I think I need help.

I haven't posted on here in a long time because I've been caught up in school and work lately, but things are really bad, and I'm only asking for help so that I don't ruin my boyfriend and best friend's lives.

Since they upped my meds another 50 mg, I've been having really bad mania. Yelling at people over the stupidest things, spending money I don't have, racing around everywhere, getting irritated over nothing, feeling like I have no control over myself, the works. It's so subtle but it feels like someone's slowly reaching over and getting ahold of the wheel so that I'm drifting towards the ditch. I've tried talking to my doctor about it, but he doesn't think it's too serious and wants to keep me on this dosage so I can remain "stable" while I go back to school. I won't see him again until mid-October.

And then, all of the sudden, WHAM! Whiplash manic-depression. I use the hyphen because it's like the two are mixed together as opposed to the actual disorder. My dad said something rude to me and I locked myself in the bathroom and sobbed while I cut myself. I snapped harshly at my boyfriend for not being able to remember some insignificant detail from eight or so months ago. Today, someone stole my wallet, emptied it, and left it in the road. When I noticed it was gone, I drove around looking for it while screaming, crying, chastising myself, and destroyed the skin on my arm.

I've made an End Date. I don't have a concise plan yet but I have a few good ideas. I tried killing myself about a month ago but had to say goodbye to my boyfriend before I left and just couldn't do it. I couldn't face him knowing that I was about to ruin his life by stepping out that door, especially when he sensed it and said "I know you won't do that to me."

But god, I can't handle it anymore. I really can't. I don't have the strength.

I'm giving myself until this winter so I can experience the snow one more time. I don't know if I'll make it until then, but I can try, and I'll use the time to give my loved ones some good memories. I'm moving out soon so it'll be easy to get rid of my stuff without anyone really making a big deal about it. Everything's in my name, so I don't have to worry about that.

I just have to figure out how to pass the time.

If you really believe suicide is the only/best answer...you are in need of serious attention. Are you in therapy? If yes, you obviously need to bring this up, if not, then I strongly recommend you look for a good t.

You really need to understand what's really going on here....please don't take this the wrong way, please understand where I am coming from, but could all this really be a cry for help? Whether or not it is isn't the point...the point is you need to seek immediate help.

I wish you well and I hope soon you find peace.

You don't know me, but if it gets too much feel free to PM me...I am a good listener.

You certainly do need help, and you deserve it too. Your mind is lying to you, suicide is not a solution - there IS hope for you. As your mood has worsened since seeing your pdoc I would suggest you call him and be completely honest about where you are at, especially the suicidal thoughts and plans. This needs urgent attention and if you are on the verge of acting please take yourself (or ask your boyfriend or best friend to take you) to the ER department at hospital. Your life is precious. This is not your fault and it is a burden too big to carry alone. Keep posting here if it helps and stay safe.

Dear person,

You don't know me, and I don't know you. But, you have me in tears right now.

I will never understand your pain, but I do understand pain, and I know how it feels to want to leave and not come back. But, I cry because it hurts to think that your pain is so bad that this world will have to lose another innocent human being.

I know I can't stop you from doing what you ultimately feel is right for you, but I hope that you will give it a lot of thought.

Needless to say, I'll be thankful if you stay with us and give life another chance. It hurts ... it really hurts, but there's beauty and meaning in pain, and I want to think that you will see light at the end of the dark tunnel.

It may mean nothing to you, but today, you have touched me from afar. You matter.

Can you reach another doctor. With this kind of thoughts you need to change your meds, they are not working for you.

You sound like you're having a very adverse reaction to your meds, and as hard as it might be to believe right now, these thoughts that you "don't have the strength to make it" are lies of your manic-depression. If your doctor isn't taking you seriously, I'm sorry, **** him, you need to find someone else. I strongly suggest you print what you've posted here and either get to the ER, call your psychiatrist and demand to be seen immediately, or call 911.

Like you, I have BP II and PTSD. I came close to ending my life one day at the worst of my PTSD. I was sitting in the bathroom, on the toilet, sobbing, with a knife just ready to end it all. Something came over me and I ran out of the house, not knowing where I was going or what I was going to do. I didn't want my roommates to find me there like that. I ended up at a McDonalds down the street, where a filthy, homeless man was sitting out in front, begging. Suddenly it hit me that as f***ing endless as my pain felt, there ARE people who have it worse, and that even in my most insane state of mind, I still had something to be thankful about, even if it was just the fact that I had a bed to sleep in at night. I went in, bought him a bunch of food, and gave him the only $10 I had on me at the time, and just told him "hang in there." Walked over to a bus stop and just sobbed uncontrollably at the thought of how close I came to destroying the lives of my family and friends by leaving them.

