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  #1  
Old Apr 29, 2014, 09:22 PM
sdguy123 sdguy123 is offline
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Hi everyone. I'm new the forums. I've been dealing with bipolar disorder for around five years now but was only diagnosed last month. I've been taking a low dose of medication daily for three weeks now (Abilify) and I can already feel a difference. I can get excited or happy about things without feeling out of control (everything moving fast, racing thoughts, etc.) and I just feel more stable.

I'm 23 and this is the first time I've felt truly stable since high school. It's such a relief, but it's also a very strange feeling. It feels weird to feel stable and good after living through an increasingly bad hell for five years. I guess I'm looking for some validation in feeling that way and wanting to hear from others who have felt similarly. I'm happy with how I feel but maybe it will just take some adjusting to.
Thanks for this!
BipolaRNurse, x_BabyG_x

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  #2  
Old Apr 29, 2014, 10:39 PM
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Victoria'smom Victoria'smom is online now
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I'm currently stable and it does feel strange. But I wanted to say welcome.
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  #3  
Old Apr 29, 2014, 11:19 PM
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BipolaRNurse BipolaRNurse is offline
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Welcome to PC!!

I know how that feels. I have to take quite a bit of medication to accomplish it, but I'm currently stable and doing well. I do have a lot of conflicting emotions about needing five drugs just to be reasonably functional, and even so I just became unemployed again after only four months at a job that was admittedly over my head. But life before meds was virtually intolerable, and if I want to live any kind of normal life, I have to be medicated.

Not everyone does, though. In fact, there are a number of people here with bipolar who don't take meds at all, and they do about as well as the rest of us.
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  #4  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 10:43 AM
StartingFreshNow StartingFreshNow is offline
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I can relate. I was mis-diagnosed as severely depressed for quite a while. Then it's taken me months to find the right combo of meds for me (we're still working on it actually).

When I first started to feel normal I was very uneasy. It was nice, but at the same time I didn't know what to do with myself and kind of felt uncertain whether I was ok feeling "normal".

I stuck with the meds and got used to it but every now and then I still feel really uneasy when I'm just sitting there on the couch realizing I feel "normal" and I don't have something else going on like racing thoughts or anxiety or depression, etc.
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  #5  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 12:46 PM
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Flummixed Flummixed is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by StartingFreshNow View Post
I can relate. I was mis-diagnosed as severely depressed for quite a while. Then it's taken me months to find the right combo of meds for me (we're still working on it actually).

When I first started to feel normal I was very uneasy. It was nice, but at the same time I didn't know what to do with myself and kind of felt uncertain whether I was ok feeling "normal".

I stuck with the meds and got used to it but every now and then I still feel really uneasy when I'm just sitting there on the couch realizing I feel "normal" and I don't have something else going on like racing thoughts or anxiety or depression, etc.
That's great that you're feeling "normal". I'm grateful myself. My doctor shared my thoughts on getting rid of Latuda for Seroquel and now my anxiety is much better. Latuda made me freak out. Although it's only the first few days I already feel better. I just can't express what a relief it is.
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  #6  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 05:33 PM
Anonymous100125
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Hi and welcome. What part of Calif are you in?
  #7  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 08:17 PM
r010159 r010159 is offline
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Do you guys (and gals) still have swings in mood from time to time? But just less frequent or intense than Bipolar mood swings?
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  #8  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 08:49 PM
StartingFreshNow StartingFreshNow is offline
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Yes! I most definitely still have swings. I feel "normal" overall but definitely swing. In fact we just realized I was going into a hypomanic phase so we adjusted my meds and now it's screwed me up and I think I'm in a mixed phase because of it. Not where I want to be at all.

