Bipolar Check-in #74

I like the new picture.

I like the new one too @Scooter9

@LadyShadow please take care of yourself

I’m still awake and it’s almost 11pm- this is the latest I’ve stayed up for a few weeks at least! (Without either a nap or going to bed and waking up at 11 )
I’ve been trying hard to look after myself and do everything I can to stay well. Maybe it’s working!
Im still waiting to hear about a p doc. I asked if I could stay in primary care but they said no.
I don’t understand why I can’t just see how it goes.

i joined my adhd group tonight and did what I said I would do which was good!

Anyway, I hope you’re well!

[QUOTE=Scooter9;7327784

She recommended an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP) to find out if there's anything they can do for me. I'll find out what will happen with that in a few days.

This new one doesn't look that great at this tiny size - I might put back the old one...what do you think?[/QUOTE]

I like the new one too.

I hope the IOP works for you. I've never been able to do one because of distance but have heard good things.

Why would they kick you out of primary care? You still need that. Or would the pdoc take over all needs?

Thanks everyone, I'm glad you like the new avatar image! I'll keep it like this!

Had my first surgery follow-up yesterday. They were thrilled at how well my incision was healing and got the staples out. The PA I saw was also pleased at the range of motion I exhibited with my neck, with no pain or soreness I might add. All of that was good!

What was infuriating, however, was the fact that my return to work date changed twice in the course of my visit! I left the office with a June 5th return day. Eight weeks from yesterday. That was changed 10 minutes after they said six weeks from the day which was itself a change from the surgeon's estimate of approximately four weeks from the surgery day two weeks ago which was itself a change from his staff's estimate of six weeks from surgery day.

Now I don't expect surgeons or doctors to try and micromanage their staff, but if anything would qualify for clear, plain and direct orders from "on high," wouldn't recovery time qualify?

I am cognizant of the fact it's only been two weeks and that while I feel OK, those cut muscles are still healing. Ten weeks though? Especially after they praised my progress! I'm tempted to set my own return day around the end of May and see if I can't get them to sign off on it. For the meanwhile, I'll just keep around the house.

On a less dramatic front, my paranoia around the primary care doctor visit that was scheduled for me turned out to be unjustified. They touched base with me about the surgery, checked my incision, checked the labs the hospital did and decided, barring any illness or injury, I didn't need to come back for a check up for a year.

Now to watch some Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown!

Hopefully IOP will be very helpful. I think at times it would be a good thing for me but closest is at least 1.5 hours away so it’s not doable.

Beautiful pic! I’m fascinated with these pictures.

Keep hanging in there

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I went out today as i felt restless but i was too uncomfortable so i came home hastily. I used to love going out and spending hours in diners and cafes studying, playing games and reading the newspaper. Everything turns to ****.

In good news, no sign of my hypomania and i feel faint hope that i'll skip it this year.

I'm not too proud of the homebody i seem to have become. COVID's part of it, all those months in lockdown really got me out of the habit of going out. Well, at least i keep my dog company.

@Aurelius710:

Delighted to hear you are healing so well but i can see how frustrating the fluctuating return-to-work dates must be. Personally, i like to err on the side of caution with physical health recovery.

Steve is overflowing with stress.

Chaise met with the FAA today. He needs to be cleared by a Cardiologist to fly again which was expected after the event. Chaise is having daily panic attacks. Poor kid.

Our advice to him is see Cardiologist and get cleared to fly again and just take a desk job for a while.

On a happy note our weather has been nice last couple day. Appreciating the good stuff no matter how small.

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Oh, I do too, but since I'm relying on family and friends for financial support (see the whole short term disability fiasco pre-surgery), it's helpful to me and them to know how long I'll need their support and support in general.

Although, if the TurboTax software wasn't lying to me, I should have a combined $958 tax refund coming which would put all of those financial worries to rest for a while. My worry is that an overly ambitious bill collector (All the creditors I have should know at this point that I'm laid up and can't pay them.) tries to garnish some or all of my refund. I hope I'm being paranoid, but it happened with my state refund last year.