Please realize that you DO have the strength, because you stopped yourself before when you realized how much this would hurt your boyfriend. You DO have the strength, otherwise you wouldn't even be here to have written this post. Don't let your manic-depression fool you into thinking that it will be easy for your loved ones to "get rid of your stuff without anyone really making a big deal about it." That is a horrible lie, and deep down inside, you know it.

I'm not you, I don't know you, but I wish I could do something right now to fix you and take everything bad you feel away. I'm crying and shaking writing this now, because everything you said makes me remember exactly how I felt when I started believing I couldn't take it anymore, just like how you said. It is the most powerful lie ever, and I can't stand the thought of you believing it. If a stranger halfway across the world feels this strongly for you and your situation, just imagine how exponentially stronger your loved ones would feel about you if they knew what you just bravely told us here.

As long as you're breathing, every single moment is a chance to turn it around. Please don't give up on yourself. You want to give your boyfriend, best friends, and loved ones good memories? Then don't do the one thing that will ruin every memory they have of you now.

You CAN beat this. You are NOT alone. Please, please, please, call your doctor or get to a hospital. You and your life ARE worth it. Please.

I'd get a hold of your dr. Asap... I agree I think your having a sever bad reaction to your meds... I went down the same road with Prozac and a few others.... it's no joke but please remember meds can help to make you stable and therapy can help you stay stable.. you can do this.

But didn't the sui thoughts come before the increase in meds?

Thank you so much for all of your kind words.

allme - I'm not in therapy. I can't afford it right now and the only insurance I have is through a Native American hospital, which is an hour and a half away. I can't afford the gas for that every week. I had some suicidal thoughts while I was on the meds, but they didn't get as bad as they are right now until the increase. Does anyone know what a "good" dosage is for lamotrigine?

Wander - I really want to be honest with my doctor, I'm just hesitant because I don't trust him and I'm worried he'll have me sent to a mental hospital. It's the last thing I need right now.

lilodian4ever - I'm so sorry I put you in a disarray. But your kindness has truly touched me.

Double Edge - Thank you so much. It's weirdly amazing to hear from someone who has exactly what I have, and to have seemed to even go through the same experiences as I have. This life is so beautiful and I wish my pain wasn't always fogging the glass.

I can really identify with how you said your "pain fogs the glass." I've often felt like I'm separated from everyone else around me, even the ones who love me, by these glass walls. People can see in, and what they see looks okay, but when I look out, nothing is really right. It's all distorted and the world is wrong, and no matter how I try to get out, I can't break the glass, it gets harder and harder to see out, and these horrible thoughts of depression get louder and louder with nowhere to run. And the whole time, from the outside, everyone else just sees something totally different than what my reality is.

You asked what the therapeutic dose of Lamictal is: it's 200mg. I started Lamictal/Lamotrigine myself just under three weeks ago because the Wellbutrin Xl I've been on for a year has stopped being effective. As soon as I started Lamictal, it was like the floor fell out from under me with my depression, and that was just at 25mg. I'm on day #3 of 100mg, and so far it's been this rollercoaster of very unpleasant, violent suicidal thoughts just running through my head, especially very weird ones I've never had before, every day. Also been having very weird, disturbing dreams almost every night. Before I started taking it, I had suicidal thoughts, but they maybe were a few times a month. Nothing like this.

A few days ago, it suddenly dawned on me that I had a very easy way out, a box of fentanyl leftover from an injury I had four years ago. If you don't happen to know, fentanyl is an extremely strong opiate painkiller, one you absolutely cannot take unless you already have an opiate tolerance. I was prescribed it after having taking 60-80mg a day of oxycodone for months for a herniated disc and still being in pain. Fentanyl helped me then, but basically, if I were to use it now, I would stop breathing.

As soon as I realized all this, my rational mind knew I needed to throw it away, but my depressed mind wouldn't let me. My depressed mind kept telling me to keep it, because if things get too hard, then it would be so easy to just to put on those patches and never wake up. I battled very hard with whether or not I would tell anyone about this... I always tell my pdoc/tdoc about my suicidal thoughts, but this was something... more. So yesterday, I told a close friend about it, and how it bothered me that I couldn't throw it away. She thanked me for telling her, then said if I couldn't throw it away, then give it to her. I said I would think about it.