However, we also agree we haven't found my perfect therapeutic dose of meds yet. We just (in the last two months or so) found the right combo, but we don't think we have the dosages right yet. Once we do, maybe I won't have the swings?
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  #9  
Old Apr 30, 2014, 09:17 PM
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hiddenfriend hiddenfriend is offline
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I completely feel you. I take 500 mg Depakote bid and 200 mg topamax bid mainly for my seizures. Then on top of that the doc put me on 50 mg of seroquel. Difficult to mix drugs to fast I guess. But yes I recently started to feel "normal" as in dumbed down to the average person you run into on the streets. I stopped talking so fast and instead of a million things running through my head I got about a thousand. I just sat down and ate ice cream for the first time in close to 11 years. I drink vanilla almond milk. I hate vanilla, it is the aura for my seizures. Freaks me out. So "normal" maybe I feel that way. But I don't like it. It makes me feel average and when I'm in a manic state I am better than average. I just hate the short periods of depression. I want to be up all the time. So normal sucks.

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  #10  
Old May 01, 2014, 01:48 PM
Anonymous100125
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Yeah, if I could be "up" all the time I wouldn't be on meds. But even the up ends up crazy. And the down, including agitation and anxiety, is completely intolerable. Can't live with it.
Thanks for this!
BipolaRNurse
  #11  
Old May 02, 2014, 01:05 AM
sdguy123 sdguy123 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Sister Rags View Post
Hi and welcome. What part of Calif are you in?
Hey there, thanks. I live in San Diego. Looks like you're in Northern CA -- nice.

Quote:
Originally Posted by hiddenfriend View Post
I completely feel you. I take 500 mg Depakote bid and 200 mg topamax bid mainly for my seizures. Then on top of that the doc put me on 50 mg of seroquel. Difficult to mix drugs to fast I guess. But yes I recently started to feel "normal" as in dumbed down to the average person you run into on the streets. I stopped talking so fast and instead of a million things running through my head I got about a thousand. I just sat down and ate ice cream for the first time in close to 11 years. I drink vanilla almond milk. I hate vanilla, it is the aura for my seizures. Freaks me out. So "normal" maybe I feel that way. But I don't like it. It makes me feel average and when I'm in a manic state I am better than average. I just hate the short periods of depression. I want to be up all the time. So normal sucks.

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk
I feel similarly. It's just a strange feeling.

Thanks for all of the welcomes and replies. Makes me feel less alone.
  #12  
Old May 02, 2014, 11:52 AM
outlaw sammy outlaw sammy is offline
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GREAT FEEDBACK! And it's super that so many of you are feeling "normal," but "normal" to us is not necessarily normal to the normal folks. I too have been "normal" since the last time that my pdoc changed my meds to include lithium. Can you image going all these years taking a rainbow of designer psychotropic medications and no one even thought about the gold standard lithium?! Oh well, I haven't had a single episode in over sixteen (16) months! Because I'm a rapid-cycler, I normally would have had five (5) episodes without meds, and at least two (2) with the meds I was previously taking. So, YES IT FEELS GOOD TO BE "NORMAL," but I still feel those little mild after-tremors. My therapist jokes that I must suffer from "baseline insanity."
  #13  
Old May 02, 2014, 12:00 PM
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Hbomb0903 Hbomb0903 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by outlaw sammy View Post
GREAT FEEDBACK! And it's super that so many of you are feeling "normal," but "normal" to us is not necessarily normal to the normal folks. I too have been "normal" since the last time that my pdoc changed my meds to include lithium. Can you image going all these years taking a rainbow of designer psychotropic medications and no one even thought about the gold standard lithium?! Oh well, I haven't had a single episode in over sixteen (16) months! Because I'm a rapid-cycler, I normally would have had five (5) episodes without meds, and at least two (2) with the meds I was previously taking. So, YES IT FEELS GOOD TO BE "NORMAL," but I still feel those little mild after-tremors. My therapist jokes that I must suffer from "baseline insanity."
I am right here with this conversation. I felt "normal" after a month-long crazy state with mixed and not quite sure what I was feeling, but not really able to function in this world.

I came out of it and was feeling great for a week before starting lamictal and I've been ramping up the dosage. Just got to the theraupeutic dose for about 3 days and bam I'm back to that lost, unsure and uneasy feeling. I think it's the lamictal. I was on lithium and still am. I think both of them is not working for me and I was feeling great with this lamictal. Don't fix what isn't broke??

Anyway. I am trying to find better ways to cope with the swings but I think that I swing naturally more even when "normal"??? I agree without the energy and mental clarity that is "ME" I don't feel right, but the depressions are unbearable.
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