Good for you! I think this is an amazing step and I know it was difficult for you.

A pdoc recently said the best way to communicate your state is to give scenarios of what you've been experiencing instead of clinical terms of symptoms. So you don't say 'I'm depressed.' Instead you say, I am feeling sadness when I wake up in the morning and I don't want to get out of bed'. Don't say I am paranoid and anxious. Say 'I feel like people do not understand me and are thinking negative thoughts about me all the time'.

The doctor said it is also helpful to provide when each symptom started and how long it has been going on. Maybe you can make a chart listing your recent scenarios you experience as well as the timing for each. You can also list them in order of severity so they can get a sense of your most pressing needs.

Your goals for treatment then become finding ways to ease these symptoms, gaining new coping skills, processing trauma, etc.