Bipolar check-in #42

Welp, 1500 of Depakote, 30 of Restoril, and 50 of Thorazine got me about 3 hours of some of the worst quality sleep I have ever had. I did get a little drowsy, which was great, before laying down. But crazy, dysphoric dream/nightmare things. Not really sure what they were. Constant, constant, constant waking up, if I ever really was very asleep. Maybe that was it--maybe I just never really fully fell asleep.

Pretty sure we are basically out of med options here. Guess I am just going to have to take my version of the Christina approach and try to stop freaking about it all the time. Just ride it. Whatever happens, happens. I guess if I get tired, I will lay down.

On the plus side, definitely not psychotic at all really. Or manic. I guess the lithium plus the Depakote plus the Abilify are doing the trick and that's much appreciated. Onward.

@childofchaos831 You mentioned to Christina that ECT scares you. At least that's how I read that response. I have lots of experience with ECT having started it in 2015 and then continued with maintenance treatment every 4 weeks ever since then. If you'd like to direct message me with questions about any aspect of it feel free.

Have you always been a poor sleeper? Have you ever done a sleep study?
It may give you some insight.
I take visteril and melatonin and ear plugs and that usually works as long as I don't drink too much.
sorry you suffer.
bizi

On a whim, I bought a banjo ukilalie a couple of years ago and practiced every day for one month. I developed calluses on my finger tips that interfered with my work so I quit. It also was getting hard to play some of the advanced keys and my memory sucks so I quit.
Last year I gave it to a friend of mine who takes banjo lessons from my husband.
I think I spent just over $300 for everything...instrument, soft carry case and booklet.
bizi
I have bought cars on a whim so this was a much cheaper impulse purchase.

My doctor brought up ECT at our last appointment. It scares me too. I want to keep trying AD's instead of trying ECT because it genuinely scares the **** out of me.

Edit: the downside to that, is that AD's tend to make me a bit manic/paranoid so maybe ECT would be best. I don't know. I wish I wasn't so scared.

I feel quite well and optimistic today. I think the downswing I had been experiencing is hopefully behind me. I've taken steps to avoid triggers, the best I can, and to do more self-care. I have some activities planned for the future that I am more excited about, at the moment, than scared of. My sleep has been pretty much ideal this past week, and I feel just right, physically. Hubby seems happier, too, and that makes me happy. Even looking in the mirror today, I felt I looked brighter. I've been able to practice (and enjoy) mindfulness and savoring simple pleasures.

This weekend should be nice. A friend of ours invited us over for a Chinese New Years celebration. She's from China, so will be making lots of goodies. We enjoy hanging out with her. She's fun!

My dad called me a few minutes ago. We had a nice chat, but it was clear he's noticed my not visiting him. I'll have to see him no later than early next week. I told him I had been physically ill. That was not a lie, but I wasn't ill the whole time.

Sorry to hear that the calluses interfered with your work. That's a bummer.

That was very nice of you to give the ukulele to your friend.

I just signed up for guitar lessons so that I stick with it this time. Well, kinda... I had to leave a voicemail for the teacher to ask if he was still accepting new students. I hope he comes back and says yes because that would be fantastic!

How do you feel afterwards? I know it's basically causing a seizure... Do you feel shaky after? I remember at one time, people had to be IP for the initial treatment. Is that still the case that you know of?

Thanks, bizi, for the feedback. I started struggling in college, which I ascribed to living on the 3rd floor of a building on Broadway in NYC--quite loud, 24/7. Slept well in medical school I think, but then, all hell broke loose. I did my surgery residency at one of the most brutal programs in the country and we were on call every other night for 5 years. Call was obviously in the hospital and there was never a wink of sleep. I think that may have permanently messed me up. Even if you got to lay down for fifteen minutes at 4 in the morning, there was constant terror of the pager going off with yet someone else trying to die. I call it pager PTSD. Now, phone PTSD.

Anyway, maybe a sleep study. I dunno what that would do. I actually don't care what the name is of what I have, I just want to get better. But I will explore who does them here, how much they cost, etc. Thank you so much for your feedback.

I read a lot about melatonin and decided it didn't look like it worked. Maybe I am wrong.

Well you have been tormented for so long now. Meds just aren’t helping enough. I know many people who have ECT and then meds seem to work better. There are lots of people who have had ECT here that could give you lots of info. Maybe start a thread asking for info ??

