This thread is kind of old. I am grateful for the many replies.

I am very seriously depressed. I am afraid to tell either my regular doctor, or my psychiatrist. They are both part of the same healthcare network. So they see each others' electronic notes.

I am afraid that, if my regular doctor feels that I am very depressed, he will never let me have access to the pain medication that I feel I need. I have been holding on to some Vicodin for emergencies. I have taken one around once a week. I am down to about 6 tablets left. (10mg/325mg) I live in fear of not being able to manage my pain.

Tomorrow, I see a nurse practitioner to learn the results of the recent MRI of my neck. I will ask for referral to a neurosurgeon, which she already offered to give me. Maybe the neurosurgeon will be someone who will appreciate how bad my neck feels. I have been controlling pain by avoiding activity that sets it off. That is just about anything.

Sometimes I think my worsening depression is largely to due to my neck pain. Sometimes I think my neck pain is made to seem worse by my depression. It is becoming a vicious circle. It's been that for months, now.

I am going downhill from this combination of serious depression and physical pain and terrible anxiety over what could go wrong with me, physically, in the future. Both my father and my boyfriend became partially paralyzed due to degenerative neck problems. I have no children. There is no one who would help care for me, if I became disabled. I contemplate awful things every day. I have suicidal ideation running around in the back of my brain on a continuous basis. I don't even think that I will ever be able to stop that.

It's terrible to put this stuff here. I am sorry. I don't know what else to do, or where else to go. I could never tell any family about this. We are not close. My boyfriend is elderly and can barely walk. I can't burden him more than I already have.

The psych rehab program that I begged to get into is not helping me. I hate going there. My understanding is that it is for educational purposes and not a place to seek therapy. I would be very afraid to disclose my level of distress to anyone there. I thought the program would be different.

I went into the psych hospital back a year ago. It was a terrible place and I would never go back in there.

Months ago I was having all kinds of psych meds pushed on me. I truly was over-medicated and woke up one morning with a heartrate of 140/minute. (I was being told to take Nortriptyline, Temazepam, Seroquel, Tegretol, Neurontin, and Ritalin all at the same time.)

Now I take much less. Yet, now, my doctor is telling me that I can't get anymore Vicodin because of the remaining (much fewer) psych meds that I take. My pdoc thinks the regular MD is being overly harsh in withholding the pain meds.

Ironically, I would never try and overdose with drugs. I would regard the outcome as far too unpredictable. I have never made a suicide attempt and have no interest in "gesturing." For a good many years I've had access to plenty of meds that I could have used for that purpose, if that was something I wanted to do.

I guess there is just nothing I can do. I guess I just can't tell anyone how bad I feel. There is a crisis line in my community that is very good. I have called them and been able to tell them everything about how bad I feel. I suppose that is the best I can do.

Being on the computer today has caused my upper back and neck to get very sore. So I've taken Vicodin for that, a little while ago. It will calm me down mentally, as well. 3 hours after I take Vicodin, I start to feel better mentally. I am becoming desperate to escape constant depression/anxiety. As I write this, I think that part of why I am desperate to have Vicodin available is because I know it can help me psychologically. This is starting to sound confused.

All my life I've had recurrent depressive episodes. I've always been able to recover from them to what I would call my normal baseline. For months, now, I've not been able to recover to that. When I get extremely despondent, I go stay at my boyfriend's apartment. That seems to always help. But I am very inactive and becoming in worse and worse physical shape. My boyfriend is needing more and more help with his household chores and I feel I am not meeting his needs as I should. The only other person I have any on-going contact with is my brother who shows up sporadically. He is mentally ill and I try to be supportive of him. That is difficult because he is so disturbed and becomes suddenly hostile at times. I've tried telling him that I am depressed and he just goes on to criticize me. He seems incapable of empathy. At times, I've wondered if he is a sociopath. He gets arrested frequently for threatening behavior.

The remainder of my relatives live very far away. I used to travel to where I grew up about every 18 months. I've not been there for a visit in over 2 years and I feel like I would not be much wanted, if I did go for a visit.

I feel extremely sad a lot of the time. The worst thing is the fear of becoming disabled eventually. Mental health services/resources in my community have become less and less over the past 10 years. I was seriously depressed in 2003/2004. There was much more support available then. I recovered to my normal baseline and was productively employed until 2010. I do not believe I will recover this time.

The pain pill kicked in and I feel much better. I believe that for the rest of my life, I will only feel somewhat okay while I have hydrocodone in my bloodstream. I have not been popping these pills willy-nilly. I should be able to discuss all this with a doctor. I don't believe that I ever will. I live in the American West. The options for self-harm are so much wider here than in the NorthEast where I grew up. That doesn't seem to motivate any heightened psych outreach.

I used to drink when I felt really distressed and it greatly relieved my mind. I could escape anxiety or agitated depression in that way. Over the past 5 years, I've lost that tendency. I just don't tolerate alcohol like I used to and feel a physical aversion toward more that a modest intake. Instead of that being good, it has been kind of bad. I feel like I have no escape. Agitated depression feels very destabilizing for me now. I am wanting some kind of help, but I don't think that what I want even exists. Since not being employed and now getting SSDI, I am alone way too much and am spiraling downward. I really don't want to live, but I don't believe that I am an imminent danger to myself. If I ever become that, it will be too late for help. I am sorry to put all this here. I need what people get from being members of loving families. I am not. There is no one to care what becomes of me. Professionals will care about not incurring any liability. So my doctor won't prescribe Vicodin. He will leave me in pain. That doesn't make self-harm less likely for me. But that won't matter to him. Only liability matters to my doctors. I blew up at my pdoc and that has me feeling very disturbed. I feel so sorry that it happened. I don't feel that it helped him understand how bad I feel. I probably am seriously bipolar. No amount of treatment or therapy will change that. I feel euphoric now from the Vicodin. I will go try to enjoy it . . . maybe something good is on TV. I am sorry for all this outpouring. It feels like PC is all I really have to turn to. This is the only safe place. I hate to leave here. Time to leave the desk. I will be okay tonight.