[lunaticfringe]

This is mostly just to vent and complain, maybe some of you feel the same way especially if you see a psych nurse and not a doctor. I am on medications...I am not overmedicated as I have been in the past and I am not sure if I might even be on the low end of dosage for the meds I'm on. Don't get me wrong I don't like being overmedicated, but I still experience a lot of symptoms. The meds I'm on now still let a lot of my crazy shine through, almost always hypo/manic symptoms. I get very exuberant and gregarious, often going on long rants and saying/doing things I regret. The medicine seems to do juuuust enough to keep me living in one place and not taking off like I was prone to do before.

A funny thing happened recently. I was out with a few other people about a month ago, actually it was a group of all men besides me (I was with my fiance). I was feeling good and I think I was saying some pretty outlandish stuff or something because he looks me right in the eyes and says to me "You're a little bit crazy, aren't you?" in a way that I immediately took offense to. I proceeded to let this man have it I unleashed some verbal wrath on him in front of everyone there. We left the establishment and I continued to talk with him for the next ten minutes or so, explaining why it's not cool to say that to someone you don't know, that it's unkind, not ok behavior, and so on like I was his mom or something. He ended up apologizing. It was very awkward. I regret the whole event.

So my point here is that other people can clearly see that there is something off about me, which is unsettling. Anyone else have others notice your crazy? I don't think it's normal to be going on tirades like this. I think others are intimidated by my honesty and at times harshness. When I was on lithium I was a smaller person, mostly depressed and didn't talk as much.

I thank my meds because I can tell that right now if I wasn't on them my life would be complete chaos right now...but are they doing enough? On top of everything else I have spent all my money. $5000 gone. My problems are seriously too many to list right now.

Just frustrated with the low level of care I get from these poorly managed agencies. I only get 15 minute appointments with my psych nurse each time and it's just simply not enough time to explain everything to her and she doesn't seem to care that I still experience symptoms and she never explains anything to me, which is what I want.

I don't know .What do you guys think? I have now tried every agency in the neighboring town and am considering trying to find a good doctor in the nearest city, but honestly I can't really handle the undertaking right now.

[Slowbrains]

I keep getting rolly eyes from people who know me, when i'm hypo. Nobody of them knows about my condition but obviously they see something's going on.

I used to be very frustated with my care when i began to have some. It takes always a year to test new medicine. I know roughly how my mood swings during year and i can just wait and see how med works. If it didn't let's try another med for a year, woohoo... But i try to learn to live with that, i try to keep my meds as low as possible. I've had new med since april and i'm hopeful it'll give some relief to my depresive episode about to begin soon. I used to think it's me getting poor care but now i've realized this is just something that cannot be cured and it's just about chasing best medication & other tools to minimize symptoms.

[Victoria'smom]

Are you seeing a t at the clinic? I found the. To say what you need to. pdoc listens to there notes more than me. It gives you 6-8 hrs to explain and they see your symptoms.

[WibblyWobbly]

I've had people notice because I get really loud and talk a lot when I'm hypo. I'm in a good place with my meds right now though and my pdoc and I know each other well enough that I know what he's looking for in our appointments and he makes the right med adjustments based on what I tell him.

Your meds aren't doing the job if you blew through $5000. If the psych nurse isn't taking that seriously then you should definitely find someone else. If it's too much for you, you should ask your fiancé for help. These things will affect him too once you are married so he should take part in making sure you get the care you need.

[BeyondtheRainbow]

Your med doses are kinda low. I looked up Invega because I don't know it and while it doesn't have anything for bipolar (not approved for it apparently) this is what it says:

The recommended dose of INVEGA® (paliperidone) Extended-Release Tablets for the treatment of schizoaffective disorder in adults is 6 mg administered once daily.

The recommended dose of INVEGA® (paliperidone) Extended-Release Tablets for the treatment of schizophrenia in adults is 6 mg administered once daily

I'm pretty certain that when I tried to take Trileptal the starting dose was 300 mg. I could be wrong on that, it didn't work out for me and it was a long time ago but I think that may be a fairly low dose as well.

So you definitely do have room to go up and still be on quite reasonable doses.