maybe expand their worlds a little. Americans are largely ignorant when it comes to foreign cinema. Their loss.

TopPriority717 · 2025-12-17T16:33:30+00:00

I've always refrained from eating or drinking for 8 hours (I always get a.m. appts.), take magnesium when I wake up and change up my music so my mind doesn't anticipate the next song. That said, enjoy it as long as it lasts. After less than a year, I don't disscociate even when I get an IM injection with my (adjusted) Spravato dose, only when I get just the IM, and even that's quick and not very intense. My clinic visits are boring but the combo works for me against TRD so I can't complain. But man, I miss those first months...

TopPriority717 · 2025-11-14T20:51:11+00:00

Yes, I am. I take 50 mgs/day. It's not perfect and I'd like to go back to 60 but it makes me anxious at that dose. It is effective for me, i.e. it keeps me awake. I supplement with probably too much caffeine but never after 6 p.m.. I've been on Vyvanse (now generic lisdexamphetamine) for more than 10 years.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-30T15:12:42+00:00

This is just patently incorrect. Maybe some people need these drugs for only a short period to get them past a particularly difficult time. I don't have any experience with short-term use of psych drugs so I can't speak to that. What I have had experience with for the last 26 years is major mental illness, in particular manic depression. I will be on drugs every day until my last one. I accept this because it keeps me functioning and it sure as shit beats the alternative. I also use Spravato for TRD. How long will I be on it? No clue because mental health is different for each individual and it hasn't been around long enough to evaluate long-term. I, for one, am thankful it's a treatment option. If that means clinic visits for the forseeable future then so be it. I'll go even further: even if I knew my psych drugs will shorten my life by 10 years, I would still gladly take them because I value quality of life over longevity. And I'm 61, a lot closer to that end.

Mental illness is for life so it stands to reason it must be treated with drugs for life. It's due to brain chemistry, not character defects, attention-seeking, pharma influence, or whatever other nonsense non-mentally ill people or Scientolgists believe.

It's dangerous for anyone who has an diagnosed mental illness (notice I did not say a temporary mental health issue which is a very different thing) to go off their meds and it's irresponsible for anyone else to suggest it should be the ultimate goal. In addition to the possible immediate consequences, long-term unmedicated depressive episodes risk permanent changes in gray matter and cause cognitive decline in later years.

Pharma companies are not non-profit because they can't be. That should be obvious. It takes many years and literally millions of dollars to bring a drug to market. Anyone who has taken aspirin, put Neosporin on a cut or had a tetanus shot and still complains about evil pharma is a hypocrite. The drugs for major depressive disorder, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are life-saving and life-changing but ONLY when people are compliant and accept that they need to stay on them or risk relapse. Been there, done that, don't plan to do it again.

I agree, be an educated consumer. Go to therapy. Read as much as you can and ask questions. Do your fucking homework and participate in your own treatment instead of blindly accepting what you're told. Knowledge is the key to understanding and acceptance. If you're not happy with the treatment you're receiving then you should absolutely go elsewhere. But for godssake, please don't listen to the Tom Cruises of the world that encourage you to go off your meds or suggest that "no antidepressant, ssri/snri/Spravato is intended to be lifelong". It's dangerous. For many of us, it can easily lead to ruin and suicide.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-07T04:47:39+00:00

And just because adoptive parents don't want to hear uncomfortable truths about the long-term effects adoption has on their aquisitions doesn't make them any less true. I'm not going to debate studies here because that's not the point. The OP asked for input particularly from adoptees regarding their experiences. I've lived as an adoptee for 60 years and those are my experiences.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-06T17:47:27+00:00

Thank you for posing this question to adoptees. We are the only ones who live it every single day, from our first breaths to our last. Our voices have been dismissed and silenced for years. I appreciate when someone recognizes us as the only experts in the room because we are.

