Warning:Triggering possibly

For my own suicidal urge states, I've been told that it's a type of psychosis. But everyone is different. Since my worst episodes happen when I'm mixed, it's sort of like the psychosis and energy of mania, plus the bleak "I must die now" aspects of depression. Because I think I "feel fine" too (and am mostly functional in some basic ways, like at work and in social contexts), it takes me a while to realize I might have some depression symptoms going on. It may feel like the images and thoughts about suicide are coming from nowhere, but for me, they really aren't. You have to do some digging though to find out why these suicidal thoughts or images are happening. For me, it's usually a bad stress implosion that I was in denial about for a long time. Often I'm in denial about my own suicidality, too. Even when I'm on the verge of attempting, or caving to the thoughts in an impulsive way, I can be insistent that I'm not actually suicidal. But if thoughts are driving you to kill yourself, then what else can it be?

Hmmm very good point inflammable. Maybe a little soul searching would be good however I don't think I'll totally discount the psychosis aspect just yet.

Thanks so much for your input

I will decide tomorrow how I feel about telling my T or Pdoc. Im down today. Not really happy about much and really just wanna sleep. I have been hypersexual which is unlike me...

rt
Interesting questions. Intrusive thoughts and images are not typically considered a symptom of psychosis, but I think it depends on the intensity and what else the person is experiencing at the time. There are no clear distinctions for this kind of thing. If it is mild, I would say it's not psychosis, and probably reassurance is all the person would need. It's unlikely that a person would act on mild thoughts or images if it was not aligned with what they actually wanted to do. That's called ego dystonic. If the images are aligned with what the person wants to do it is called ego syntonic, and that is much more dangerous.

I have had this experience, but only during severe depression. But I was not suicidal at the time. It was really violent images, and very real and intense. It felt like the images were coming from somewhere external to my normal thoughts. At the same time as I was having these images, I was also having very intense lucid dreams, and I was having trouble determining if I was awake or asleep, or what was real. So for me, I would consider that part of psychosis. It stopped when I started taking an antipsychotic.

It's interesting to see how many of us have had this experience. It looks like it's pretty common in bipolar.

Well I seel T in just a bit. I guess I will decide there what to tell her

I told her right before I left and she wants me to talk to my Dr about it tomorrow. Gah!

Good luck, I hope your doctor realizes this is just passing thought.

In the future, if your doctor wants to talk to you it might be better to just come out with it right away and stress that you will contract for safety, you just wanted to make him/her aware of your thoughts. If you time it and phrase it right, they should know you're just being safe. Eventually you'll build up enough trust that they believe you outright with less convincing - but then you really need to take responsibility and tell them if you're not safe.

Well actually today for some reason Ive had a lot of anxiety and since seeing my T the thoughts of gone to wanting to Od and Im not sure why. I think about it. Like waiting til refill to OD on my lithium.

Idk why this is happenign

When I was on lithium I always dreaded refilling my lithium because oftentimes when I had a full bottle I thought about ODing on it. Maybe if your doc is concerned you can drop down to weekly refills? My pdoc did that for me for a few months just so I didn't have enough medication lying around.

No one knows but you guys about that thought. When I OD last year I researched doxepin before I took it. No one knows that either actually.
Im no suicidal but why do I think these things?

A lot of us have those thoughts, even when we're not actively suicidal or having suicidal ideation. For me, it depends on my stress levels, which are high right now and so those thoughts come up fairly frequently (at least daily). But I'm not depressed, and I'm not the least bit sui, so I'm not worried about it. It's just part of my mental landscape.

I found myself researching lithium. Then I started thinking how I could wait til I get it filled to take it etc. And Im like super hypersexual and at times am not myself...the anxiety..all of it is just bizarre. Its all coming from nowhere.

Death by lithium OD can be a long, painful one, and chances are you actually will just end up doing permanent damage to your kidneys. You need to let your pdoc know you have thought about this so he can limit the amount of lithium he prescribes to you at a time until these kinds of thoughts pass.

Im scared to tell her Ive thought these things. IDK what she will do.

My pdoc was concerned about my having lithium on hand while I was suicidal, and as a preventative measure, he wrote the prescription out for only one week at a time. It was a pain to get refilled every week, but it kept me from having a large quantity on hand while I had time to get past those kinds of thoughts.

Im constantly worried shes gonna wanna admit me inpatient somewhere for this stuff. This hasn't happened since Ive been her patient. She wasn't my dr when I OD last yr

That happened to me. For a whole year I was given 1 week at a time but I had had a very serious overdose on Lithium and anything else I got my hands on. It's a pain but safer.

Well...,

My Dr says Im in a mixed episode... and shes pretty sure I am a rapid cycler. Aparently shes seen 4-5 episodes since Ive started with her in like last 7 months..