Long story short- I'm a Veteran of the War in Iraq (24 months over three tours), with some a little PTSD ad a diagnosis of BPII. I was diagnosed with the BPII a couple years ago at the VA Clinic, but never took the meds and just continued to self medicate by drinking upwards of a fifth a day. Now it wasn't easy but I've managed to get myself sober, which means that now I have to deal with the underlying mental illness. I have no insurance, but make little enough money that I can get treated through the VA for free. Last month, I talked to a psychiatrist via skype (or something close) and he kept me on the 20 mg of citalopram my pdoc assigned me while I was waiting to talk to the psychiatrist and added 25mg of quetiapine before (and everything I've read says 25 mg has no therapeutic affect) bed. For the first week or two it helped me sleep and it felt like I was starting to get 'better'. Now a month later and I feel 'crazier' than I ever have ( ie slept for 18 hrs and 20 hrs over the weekend, then at work feeling almost manic for the first half of my shift, then locking myself in a bathroom for 15 minutes crying). Obviously I need to talk to my psychiatrist, right? So I called the VA to try and see him sooner than my next scheduled appt on the 10th of next month. But apparently he doesn't have enough time, so I can't see him till the 10th.

So my question is: what the heck to I do to avoid going off the deep end before the tenth of next month? And with the VA being the VA I can't shop around for docs, I'm stuck with this guy. I am just frustrated beyond words.

Thanks for reading this wall of text. Any advice is greatly appreciated. Apologies in advance for spelling and grammatical errors which are no doubt rampant in the above paragraph.

Anyway, thanks again,

-John