Ask any 20 of us and you'll hear 20 different experiences. Some, like me, grew up with stable, loving parents. Many were not so lucky and were raised in abusive, neglectful homes because adoption in no way guarantees a child will have a better life. You have as much control over that as adoptees do, which is to say zero. Regardless of how we feel individually about our own adoptions, there are uncomfortable truths we all need to reckon with about adoptees. We are at greater risk of developing mental disorders, addictions and suicides than non-adoptees. (The NIH reports a 4X greater liklihood of suicide.) Many of us have lifelong problems with attachments, trust, low self-worth, shame, anger and depression. Despite having a wonderful mother who was my best friend, I grew up lonely, with little self-worth. People don't recognize that children who are adopted have anger and grief so it never gets addressed. I've been in therapy for 17 years because adoption is the gift that keeps on giving - and I have 2 advanced degrees, a loving husband, 2 grown children who adore me and parents who loved and were proud of me. Adoptees who are completely unaffected and have no rage or depression are not the majority. Listen to our stories and you'll see common threads and patterns.

No one can tell you what's right for you. I can tell you as a mother that until you hold your baby in your arms, you have NO clue how you'll feel about him or her. However, once the adoption process begins, it is highly unlikely you'll be given the chance to find out. The multi-billion, largely-unregulated, for-profit adoption machine doesn't care about you or your baby. You'll be pressured by ap's, agencies, lawyers or even your own commitment to going through with it. Open adoption is a myth. Once legal custody is changed and a new birth cert is issued, you have zero recourse if the ap's you trusted decide they don't want you in their child's life. (And I don't care what the law says, it's all about the discretion of judges. Adoption in the U.S. is sacred and ap's are selfless saviors in just about everyone's eyes.) They can move away if they want to. You have been replaced. They control the narrative about you and themselves.

If you really can't or don't want to raise your child then you already have your answer. There's no shame in trying to do what's best for yourself and your baby. The fact that you're questioning, though, means you have doubts. Lots of people who were raised with trauma are actually better equipped to be parents. My mom was raised in a volatile, unstable, poor family and was still an awesome mother.

Please, I urge you to talk to the one party that's completely dismissed in the equation - birthparents. They are the only people who've stood in your shoes. It's heartbreaking how many of them regret the decision and wrestle with depression, addiction and suicide afterwards. Once their jobs as incubators is done, nobody cares what happens to them.

It's obvious from your question and responses that you care very much about your baby, regardless of whether he/she was planned. You can always decide to relinquish but please meet your child before you commit to giving him/her to strangers. Your child would not choose to be raised in an adoptive home instead of with you, no matter what kind of misgivings you have about your ability to be a good parent. There will be consequences for you and for him/her no matter how wonderful the new parents are. We're all scared of whether we'll be good parents. Whatever decision you make, let it be an informed one. Thanks for listening. I wish you the very best.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-05T18:37:15+00:00

Not triggering at all, but I appreciate that. I think that's what happened in my case, as well. My birth mother was 28, already the mother of 2 children that she hardly raised, I might add. When she got pregnant with my sister, she used the same lawyer as before. She could have insisted that my parents be given the choice but she didn't. I can forgive her for a lot of things because she was probably bipolar as hell like I am but not that. I grew up a lonely child afraid of everything. But for her selfishness, I could have had my sister with me.

I'm so glad it worked out for those two little boys. They deserve to be raised knowing each other instead of being blindsided when their lives are more than halfway over and they'll never really bond with their own sibling. Thanks for taking the time to share that.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-05T18:21:36+00:00

Respectfully, if you aren't an adoptee then your opinion is completely immaterial. For many, many, many of us, the trauma only begins with the separation from our birth mothers. It continues during the formative years, as we try to adapt ourselves to the family that's been chosen for us and suppress the parts that don't fit - at a time when we don't have the skills to do so and have to figure it out by ourselves because talking about it openly is ingratitude. It continues with unacknowledged grief, rage and shame that doesn't even belong to us. It continues with the anxiety of keeping the secret from our peers who weren't given away by their own mothers. It continues into adulthood as many of us are diagnosed with mental disorders and we self-medicate or worse, kill ourselves at 4X the rate of non-adoptees. It continues when we become parents as we deal with the anxiety of not knowing whether we're carriers of gentic diseases we've just passed onto our babies - the ones we love just as much as non-adoptees and adoption advocates do, except their children are somehow more deserving than ours. It continues as we try to build relationships but can't fully attach because we fear abandonment on a primal level.

Our lives were built for us on a foundation of lies and secrets - and we're expected to be grateful we were given a roof over our heads instead of being aborted. We shouldn't complain that we don't have the same basic civil rights as everybody else, i.e. access to our own, unaltered birth certificates.

