Purposefully Triggering Mania

Here I am. Four or five days off of my meds. Taking St. John's Wort with plans to stay up all night. Also taken 1.2 grams of caffiene throughout the day. (600 mg two times)

My plan is to get manic and then control it through taking my meds as to not get to out of control.

My question is this: has anyone ever tried doing this? Successfully?

P.S. I know this is most likely a bad idea, but never before have I been so damned happy then when I was in a full blown manic episode.

Yeah as you said bad idea but hey, we all do stupid stuff from time to time. I hope you dont damage yourself or reputation and stay as safe as possible. It is certainly not something anyone would recommend you do. Stay safe.

I would say bad idea....because you where it will lead....to an eventual crash and burn.

I understand why you would want to do that, and I've considered doing the same thing. It's definitely dangerous, and not recommended though. Have you told any friends you are doing this so that they can keep an eye on you to make sure you don't spin out too far? Stay safe

I have not told any of my friends. Though I have told my sister (currently living at home). I am also going to try and quit smoking. The first manic and only manic episode I have had so far I believe was caused by me smoking ciggs a lot less and also the fact I didn't smoke any weed for a week prior to it happening.

I'll see how this pans out and hopefully all goes well. I only received my diagnosis in August and after they medicated me I went into a deep depression resulting in me dropping out of college. I'm relatively balanced right now though, but not if everything goes to plan >=D

Courtlander, I agree with you that mania is the best mood to be in! But what always happens afterward - depression. And I am finding that each new depressive state I get in, is worse than the previous. If there was a way to prevent the depression, I would definitely stay in the manic phase!!

Im still in depression from my crash after mania last month. It sucks. Just sayin...

Please don't do that... I've done that before. Once I was into it I didn't care at all what happened so I didn't regulate anything. Got way depressed afterward and tried to kill myself.

I told myself I was gonna regulate it and I didn't...

if there was an euphoria pill, it would be the most popular drug ever... that's why people use cocaine and heroin, i suppose... but the brain-made is the best~! sadly, as earlier posters have mentioned, there are drawbacks,, poor judgement, lack of inhibitions, loss of impulse control, and the usual poor judgement of being high.

i seriously hope you consult a pro, that is to say a doctor, or psychiatrist (and i don't say that lightly), to get your meds adjusted so you don't feel the need for this extreme measure~!

best wishes~
Gus

I have done what you are doing. In august I felt I was tired of being depressed and my doctor wasn't helping me so I decided to start taking the Prozac (10mg) by itself - no mood stabilizer or antipsychotic. I didn't know what would happen As euphoric hypo/mania was new to me.

Within days I was hypo and soon after manic. But unfortunately for me I only feel happy for about a week. Then rage takes over. It only took an annoying tone from my husband to completely flip the switch from euphoric mania into dysphoric mani, and by then I was trapped out in space. I began seeing things, hearing things, and believing that a being was implanting thoughts in my head. And at that point my pdoc became uncooperative, believing I was saying everything for attention, so he refused to see me.

Long story short I ended up hospitalized after attempting to hurt myself because the thoughts told me to.

There is an ugly side to mania that you may or may not experience, but if I read your post right you've only experienced mania once? You don't know how your brain could twist things around on you. I don't know what meds you're on but I hope you have a fast acting antipsychotic handy to bring you down because mood stabilizers take time and you may not have time.

Good luck! Be safe.

Yup. Bad idea. You might like that mania, but you probably won't have the sense to take your meds in order to keep things from getting out of control, and the depressive crash that will follow is horrible.

Bad idea. Consult your pdoc and see if he/she can help you thru this idea.

Please please please listen to your peers. We understand the seductiveness of feeling so great but afterwards...its miserable. :/ And it take a LONG time to regulate yourself again! Not worth it. Just sayin!

Since you posted this last night did it work? Agree it's a very bad idea. Somebody mentioned heroin. Extreme example: The reason people get hooked on meth is you can't achieve that high naturally. It works the same as an orgasm on hyperdrive. So when the person comes down a "normal" level of mood is a downer in comparison.

I'm extrapolating but I think the same thing might happen if you are prone to "happy mania". (I know there is bad mania.) Not only do you crash but you have to learn how to be ok with normalcy. By inducing it you are making it even harder. And once you are in a manic state are you really in a place to act on your word to control it? Or are you going to take it as far as you can? I would. The only time I experienced mania was drug induced. I am more prone hypo mania rarely.

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Not successfully. Never successfully.

I slept for all of three hours last night. So far I feel a little worn out but maybe felt a little hypo when I woke up. As to what I am taking I'm taking abilify 20mg and depakote 1000mg.

Excellent reply Gus and I want the euphoria pill - woohoo - that would be awesome!!!

euphoria pills... there's MDMA.

I tried to bump myself up few times, but mostly i just end up irritable and mixed. Careful with St john's wort if you are taking anything else.

Greetings Courtlander!

We all LOVE that manic "high." It's better than narcotics, marijuana, meth, coke, and many others. I once took off to New York City, drank beers in Central Park all night, toured the harbor to Ellis Island - and then flew back to Denver - all because I was manic. I had to get S.T.D. testing upon my return and I couldn't remember where I spent several hundred dollars. Yeah - it's fun - but dangerous.

Have not triggered it yet. I only slept about 3-4 hours last night. Gonna see if I can't do that again tonight and hopefully I'll trigger it this time.

I heard therapy light boxes for SAD can trigger mania.

They let me use one briefly in my last inpatient stay about a month ago, and I felt like a god standing naked in front of that thing.
_____

Yes, I did successfully trigger my own episode of sorts last year. I'm no longer diagnosed bipolar, but it's possible I could be determined to have some ultra rapid form of it, or I might have schizoaffective, borderline, or even adhd. What I did is I became obsessed with writing--it started with trying to figure out this disorder through thought experiments, just imagining what might be going on in the brain, then I went on to other things. Slowly, I started thinking I had some great insights and it all just snowballed from there. Suddenly logically trying to understand bipolar disorder became intuitively understanding the universe, then the thoughts of being a prophet came, then I had to save the human race, and as I was developing powers, the illusions of this reality were crumbling and I could see clearly the true nature of everything. The funny thing is that I had to convince myself this was logical in order to even get my feet wet with it. I suppose that's from being an INTJ personality. In short, I just started obsessing, thought it was a good idea (not sure if that was my choice, or the illness telling me it was), and it blew up.

I never crashed. This was over a year ago and I simply made it back to earth as if I gracefully floated back down. I guess I'm mostly manic, rarely get depression, but I do get intense "manic sadness" and suicidal feelings, just with virtually no symptoms of depression. I didn't have much if any problems sleeping, and my preoccupation with the delusions were the strongest aspect of it, so that's why I think I have psychosis and not so much the acute mania that causes destructive behavior.