Today, I told my tdoc about all of this, and how it really bothered me that there was this part of me that wouldn't let me throw it away. She very plainly told me that she did not give a f*** WHY I didn't want to throw it away, because it was completely irrational, coming from my depression, and very likely coming from starting new medication. She reminded me that I was in a very vulnerable state right now starting a new medication, that I'm not even at the the therapeutic dose of Lamictal yet, and that there was no reason to have anything around me that could hurt me if I became so vulnerable that I lost control when my feelings changing for the better are just right around the corner.

At the same time—and this is what really mattered—she told me that all my thoughts were real, that my feelings were real, and that I had no control over feeling them. And she validated the fact that that is truly terrifying. Thoughts you can't control? Seriously, what the hell, that's unbelievably scary. My depression and possibly medication are filling my head with irrational thoughts, and when I sit back and look at them, I KNOW they're aren't rational. I KNOW that I should throw it away. That doesn't make feeling like I should keep the fentanyl any less real, and it doesn't invalidate that these very real suicidal thoughts keep running through my head. What matters is the fact that I can identify them as irrational, because that means I can now choose a constructive behavior that actually helps me.

I'm sharing all this with you because I just want you to know that feeling suicidal just isn't rational, at all, but it happens, and many times, it happens A LOT. It might seem rational, but it's not, they really are just these terrible lies over which you have no control from coming into your head. But you DO have control over what you do with them, even when these thoughts really make you believe that you are powerless and helpless against them. None of that is true. You have to keep telling yourself that these thoughts aren't rational or true.

I'm also sharing this with you so you know that you aren't alone. I'm struggling too right now, and I haven't struggled this hard since that close call I talked about in my last post. I haven't even had the strength to admit to my husband how I've been feeling because I don't know how he would handle it. And all in the face of what should be an objectively "great time" in my life. I'm in my last semester of undergrad, I'm graduating with honors, I'm planning to go to graduate school, I just quit a horrible job I hated and started one that I love... yet these absolutely horrendous thoughts fill my mind. It's utter madness, but my thoughts are uncontrollable...but they're just thoughts. My behavior is what's real. It's what I do with my thoughts that counts, and the same goes for you too. No matter what kind of truly horrible thoughts fill my head, I still can choose to do the opposite, and so can you.

I'm sorry to hear it's so difficult for you to get regular help because of distance and finances. I'm really sorry to hear that you feel you can't trust your doctor... I know that makes things even worse. (I once had a psychiatrist for couples therapy asking after two sessions if we were ready to "fly free" when that now-ex was physically abusing me. That made me doubt all psychiatrists/psychologists for years afterwards.) All of that makes a horrible situation feel even more hopeless.

If you tell your doctor how you really feel though, chances are he might either change your medicine completely or have you increase the dose to get to therapeutic levels faster so it can actually start helping you. With this medicine, as long as you haven't developed the dreaded rash from it, those are really the only two acceptable answers you should be getting from your doctor when you have urges this strong. Otherwise, you really need to find another doctor who will take you seriously.

You really aren't alone though. If for any reason you feel like you can't take it anymore, and you feel like you can't call anyone or tell anyone about it for any reason or get to somewhere safe, or you feel like you're out of options because of money or distance or anything, please just know you can call the suicide hotline at 1-800-273-TALK anytime 24/7.

Above all, I just wish and hope that this helps you remember that you're not alone and that you can beat this. You CAN and I'm really betting that you WILL. Your life does NOT have to end this way, and there's absolutely no rational good reason why it should. Just like I have absolutely no rational good reason why I should keep a box of fentanyl "just in case." I'm going to throw it away. I wish that you can throw away your plans too and hang on.

These illnesses we have are not our fault and they take us on long, twisted, f***ed up paths sometimes, but one of the things that's helped me hold on so long is believing that if I can even help one person by sharing what I've been through, then all of it will have been worth it. I am just going to believe with everything I got that that one person ends up being you. Please hold on and just don't give up. BP II is the worst because of how much time we spend in depression, but there are so many people who have been saved from it once they've found the right medication. You and I both just need to get there, one day at a time. It will happen. I'm not going to give up and you don't have to either.

I want to thank you too, because your post and replying to it made me realize how serious my own thoughts were and how much I was in denial about them. It's incredibly brave of you to post what you did here, and even though you didn't mean to, you ended up helping someone because of it. I hope that helps you see that your life is worth living, because you helped me, and I honestly can't say I know what I would have done in the next few weeks without the wake up call. Thank you, so, so much for that. Please keep being strong.