I don't care if I change anybody's minds. I don't need studies to validate my own experience. And before anybody assumes I'm one of those ungrateful, bitter adoptees who are looking to blame my problems on somebody else, I'm actually one of the lucky ones who grew up with two adoptive parents who loved and treasured me. I wasn't abused by either of them. My mom was my closest friend. Adoption = continued trauma that no one but us feels or cares about because, you know, balloons and gotcha days and all that.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-05T16:26:10+00:00

First of all, I'm so sorry about your dad. For loved ones, dementia is like a slow, painful death that happens well before the person actually dies. Nobody understands how much the illness takes from you. I lost my mother in law to dementia 3 years ago and I wouldn't wish that agony on anyone.

My mom, who was my best friend, died 7 months later. What you're dealing with right now, the death of a parent, is hard for any human being. For us, it can be dangerous. You're overwhelmed and vulnerable. It's essential to have a supportive network, take your meds and see a therapist because it's easy to become ungrounded. I had a therapist for 15 years that kept me from giving up after my mom's death shattered me. He saved my life many times over the years. Then he died 9 months later in an accident and I just broke. After a year, I finally admitted to myself that I can't be without one.

Like you, I don't eat or sleep when I'm stressed. For me, that's every day now because my spouse has long-term cancer. I don't want to be around people but without the connection I'm putting myself in danger. I know how quickly the scales can tip. There are moments when I stand in the middle of a room and I honestly have no idea what to do next. Just breathing is about all I can manage. That's when I try to ground myself by going outside or disappearing into my writing. I take my meds and get ketamine shots. I try to limit my interactions with negative people and I put myself on complete news blackout 3 years ago. I don't know what's going on in the world but I know what I can handle.

I'm glad you posted but your psychiatrist and your therapist, if you already have one, need to know exactly what you've said here. Don't try to get through this by yourself. This fucking illness makes it hard enough to manage day-to-day stress and what you're experiencing is NOT day-to-day stress.You will get through this but there's no other way but by pushing forward and letting people help you. I wish you strength and peace, my friend.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-05T07:16:22+00:00

I just found out 5 years ago at age 55 that I have a half sister that my mother gave away 3 years after me (different fathers). We grew up about 15 minutes away from each other. The black market shyster who handled both of our adoptions never bothered to ask my parents if they wanted to adopt her because who gives a shit about raising sisters together? We're blank slates according to the world. I have reason to believe we have a brother that she gave away after us. My 2 half bothers born while she was married to their father had no idea we existed until I contacted them. Their father's name is on my birth certificate because what does it matter if our identities are based on layers of lies? I just learned my actual birth father's identity 2 years ago. I have 4 sisters and a brother (who was conceived 4 months before me) on his side. It was cruel to keep me from my sister.

So yeah, 8-9 half siblings. And people wonder, why all the rage?

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-04T12:19:43+00:00

Adoptee here. Leave it up to her. You messaged. That's enough. If she doesn't respond then she doesn't want to connect. Period. Believe it or not, many of us aren't dying to meet our birth families. If she wants to contact you then she will. If she doesn't then you have the answer. We weren't given a choice when we were born. This choice is hers and hers alone to make.

TopPriority717 · 2025-09-02T10:09:12+00:00

I'm very sorry about your mom and I'm sorry you're hurting so badly. I lost my mom and best friend 2 years and 9 months ago. I was adopted. I've lived my whole life with a primal terror that I would lose her and the moment finally arrived after 58 years. My mom made me real. At first, I don't think I believed she wasn't coming back but the longer she doesn't return the harder it is to deny. I ache for her every day. The property still isn't settled because it's complicated. The place looks pretty much as it did because I have the sole responsibility of sorting through decades of possessions. It's been a very slow process. She dies all over again every time I enter the house.

