hello everyone.

(after i wrote this i didn't realise how long it was, sorry!)

so yesterday i finally told a professional that something is wrong with me. i went to a new doctor because my regular GP said he had "tried everything" when i told him the mirtazapine i was taking wasn't working. that made me angry, i swore at him, and never went back. i was also sick of going there for him to just ask me about how much i'm drinking, and nothing else really. the drinking is a problem, but i feel that if i felt better i wouldn't be drinking as much. so i decided to go to a new doc, and just say from the beginning that i am worried and don't know what to do.

i didn't know what bipolar was until about six weeks ago, so i never considered it as a possibility. but then when i came across it by accident and read the symptoms, i knew right away that it's likely to be what is wrong with me. i don't think my (original) GP considered it either because of the drinking, and the fact that nine years ago i ended up in the psych ward where after speaking to the psychiatrist for ten(!!!) minutes he said i had borderline personality disorder and that nothing could be done.

i will admit that for about two years it would have looked like borderline. i think in two years i went to the hospital about ten or eleven times. it was mostly due to doing impulsive things, and getting myself in trouble.

anyway, i haven't done anything like that in about seven years, i have absolutely no fear of abandonment etc. and i don't think i fit the criteria at all. other than the impulse control part (i get a into fights, light fires, and smash things, windows etc.) and mood swings.

so i've been living like this for a long time. my first depressive episode was when i was 15. to the point where i'd lie on the floor all day. not go to school, and became selectively mute. i turn 32 next week.

i think i had my first major episode of hypomania about four years ago. slept about one hour every three or four days, pacing around and drinking all day, hallucinations of dead relatives/spiders/bugs. the hallucinations weren't major, but they did bother me. i had a few episodes like this before (and since), but not for this long. it went for about two weeks. i couldn't sit down because my body would start rocking back and forth without me doing anything, so i had to get up and walk around. got a lot of holes in a lot of socks, lol. i was home alone the whole time and even started ringing strangers so i could talk and talk and talk. lol.

anyway, i'll stop there, this is getting longer than i thought.

so yesterday, i went to the new doctor, that a family member recommended. he was great. very nice, and listened very well. i was scared (docs scare me) so before i went, i wrote down what was wrong. how i feel when i'm happy, how i feel when i'm sad. one page of each. it was hard to write because i couldn't concentrate too well. but i did it. i even wrote down things that any "normal person" would think was absolutely nuts e.g. walking around in the middle of the night with a "magic wand" thinking i'm going to be a wizard. spending all my rent because i'm going to win the lottery in a few days, spending all night writing letters to famous people on my ceiling (had to repaint), starting up businesses etc.

even embarrassing stuff like not showering for up to eight weeks at a time (gross, i know, but what can i do). the anxiety/paranoia over people spying on me. he asked me about my drinking habits... that was pretty embarrassing.

he took it very seriously. i kept on saying, "sorry, i know it sounds stupid", but he said it's ok. before he even read the whole thing he was on the phone booking me a psychiatrist appointment for an assessment. he was straight on to it. i was so relieved that he took me seriously. i knew how ridiculous it all would have sounded. but as i said to him, it didn't seem ridiculous at the time. he understood.

he spent an hour with me and only charged for a ten minute appointment! he even retyped the whole letter i gave him.

so at the end he told me that he can't medicate me right now, not until he gets word from the psychiatrist about what's going on. that's fair enough, this isn't gambling. he told me he thinks i may have adhd, bipolar or schizoaffective disorder. but we're going to get to the bottom of it. he wrote on the referral "has been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder previously but has a lot more bipolar signs". that's why i chose to post it in this forum.

my appointment with the psych is in six weeks. he told me that it's important that in the meantime i keep a mood journal. and write as much as i can. i didn't ask him to elaborate because i was freaking out, but he told me i need to do it and take it to the psych appointment.

can you guys help me understand what this means? do i need to do it once a day or multiple times? is it when my mood changes? how much detail do i need to give?

sorry this ended up so long, i didn't think it would be.

also a few questions, if you don't mind.

1. the mood journal. what's important to put in it, what isn't?
2. i know it's common to be misdiagnosed, but i want to know if whatever it is was recognised properly earlier on, would i still be this way?
3. what is important that i need to tell the psychiatrist? i'm worried that i'm going to get anxious and my mind will forget everything. so i need to write it out over the next few weeks. the doctor told me to get down as much mental health history as possible. i'm worried because i have "blanks" in my memory.

thanks a lot! sorry for the essay, lol. i hope you're all well and good.

skw