[BNLsMOM]

I can't seem to find any info that is specific but not too scientific. I can't concentrate on a bunch of lingo right now, but I want to fine out if this is what is going on with me.
My symptoms include:

Extreme anger/irritability
Some thoughts of death and wnating to die but no specific plans
Depression and despondance
Occassionally feeling "normal"
anxiety
Racing and intrusive thoughts which are quiet an hour after some Klonopin.
Crying spells
Inappropriate reactions to stress

I think the medication I am on (Trileptal) is either contributing, or just not helping. I may be going to the ER if I can't reach a p-doc soon because I keep switching between all these symptoms several times each day. Although crying my eyes out today seemed to help a bit.

[Berries]

Originally Posted by BNLsMOM

Extreme anger/irritability
Some thoughts of death and wnating to die but no specific plans
Depression and despondance
Occassionally feeling "normal"
anxiety
Racing and intrusive thoughts which are quiet an hour after some Klonopin.
Crying spells
Inappropriate reactions to stress

I am not a pdoc or T and we are not alwowed to diagnose, BUT my opinion is yes, except for the depression/despondance it sounds like dysphoric mania to me. Perhaps you are rapid cycling between dysphoric mania and depression.

It doesn't really matter though, what you call it--It is distressful and disabling and you need help in managing the symptoms not the diagnosis per say.
Does that make sense?
Be sure and tell your treaters your symptoms and let them worry about the dx.
I'm sorry you are having so much trouble right now.

Originally Posted by BNLsMOM

I can't seem to find any info that is specific but not too scientific. I can't concentrate on a bunch of lingo right now, but I want to fine out if this is what is going on with me.
My symptoms include:

Extreme anger/irritability
Some thoughts of death and wnating to die but no specific plans
Depression and despondance
Occassionally feeling "normal"
anxiety
Racing and intrusive thoughts which are quiet an hour after some Klonopin.
Crying spells
Inappropriate reactions to stress

I think the medication I am on (Trileptal) is either contributing, or just not helping. I may be going to the ER if I can't reach a p-doc soon because I keep switching between all these symptoms several times each day. Although crying my eyes out today seemed to help a bit.

SOUNDS like not helping - you know sometimes we have to go through SOSOSOSOOSO many until they get it right, then even at that, it may have to be changed again.

But keep it up - you'll find something - honest

[BNLsMOM]

I think I am finally on the right track. I was able to get an appointment for the day after p-doc gets back in town. And if he continues to not be helpful, I may switch my treatment to the on call who I spoke with yesterday who was very helpful and compassionate.

[VickiesPath]

Originally Posted by BNLsMOM

I think I am finally on the right track. I was able to get an appointment for the day after p-doc gets back in town. And if he continues to not be helpful, I may switch my treatment to the on call who I spoke with yesterday who was very helpful and compassionate.

A big plus is you are able to describe your symptoms specifically. That should make it easier to get you help. I'm tempted to call this a mixed episode cuz of the depression. But what do I know? Not much. Are you ok waiting? If not, go to the ER like you said.

Also, I'm curious. What's an "inappropriate" response to stress? Are you staying safe?

Hang in there.

[BNLsMOM]

I am safe...I meant just blowing up randomly at anyone for little things unrelated to the original stressor. I guess it goes along with the anger/ irritability issue.

I am OK waiting as long as the Klonopin is keeping things at bay.

I have a t-doc that I see twice a week and I keep a close watch on myself through journaling, etc.

[Berries]

(((((((((((BNLsMOM)))))))))))

I went through a mixed episode/dysphoric mania almost a year ago. It is really rough. I can totally relate.

Hang in there!!!

Wishing you strength--Berries

[BNLsMOM]

It's weird... right now I am so hyped up, but I know this never lasts long before another angry outburst and then depression...
I'll do what it takes to stay safe. The ER will love me if I go back. I was there in June for bipolar stuff, this past Sunday for a hurt foot and tonight for my son who had heat exhaustion. There will be $$$ in their eyes because that will equal $200 in ER visits in three months.

My insurance must hate my guts right now, or love me depending on how they get paid...

Crap, I really need to go to bed.

[thinker22]

Wow, only $200? Is that after your insurance pays? That sounds pretty good to me. I figure a trip to the hospital will bankrupt me even if the insurance does pay some. They'll likely find a loophole though and I'll be screwed. If I could get out of there with the right meds for under $300 at this point, I think it'd be worth it. Sure, I don't even have that much in the bank, but that's what credit cards and payment plans are for, right? I've already been suffering between Seroquel and quitting it for like 5 weeks now...with no help from a professional until Tuesday...not a p-doc, just the MD that gave me a sleep aid...even if it's not totally working.

Jeez...sorry, I went on a rant on your post. I guess we're all going through it. I'm just tired and irritable and everyone is suffering financially. I don't mean to belittle your costs or overhead. Thinking out loud. Should probably shut up.

Hope your son is feeling better. Summer heat sucks!

Wishing you some good sleep. And cross your fingers for me too.