Fingers crossed nothing happens! I really need that money!

Oh I didn’t mean they’re kicking me out, sorry if that’s how it came across. I just meant I asked if they would manage my bipolar disorder and my meds in primary care but they said no they couldn’t because of my illness and how unwell I can become. So they’re referring me to secondary care for that. They will still cover everything else.
I get that it’s a difficult balance and of course I have the option to not engage, but I want my meds and I want to stay well, so I will of course engage.

I’m sorry to hear you have so much stress around you, that must be very difficult.
I hope you manage to enjoy the nice weather

Hi everyone. I'm still around, just been hanging around other parts of the forum. I've been doing very well lately. Absolutely no psychotic symptoms. Usually I hear some whispering or mumbling or see some spiders or something nothing major every now and then, but on my Haldol/Vraylar combo there is literally nothing. Not even an ounce of paranoia except when it's warranted.

I'm looking for places to volunteer. I'm especially interested in this farm in the next town over. Also looking at the animal shelter, fish and game, and the local park. I realized I was in an abusive relationship and went NC with. Literally everybody in my life was ecstatic when they found out he was out of my life, except my mom who didn't know shyt about what he was doing to me.

I hit a real low with my bulimia about two weeks ago. Around 2am I had a binge/purge session and I went outside in the woods behind my house to purge so I wouldn't wake my mom up in case I made a lot of noise. Now this was the fourth time I b/p'd in the past 20 hours. After I just kinda laid there, and I was shaking, and I couldn't get up for like an hour. It was scary. I only b/p'd 4 times since.

I'm worried my spring/summer mania is coming back. Last few days I've been waking up at 3am frustrated the sun isn't out because I want to go for a run. We need a 24 hour gym around here lol. Running on a treadmill isn't comparable to running through the woods, listening to all the birds, smelling all the pine sap, maybe seeing some bear scat and hoping you're not running FROM the bear, feeling that crisp, clean air in your lungs though. should take my PRNs more often though to avoid another episode. I will. I really will.

Anyways, sending hugs to all of you, and extra love to those who are struggling

Hi guys. It's me but I changed my avatar. Some people don't know that Snoopy was an avid writer and there were many, many strips devoted to his attempts to write and publish. I actually have a book about Snoopy as a writer. Also, Charles M. Schultz's son Monty was a writer.

Today I had a crisis/breakdown and managed to resolve a problem with my novel. I've written 10 chapters but realized (by doing a plotting workbook) that I have to move one of the subplots to later in the novel and re-structure the rest. So I'm going to have to start again at Chapter 3.

However I can obviously keep the material I wrote for later

As bad as this feels, I would rather this happen NOW than realize after writing the entire first draft that it doesn't work. Been there.

Hugs and best wishes to all

I'm in the US, as of last night NJ time. The first leg of the trip (Prague to Paris) was fine, but the much longer one to NYC was quite awful. I had a terrible seat with zero leg room, and I'm 5' 7" and had an aisle seat. The young guy next to me (an inner seat) was a tall Parisian. He was clearly uncomfortable, but seemed much more tolerant of it, probably because of his youth. He was somewhat friendly and quiet, which was a relief. Of course I couldn't sleep at all, despite taking all of my evening meds plus an Ativan. I only got about four hours even after arrival when I finally got into bed. When I got through baggage claim, I was hoping to see my airport pickup guy waiting for me. Instead, I had to struggle to call him and then struggle to get outside to the "private pickup" area outside the terminal. He wasn't even there yet. I confess I was fuming. It cost $350 for that one-way car ride and was the cheapest quote I got.