Ahhh Fantastic ! I’m glad you are feeling so much better

When I first wake up I'm a little wobbly on my feet, but that's because of the anaesthesia. You're right that they're inducing a seizure, but it's only taking place in the brain. The body doesn't seize because the anaesthesiologist also gives you a muscle relaxant which prevents them physically reacting along with the cerebral seizure. To put it simply, I'm a little dizzy and unsteady, but not so much that I don't go to the coffee shop immediately upon leaving the hospital.


Initial course of treatments and IP stays. Yes, that was my experience for the simple reason that I live 2 hours from the hospital and they schedule 3 treatments/week (MWF) for 3 or 4 weeks to sort of get an extra boost at the start. So I would suspect that if you live close enough to the facility where you're getting ECT that driving back and forth isn't an inconvenience they'd be ok with that. Of course, you're going to have a driver to get you home so it may come down to driver availability over any actual clinical reason for IP. But it's not like you'd look back on a 4 week stay IP and bemoan the food and boredom of the ward. You won't remember the initial series at all, at least I don't. Now, however, I am much more alert and functional after ECT. I come home and do dishes, laundry, tune my bike up, all sorts of activities I wouldn't have thought possible in the early stages of ECT like back in 2016 when my maintenance was still every other week.

I've probably given you more than you were looking for. I hope I didn't bore you. Feel free to ask anything else that comes to mind.

It scared me, too, before I started it. In fact, I remained scared of it even after starting it, even after reaching the point where I wished I had started it sooner. It completely changed my quality of life.

I want to ask you though, what is it about ECT that scares you? I might be able to help with how you envision the procedure, thus reducing anxiety.

Well I know what causes my chronic inability to sleep and it goes back go my childhood.

When we are traumatized especially when it is directly involved with the ability to sleep, well maybe meds can help some , but in reality you have to get to the true trigger ... yours is a pager and pure fear it will always go off. It’s pretty easy to connect the dots for me now.. you need EMDR or trance work, that connection needs cut.. maybe just finding a pager in a thift store and physically destroy it might make a big change.

Trauma therapy is needed

Cold rainy day here

This viral crap just keeps going strong, sore throat and head and chest congestion is just stoopid

I have numerous things in my life i need to come to terms with , some medical and some is family stuff. Acceptance unfortunately just takes time.

"Thugs"... lol. I think that's a typo, but a funny typo. Just like when people type Latuda and it gets autocorrected to Latina. "Did you remember to pack your Latina for vacation?" "Omg I lost my Latina at the airport!"

Sorry... I had to. lol.

Anyways, I hope you feel better soon. That virus does not sound pleasant.

I also hope you're able to come to terms with what you need to.

Three things about it scare me:

1) Memory loss.

2) Anesthesia, I have a fear of anesthesia in general and the thought of having the procedure done 3-4 times a week at first and having to be put under each time scares me.

3) Stigma. I'm effected by the stigma of "shock treatment" and expecting bad things to happen just because it's so stigmatized.

My parents are understandably upset with my sister and her bf. My sister wants to go out to dinner for her graduation (which is fine), but she wants to go to an expensive place. The problem is that neither she NOR her boyfriend eat leftovers. They will eat like half of the meal (if that) and then not eat the rest. They are so ungrateful. (And we are talking like $100 a meal in downtown Boston. That's what she wants. Yes, it is ABSURD and way over the top.)

On top of all that, she wants my grandma to come, but my grandma has a hard time walking and doesn't like to venture far from her place. My sister is not budging and being a little b****. She doesn't automatically "deserve" anything she wants. Everything has to be her way and her way only. I can't wait until she starts her first job and realizes how much she is wasting, not just on food but also on clothes etc that she only wears once. She is going to go broke and I am not helping her. My therapist said not to feel guilty if I don't help her out of debt.

1)Interestingly, not everyone suffers memory loss. I know that getting unilateral ECT tends to result in less memory loss than bilateral ECT. Other than that I don't know that there's a way to determine or mitigate the amount of memory that will be lost. I've just taken a philosophical approach: It's a small price to pay for the new quality of life.

2)Anaesthesia also scared me at first, but the staff are so very professional they immediately put me at ease. I also trusted to statistical odds, knowing that they don't often have serious problems. Often the nurse in the OR would be standing next to me and put her hand on my shoulder or even hold my hand while I was waiting to drift off to sleep. It's all very reassuring.