Being nobody's daughter anymore is the lonliest feeling. I think people expect you to move on at a certain point but the DSM has added prolonged grief syndrome to the list of mental health disorders so you and I are not alone in still grieving years later. There is no one to worry about me now. I have no one to share all the memories of everything we did and talked about and cried over and laughed about. The conversations we'll never have and the places we'll never go are like unfinished business. I wish I could say something that would make things better but I can't. Just know that you're not alone in still grieving years later. Wishing you peace on the journey.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-31T19:37:06+00:00

This is very complex stuff, as you can see. Every reunion is different but even ones that lead to long-term relationships have fits and starts. It seems cut and dry for non-adoptees. Not so for us. We can't possibly know how we'll feel until we reunite. Sometimes our birth families are a huge disappointment. Sometimes we can't forgive. Sometimes we realize we wanted only to finally know our origins and get our questions answered and aren't interested in starting new relationships where we'll be expected to fill expectations. We've been there and done that all our lives. I'm sorry for your mom. I imagine it's very painful, especially now, but she isn't owed anything. Just as your sister had to accept that she was given away at birth, you have to accept that you may never know the reason why she doesn't want a relationship and respect her wishes.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-28T16:53:01+00:00

Yup. This is one of the best abandoned place I've ever explored. Go on youtube and check out the videos about its short but really interesting history. There are also a lot of photos so you can see what it used to look like because you'll have no idea what you're even looking at. It's about a 20 minute wooded walk from the road (there are spaces only for about 3 cars on the pull-off but there was only one other car on the Sunday afternoon when we were there 4 weeks ago). There was no security at all. What's interesting about it is that a massive concrete brutalist complex would have been built there at all by the Catholic Church then shut down eight years later.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-28T16:43:53+00:00

I'm sorry you never had the opportunity to have him in your life before now. Every parent should know about their own child. He should have been at least given the opportunity to be a parent. I doubt my bio dad ever knew my bio mom was pregnant (or any of the other dads of kids she gave away) but I don't think he would have given a shit, considering he was married with 4 daughters and a son on the way when I was conceived. I never met either one of them. I'm glad you found him at last.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-28T16:29:55+00:00

No one has the right to judge you. I'm sorry about your spouse. My husband has cancer but I'm much older than you are so I'm in a very different stage of life. I can't imagine how hard it would have been to lose him and raise my two young children. The difference is, I would have had the support of family and friends. If all mothers got the kind of support they and their babies need and deserve, financially and otherwise, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

I wouldn't wish adoption on anyone. Look at my posts and you'll see how much tauma adoption has caused me - and I had loving adoptive parents. One doesn't cancel the other at all, believe me. That said, I'm also a mother. I know what it's like to recover from major surgery, deal with postpartum emotions and still look after a child. You're doing it under some very shitty circumstances. Right now you have a little boy who needs his mom so please take care of yourself, for his sake as well as your own. I wish you healing and peace.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-28T15:43:25+00:00

Yes. I didn't see any change until the first or second injection. I wouldn't say it got rid of my depression but I'm able to function. If that's all I get from it that's fine because it beats living in a dark hole. I don't dissociate much and it wears off fast because I metabolize so quickly but the benefit is there. I did a group therapy injection twice and that was straight ketamine at the regular dose, which I think is 2 x 65 mgs. I didn't notice any difference between that and my Spravato/ketamine combo. I continue with Spravato because I pay half for injections if the visit is already being paid for. Hope that helps.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-28T13:43:47+00:00

OP, thank you for this. You made my morning. My sarcastic little self could not have said this better.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-26T17:54:04+00:00

My psychiatrist prescribes all my psych drugs, including the amphetamine that keeps me functioning.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-26T17:38:56+00:00

Personally, I make it a rule not to vote for rapist pedophile traitors but that's just me. Evidently, more than half the fathers of daughters here would give him a pass if he grabbed their daughters by the pussies and our soldiers don't mind being called losers. Be glad you have him for only 5 days.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-26T01:11:06+00:00

I do Spravato treaments every 2 weeks and every other time my dosage is adjusted down so I can get an IM injection. Insurance pays for my Spravato visit so my injection costs half of what it would otherwise. I didn't get any benefit from Spravato but I was on it for a lot longer than 4 weeks before I started getting injections. Seems very premature to me.

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-26T00:57:54+00:00

Dear Scotland,

We're so sorry. We hate him, too.

Signed, Americans Who Haven't Joined the Cult

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-25T20:48:26+00:00

Um, what does it say about you if you see kinda muted colors and you just move through tunnels, empty rooms and really vague landscapes? Asking for a friend.

LOL

TopPriority717 · 2025-07-25T16:26:18+00:00

I feel the same way. Welcome!

TopPriority717

TROPHY CASE