[BNLsMOM]

No problem...$200 is just the co-pay. I haven't received the bill for the IP and the partial yet. I know my insurance will cover some of it, but I have a feeling i will have an insurance fight on my hands because I went an extra day to partial beyond what insurance pays. I also think the co pay for IP is another $200 and the partial is another $200/week and I went two weeks and a day. So it's more like $800 if insurance decides to pay for it at all.

I for one would love to see a different health insurance system. Maybe I'll invent one while my energy lasts.

My son is OK now. It turns out he had heat exaustion on top of a viral infection brewing so he is still a bit sick, but not like yesterday when he couldn't walk. My husband had to carry him out of the house to the car and into the ER. Turns out that is the secret to avoiding hours of waiting before triage. Have someone carry you in.

[thinker22]

Oh crap! That's just the copay? Yeah, I'd definitely be screwed. Your plan sucks...but then, most of us who aren't in Congress have sucky health plans. $800 in all? Yikes. Sorry I misunderstood.

When I had to go to the ER in December, even though they didn't admit me or give me anything or use any equipment, the bill was about $785. No copay. Insurance paid $580 or so, I proved I was poor, hospital never sent me a bill. I got lucky.

I keep reading my health insurance brochure and I can't figure out if whether my seeking treatment at the hospital would count as "Hospital Outpatient Department or Walk-In Visit Expense" or as "Emergency Room Visit" or as "Inpatient Mental Health and Substance Abuse Expense." Depending on whether they decide to keep me I can see the latter, but why couldn't I just talk to one of their staff psychiatrists about my medications and have it count as outpatient? Grrr...and if I call the insurance co they may tell me it's not a true emergency and they won't pay.

So if it's considered ER, I have a $150 copay, then they'll only pay $1,000 max after that. If it's Inpatient, it's only a $20 copay "per visit". How does that make sense? But the inpatient says it requires "prior review" to be obtained. And hospital outpatient has no copay, but they'll only pay 75% of the charge. Man, why can't things be more simple??

If intelligent rational people were raving as loud as the nutjobs who don't want the system changed at all due to being drummed up on fear by the right (I'm not a leftist, more libertarian, but left of center)...perhaps they'd start voting on this friggin' reform bill already. Of course, such people don't act like idiots in public because they're not largely ruled by their gut and the limbic, primitive parts of their brains.

I'd guess that 70% want another option for their healthcare, even if it is "run by the government", 20% are ignoring the whole thing, and that 10% are making the headlines and scaring their senators and representatives into capitulating into doing nothing when everyone knows that's no solution at all. Pisses me off. Maybe they want to go bankrupt to the bottomless pit that is healthcare cost in this country, but I sure as **** don't. Maybe I'll move to France. Not really. I like cheese and wine and bucolic life, but my French is terrible.

Haha...I'll have to remember that. Have my guy carry me in. Of course he only weighs 175 and I'm just shy of 110, so I'm not sure I'd want to take his back out in the process...then we'd have two ER bills.

I know I need help, but I'm trying to hang on for 12 more days until I can see the new p-doc.

Hope you're doing okay today.

[BNLsMOM]

I am doind OK, but I am feeling sad, because something that has been a part of my life for over a year may be ending. i was part of another health and wellness community and the person who created it is starting to pull a Jim Jones on us. He is deleting threads that question his methods, and of course feeling dysphoric mania, I began to question why we all had to bleat like sheep when he posted something. I got mad that he answered someones question with a guru-style platitude that diminished her question and I went off. Respectfully, but I questioned his methods and his beliefs. The thread was pulled with no explanation, and I am sad that a community that claims to be welcoming of everyone would censor the questioners. I think the "free thinker" alarm went off. I am thinking of leaving that community, but I also largely credit that community with giving me the courage to get psych help. Not sure what to do, but it makes me feel sad.

As far as healthcare, maybe we can move to a country that provides it for free and speaks English.

[thinker22]

I've said this before, but I'm pretty sure so long as insurance is about making a profit, people will always be treated like numbers: this one is making us money; this one is losing us money...cut their *** out of our plan. If they can't completely cut you because it's a group program, then they can raise your employer or group's rate, then they might switch to a new one that's less costly for them, but where the 6 month pre-existing reapplies to you. GRRR. And I think most healthcare companies would like us to move to another country...or else die. It would save them money. I don't care anymore. I hope I'll get to feeling better eventually, but in this maddening cycle, I kind of doubt it.

Sorry your group got too authoritarian. Sad but true that a lot of people in certain professions (counseling, psychotherapy, psychiatry, MDs, etc.) start to think they're a god and know everything even though everyone's situation is different. I've always been an independent person, which is why it took 29 years to seek treatment and even now I wonder what I'm doing, but at least I know when people start to act like the authorities in my childhood: school, church, parents, I know it's time to get the hell outta there. You can probably still talk to friends you made on that site without having to post anything, right? Sorry you're sad. We're here.

[BNLsMOM]

Yeah, he is considered a big deal in the fitness world, but I just feel slighted because there are a few of us who have MI on the site, and one of them asked a question about meds, and got an answer that basically said that she could believe her way out of MI. That of course triggered the heck out of me, and I just tried to defend her. I am getting angry again just describing it so I am going to stop talking about it right now. I have to hold it together for 11 more days.