3)There certainly is stigma attached to ECT. It's not the shock treatment portrayed in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest though. As much as there is stigma and misinformation out there, you can also find good facts on the WebMD site and the Mayo Clinic site. I think the Mayo page on ECT cites a study which found 80% efficacy whereas meds typically run around 30% efficacy.


I hope this helps. I'll watch for other questions.

Hi everyone! I had a great psychiatrist appointment and feel more hopeful. They listened really well and even said they were following my rambling train of thought when I apologized for it. My psychiatrist said he had some ideas for treatment, but just wasn't sure enough and wanted to get some more opinions. They are going to refer me to their colleagues for some additional evaluations. So I will see an OCD specialist and someone who specializes in women's mental health for the hormone issues. They will also schedule me for a neuropsych eval. They told me my situation is a mixed picture, and that I have some signs of bipolar and some of OCD, but neither are a classic case. Anyways I feel good about the outcome. I kind of wish I'd done it sooner, really. Will keep you posted!

Unbelievable, you are still struggling with congestive problems! BE GONE! * waves wand* really you need to give your lungs a talking too.

So today I got rear ended while on my lunch break. Very low speed, I didn’t notice any damage on the car who did it and it was a small car like mine, so I didn’t even stop (I only get 30 minutes for lunch). When I got back to work I checked the back of my car. No damage. So whatever. BUT, on my way home, *I*rear ended a school bus!!! Same deal, low speed, no damage. The bus driver came out and said I needed to be more careful (which I did, I should have been paying more attention, I didn’t think he would come to a complete stop at a yield sign) but let me go without calling the cops. Sheesh! Two accidents in one day! At least both of them were low speed and no damage. No police report, no car insurance claim. I will be more careful and I hope others will too.

I woke up out of a nightmare today. In my dream, RS was accusing me of cheating on him and threatening to break up with me. Just like my husband used to do. My husband once made me FaceTime him while I was grocery shopping because he didn’t believe I was where I said I was. And we had been married for like, three years at this point and I had never cheated on him. He was totally paranoid.

The more I think about it (usually in bed at night with RS next to me), the more I realize how much my relationship with my husband was messed up. He loved me, I know, but he was also hot tempered. He was always fighting with me over dumb ****. He was verbally abusive at times, paranoid. He never understood my illness. He always accused me of becoming depressed just to ruin his life and never tried to make me feel better. When I was depressed earlier this year, RS would just simply snuggle with me to help me feel better. That’s all I needed from my husband, but I never got it. When I first told RS I had bipolar, he set about researching everything he could. My husband could never be bothered. And then my husband fell into drugs and ruined MY life, financially and personally, and yet still blamed me. I loved him. A part of me always will. But I love RS more. We’ve only been together for a year and some change, but our relationship is amazing. I’m sure we will run into troubles as time goes on, but I trust RS more to weather the storms. The only reason my husband and I didn’t divorce was because he didn’t believe in it, and I couldn’t walk away. I hope I’ll never have that problem with RS.

I decided to keep my dog as i was having acute anxiety, trouble eating, trouble sleeping. My neighbor said my dog wasn't adjusting well either. She said my dog loves me too much and i can't argue with that. She says she's happy to help out more any way she can so things should go more smoothly. I am happy to have my little friend home and all to myself. I really value privacy, it upset me to be co-ordinating so closely with someone else regarding my dog's care. I'm so glad for long quiet days on our own.

I got out for lunch today and bought a can of my favorite strawberry-rhubarb-parfait tea. It was expensive but worth it. I can still smell it now, hours after having it. Mmm! Yesterday was Scrabble club and it was very stressful, not a relaxing way to spend an evening at all. I'm quite annoyed by some of the unsportsmanlike behavior from some of the novice players and unhappy to have lost one to this teen boy, but he's a rising star as the young men tend to be.

Mood is mildly depressed as is to be expected at this time of year. At least we saw the sun today and January is moving along.

Hugs to all who need them!

Doggies love their owners quirks and all. I'm sure all your dog wants is to be with you. He doesn't expect you to be perfect.

@Nammu: Thanks, i needed to hear that! I'm not an ideal dogmom, not an optimal dogmom but my dog is happy and healthy and adores me so i must be doing something right. It's just the depression messing me up. I sing to her, "Just you and i / Sharing our love together"! Isn't that the silliest thing?!