Once I finally got into the car, I calmed. He got me to my dad's house at around 10:30 pm NJ time. Remember that's 4:30 am Czech time, after several hours in the air with a few hours in the Paris airport. I had gotten up at about 6 am Czech time (12 am NJ time), so it was almost 24 hours that passed. When I reached my dad's no one was waiting to greet me. I'd really hoped my sister would. The door was unlocked for me, though. I walked in and the place was worse than I had even remembered it. Filthy vile conditions (unhealthy) and stinking bad. It was a sort of punishment even using the toilet to pee. I thought I'd just go upstairs to sleep (the only room that was deemed usable). Before lifting a cover, I'd decided to sleep in the clothes I wore the past 24 hours. I then checked the bedding, given the room condition. I lifted the pillow to find a live cockroach crawling out quickly. Was the final straw! I managed to call my sister and demanded she come to drive me to a nearby hotel, which she did. Of course, like all other things, I paid for it. I couldn't stay with her because her house is a near hoarding house and almost equally as unsanitary as my dad's, which was my late brother's doing.

As soon as I woke up, I called Hubby and begged him to find me an Airbnb downtown. He did find me a very nice place, and the least expensive place in a "walkable to most things" distance. But it's still not cheap. Few are in the US, and fewer in NJ, especially in a touristy town like mine. That's x 6 days that I originally thought would be $0 per night out of my pocket.

I spent most of the day with Sis doing some research and phone work, mostly. Stressful, too, and already there are some uncomfortable ideas on her end (born mostly from her husband) that I declared unreasonable/unfair. Won't go into details. Towards about 4 pm I was already super tired from jet lag. When she dropped me off at my Airbnb, she said something like "Well, I'll see you either tomorrow or the next day." What???!!!!! And I expressed this. So she thinks I've come to be basically a tourist (without a car) in my own hometown? Alone. My dad's house is actually on the outskirts in a more rural area. It can be reached by foot, by young and highly in shape people, but that's not me, at this time. I know the walk and getting there is about four times harder than the opposite, given several steep long hills.

I talked to Hubby later. I wanted to reach towards him for support, but he's equally stressed at home. This is the most stressful challenge I have needed to endure since my psychiatric inpatient years. I am stable still, but feel I'm hanging on so by just a few threads. If comparatively little progress results from my early stay, I will regret it, deeply, on many levels.

Oh soupe! that sounds so stressful I’m glad your trip itself was ok but so sorry you couldn’t at least sleep. Sorry too about your dads house, eww cockroaches!

What a shame, @Soupe du jour
I’m so sorry that all sounds awful!
Would it help to talk to your sister about this?
Or is that not something that would help the situation?
I’m so sorry you’ve been through all of this!

And @Samicat , well done on your realisation and good for you for working on your book! That’s excellent! Make sure you’re not too hard on yourself and give yourself some credit

I think I’m managing to pull myself through this dip of my mood, hopefully! I go through waves of being overwhelmed by it but here’s hoping!

I think I should continue to stay off alcohol as that probably doesn’t help!

I have a very busy and overwhelming day tomorrow so I’ll see how that goes at work! Urgh.

I’m just so tired all the time, it’s so frustrating. I went to sleep at 7pm and I’ve just woken up at 2.30am and I’m away back to sleep in a few minutes.

Anyway, I hope you’re all doing as well as possible

Sorry soup I was hoping everything would go smoothly.

So sorry you are going through that, Soupe. I wish you the best with it all.

@Soupe du jour

I am so sorry you’re going through that. It sounds so stressful! On top of the two deaths close together it sounds near unbearable. So proud of you for keeping it together! Good luck with everything. My mom is a hoarder so I know how terrible the house must be. I’m not looking forward to helping my mom clean up.

My depression is just terrible. SH and SI thoughts abound. What’s worse is my self esteem is in the toilet. I’m so depressed and feel so worthless that



Yesterday RS was upset bc he doesn’t understand why this keeps happening. He said he just wants to get it back to when we first started dating. I know he’s frustrated. Not with me but with the situation. I did go for a walk to appease him.

I feel like maybe I’m just not trying hard enough. Maybe this is all my fault, I let myself fall into this. Maybe I just need to try harder to climb out. But idk what to do to do that.