[thinker22]

Okay, no problem. There will always be those who say you can will a mental disorder away. Of course they would say that! They've never had months of insomnia and projects followed by months of despair! They've never hallucinated while on nothing or have lost their will to live when their brain was making them feel so terrible that they thought it was the only way out. They think meds and therapy are BS because they themselves don't have a chemical problem (or they do and are in denial).

I feel like telling them: if I could will my way out of these terrible mood swings, don't you think I would have by now? I exercised like mad as any child does during recess and sports (I played many) as a child. I had a good diet. I did my school work. I was a bit precocious (haha, okay, a lot), but still I had terrible spells of depression and questioning the meaning of existence since age 7 and also super silly hypomania where people wouldn't even recognize me as the same person they thought they knew. This continued through high school where some thought I was a class clown and others thought I was a total withdrawn brooder and when they got together they didn't believe each other's description of me. I just laughed. I didn't think it was a problem at all except when depressed. I wanted to be the happy funny person all the time. Okay, enough of my bio...I could go on and on.

Suffice it to say, ignore the ***holes who don't understand the severity of mental illness. I'd like to shoot their *** full of my natural chemicals and see if they could even survive a day of being me without running to the hospital saying, "WTF is wrong with me? I feel sick."

I have to hold it together for 11 more days also.

[BNLsMOM]

We'll hold it together, together. he he he! So far Klonopin has been a nice think for me, but I think I might be on my way up. If so, I will direct the energy into housework. My house is beyond messy. I think it borders on dangerously unsanitary. I don't even want to use the bathrooms any more.

[thinker22]

hehe...wear your biohazard suit.

[VickiesPath]

Originally Posted by BNLsMOM

As far as healthcare, maybe we can move to a country that provides it for free and speaks English.

Trust me, you don't want to move to England. My little 6 month old grandson was having seizures and it took them 3 months to get an appointment for an MRI.

[BNLsMOM]

I am feeling awful about that other board. I am bordering on obsessive. I keep checking it and I got a nasty overly professional message laying a guilt trip on me about how it is a free service provided by a rich philanthropist and whoever doesn't like it can go to other, unmoderated forums.

Now I think I am going to be up all night thinking about it and wondering if I should go back and bleat. I requested that the rich philanthropist talk to me in a private message rather than simply delete a thread without any notice or reason.

I wasn't offensive. If I asked Ghandi questions that challenged his beliefs, he would sit down with me and have a discussion. If I told the Dalai Lama that I had read The Art of Happiness and disagreed with a few points in his text, he would invite me to discuss it with him and not burn my notes.

I am not usually this mean and defensive. I think I am having dysphoric mania issues. (by the way...just being precautionary and bringing this thread back around full circle, although I was enjoying our discussion on healthcare.)

I think I need to be offline for a few days until settle. (I know I won't...I can't seem to go more than a few hours without checking one board or another.)

[thinker22]

It's hard not to feel slighted when something like that happens. I kind of went on a mission to make it known what my p-nurse had done to me: ignored me/wouldn't change my meds to the point that I got so sick I wanted to die. So...I talked to admin people. They apologized, but the p-nurse never did and she still has her job. So it goes. I wasn't trying to get her fired anyway. It's just the principle of the thing and I hope she learns from my case that there's a time (like maybe after 6 months of no success instead of 13) when she should refer a difficult case to someone more learned and experienced instead of just telling the patient to keep waiting when they're dying in front of you.

Chalk it up to an ***hole who will never get what they did to you or others by silencing your dissidence. They are solipsistic idiots. They can do whatever they want with their site. But I'd make my peace with it and just stay away. They haven't won; you haven't lost...you'll just be moving on because battling with an egomaniac is more trouble than its worth. Reasoning with some people is a waste of time. Like I said, I hope you can still contact people you grew to know and like without that site.

I'm sure you're not the only one with such an experience on that site. You are good and lovable and kind and caring. Try not to let it get you down or paranoid or whatever. We're all here for ya.

[BNLsMOM]

I will be composing my respectful good bye letter today. The cool think is that I can check in without being logged in.

I feel awful today. Not depressed, but somewhere inbetween, but not the stable category.

I may go to the beach with my family and just bake in the sun. Maybe it's just some vitamin D that I need.

I feel like I am in trouble here because I am still sleeping too much, feeling tired, but feeling tweaky and I haven't had a shower in 3 days (yuck) I am feeling like I am fighting some sort of cause and I am having trouble letting it go. Not cool.

I feel like something bad is going to happen, and I have brace myself for it.

[thinker22]

Know that feeling. Been feeling it for a while now, but then I'll wake up and feel "fine" and think it was all my imagination. If I look through my posts and my journal, however, I know that's not true.

We are often close to the edge when not fully stable/on the right meds. Listen to your inner self...to what you really need to do to stay safe and well.



Hope you can get to feeling better soon. Maybe the beach will help.