[RainbowFaerie]

I saw these in a book I am reading and I wondered if anyone had done this and took it to their therapist or P-doc? Was it helpful? I just finished what seems to be a hypomanic period of 4 days where I slept much less than normal, a little over 4 hours a night, and then the day after that about 11 hours!

I cry very easily but I'm very irritable and quick to anger. I am taking Trileptal 150mg twice a day now and I am hoping something starts to happen soon. I know really nothing about this condition, so input is welcomed.

Thanks,
RainbowFaerie

[complic8d]

I was just wondering myself about whether to keep these kind of charts! The sleep, or lack thereof, issue seems to play a role in my moods. I wonder what I could find out if I tracked these. Might be helpful, even to bring to docs.

[JonB]

I'm interested to learn about this too. I've never tried keeping track, but I suppose it could be very helpful. What all do these charts track? My Pdoc mentioned them once, but I've never seen one. I guess it's time to do a little research...

[RainbowFaerie]

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JonB said:
I'm interested to learn about this too. I've never tried keeping track, but I suppose it could be very helpful. What all do these charts track? My Pdoc mentioned them once, but I've never seen one. I guess it's time to do a little research...

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Well, the book is called Bipolar for Dummies and the charts I am looking at are the Mood Chart on p. 198 and the Sleep Chart on p. 200. The mood chart tracks a month at a time. Groovy/Normal is the baseline, and the range is +3 Yeehaa!(Really Manic) down to -3 Who Cares?(Really Depressed). The sleep chart is also for a month. You can list things like time you went to bed, time you fell asleep, time you woke up, times you woke during the night, nap times, total amount of sleep, and your energy level on a +5 to -5 scale. I think I am going to make a couple copies, one to have and one to start filling out. What could it hurt?

RainbowFaerie

I don't have Bipolar but I do have depression and I keep many different types of charts. those related to depression and anxiety I do the ones in the book - Mind Over Mood. The charts are called depression inventory and Anxiety inventory.

I also from time to time keep track of my sleep schedule because I have nightmares and keeping a sleep log helps with locating partterns with people with nightmares.

And yes I do show them to my therapist from time to time. The only way she can know what is going on with me and help is if I tell and show her because she is not a mind reader.

Yes it is very helpful to me.

[Perna]

There's a really good chart you can download from here and use:

http://www.healthyplace.com/communit...mood_chart.asp

[JonB]

Thanks for that link. I like that chart - very easy to understand, comprehensive but also quick to fill out. I think I'm going to give it a try. It was much clearer to understand than the others I looked at.

[Bleufacez]

Pdoc gave me h/w for tracking mood, sleep, energy, activities, reckless behavior, thoughts, and speech. I have no idea how to rate them. I mean what's normal to me maybe fast to someone. Cuz friends tell me I sound hyper or talking to fast when I really think I'm being normal.

Then I have to rate energy... hmm... ok. I'm tired but I still do all of my workouts. Does it mean I have low e+?
If I don't feel good or bad... is that mean I feel normal?
Plus I'm conscientious of my actions so... no info on reckless behavior.

Anyway... so I just write detail/scientific stuff. Sleep: 4 hrs, Activities: w/o 2 hrs, etc... etc.. I'll let pdoc figure it out how they all connected. Then I write miscellaneous notes like what happened that day...
dog died, grieving, crying spells, etc..
Had a conflict - talked fast, ruminating over problems, etc.
Increase need for talking -
Etc... etc...

Then there are days when I don't talk to people - so... how would I know how fast I'm talking? In my line of work... I talk to random people on a daily basis and they're no good at rating how fast/slow I'm talking.

Sleep does matter but I find that with sleep... I feel slowed down. I miss having like I have to rush but nothing to rush into.

Being normal sucks!

I just started keeping a sleep diary after a long hypo manic state (5 1/2 mos.--god, did it feel good) where I slept 3-4 hours a night, but then I had an awful crash & did some harmful things so back to the doc for a medication adjustment. She said I can't let myself go without a good night's sleep for more than 3 nights as that can trigger another manic or hypo manic stage & then I could do the crashing depression thing again. She gave me Trazadone to help sleep & said she would have to drug me up to get me to sleep. The first dosage of Trazadone didn't get me to sleep much longer so she has increased the dose & I slept 6 hours last night. I keep the sleep diary & report back to her in two weeks to see if I need further adjustments.--Suzy

[JonB]

Boy can I relate to that. With a little thought, you can make any "symptom" seem normal or depressed or manic. I overthink it way too much and end up getting frustrated. I think your method of noting "just the facts, m'am" is a good way to go. The ones I have the most trouble with are rating how much the symptom is disruptive to your daily living. After all, I don't find any of my hypomanic symptoms to be disruptive, isn't that the problem. I think it's all great. Sometimes I wish we could have a mood meter like a blood sugar meter. Just stick your finger and get a numerical readout. Still, I'm pressing on with the mood chart in the hopes that it will help in some small way. If not to make things clearer for me, then at least to make things clearer for pdoc.