I did get my pdoc to see me earlier. He won’t put me on Emsam bc he says it’s too complicated and requires too much lab work. He bumped up the lexapro to 10mg and told me to add vitamin D3 and folic acid. So many pills. I asked if I should go back for more ECT and he said I could but let’s see if the lexapro helps first. Idk. I just don’t know what to do. I think I’m being a big whiny self pitying baby.

I have a pdoc appointment today. Theres no need for him to do anything. My meds are fine. My physical issues are tough. I started having bleeding and it freaked me out, confused me, made me feel dysphoric. My mom wasn't home so I texted her and asked how to send a message to my endocronolgist through the portal. She told me how. I didn't know if he was the right doctor but I figured he'd understand about the dysphoria part. Anyways he got back this morning and was super nice and he said becauase of the stomach pain I've been having lately and now the post hystrectomy bleeding, he urgently wants me to see my gynecolgist. And now I'm freaking out. Like what is going on with me, what tests will they do, plus I am a ****ing man with a full beard going to a gynecolgists. I was in severe stomach pain last night for some reason. I only had a couple sips of a caffeine free Coke and a grape Uncrustable. I was in so much pain I almost had to get my mom. But I took some tylenol and my other stomach med and I ate some saltine crackers and my stomach calmed down and I fell back asleep until 6:15. I took a valium after reading the message from my endocronolgist so I feel decent right now but still not very hungry and I have this BOGO chipotle coupon my moms been bugging me about for awhile thats going to expire in a few days.

Thank you for your supportive post above, @wildflowerchild25! And thanks to all who've been supporting me so kindly these many months!

Wildflowerchild, I have experienced similar to what you describe in the past. I remember a lot the "want to run away" desire. Once I even booked a flight to San Francisco and started making plans. Hubby found out and I was able to cancel it back then. I forget exactly what happened then, but I did get passed it. I know reading this likely doesn't ease how you're feeling now, though. Just know that it's the illness speaking. I realize it's been super challenging you for a very long while. Don't let it get you, as painful as it is. You are a lovely person with people that love you. Even if you didn't have the latter, you still deserve happy easier times. Patience can seem a dirty awful word, but it is worth having.

I don't know why my brother and sister created homes of squalor. It wasn't anything learned from my parents or grandparents. Before my dad became ill enough to go to assisted living, I remember him voicing that he wanted to move out of his own house to live in an apartment, because of my brother's habits and other behavior. As for my sister's house, most of the hoarding is from her husband and my eldest nephew. But my b-i-l's parents kept their home neat and clean, too. My sister seems to now see the squalor as almost normalized. I wonder if my refusing to stay in my dad's house seems to her as some form of insult, given her living conditions. I have tried not to lecture her about it, but have brought up that it is not normal and they are unhealthy conditions in live in. Like many hoarders, they are hesitant to let anyone in. They almost refused to let me come in to even eat lunch with them (on my lap). The excuse was that they had no chair for me to sit on. I told my sister she could just move enough for a little space. Her house is actually a nice one, minus the hoarding and squalor. After over 30 years her kitchen cabinets have yet to ever have doors. Obviously all of this is born from mental illness. Illness that they refuse to properly address.

Feeling like you deserve suffering - that's something I often experience. Yet I've had plenty of suffering and I'm sure you have. A feeling doesn't make it real - that's self hatred speaking. Nobody deserves that kind of suffering.


I'm not sure that your pdoc not putting you on Emsam is reasonable if it has worked for you in the past. I know that many people with treatment-resistant depression find relief from the MAO inhibitors like Emsam.


You have an illness just like someone with epilepsy or MS has an illness. I hope your RS understands that this is not within your control.

I hope they don't see your refusing to stay at your dad's as an insult, but that's not within your control. I'm sorry they are hoarders as I think that must be awful, but like you say they are refusing to deal with the underlying mental illness. And it doesn't sound like you are judging them for it. Please don't give yourself guilt on top of your emotional burden of dealing with your dad and brother's death.