Bipolar Check-in #81

Thanks, @raspberrytorte.

Yeah I tried gabapentin several times at various doses and it didn't work for me. I even accidentally took 3x of my dose for a week and it didn't make a difference.

Wow, so many people posted that I can't keep up with everyone! I have read all the posts, but I don't have time to reply to everyone, so don't take it personally if I don't reply to you.

@raspberrytorte
Are you reluctant to quit vaping b/c you fear the lack of nicotine will stall your weight loss? I know you said you wanted to lose weight. Or is it just that you crave it so much?

@Manarinorange
I do struggle with low iron levels and in the past have had 2 iron infusions b/c of iron anemia but even after the infusions when my iron was high, I still struggled with anxiety, I just stopped having pica (eating ice all the time). So iron may help but not always. However, if you have heavy periods, it is a good idea to have your iron checked. Getting the levels back up did temporarily help my energy. But taking iron pills is hard on the stomach and didn't get my levels up sufficiently which is why I had the infusions. Now, at last check in June, I didn't have anemia, but my iron stores were already low. I am taking 65 mg iron but it doesn't seem to be helping much and yes, it is hard on my stomach.

It wasn't raining this morning for a change! I went for my walk and am all sweaty, so I'm headed to the shower. I have groceries being delivered this morning, so I need to hurry up.

Edited:
The police came by this morning to look at the fence damage done by the large rental truck and to add our names & the neighbor's name to the police report, gave us a case number and the insurance policy of the rental truck that plowed into our power pole and fence. Our backyard fence is still a mess and we need to get it fixed but H was waiting to be able to file on the insurance for the truck.

Today is a good morning so far. I slept 8.45 hours which is the most sleep I have been getting lately. Thanks so much @Nammu - this experience is going to force me to shop outside of Amazon and start giving my business to other companies. I have just been too lazy with the convenience.

Yeah guys, these constant pharmacy trips are getting to me. Because of work and Galaxy Con I literally kept forgetting my psych meds there even though I had JUST went for my medical meds. I would absolutely hate to start missing some meds so it balances out to the same time - that doesn't seem like a good idea at all though.

I understand what you mean @June08 - I have a lot of resentment as well as grief as to the effects of being bipolar half of my life and what I did when it was untreated. It impacted me so much and I literally lost 15 years of my life to darkness. It's interesting because my lithium is about to be dropped, and I am the least amount of medication I have ever been, so it doesn't even feel like I have bipolar anymore, (despite my whiplashing mood swings, lol) - congrats on the coffee drinks at Panera! Yay non-alcoholic fun! You know I am all for it!

Wishing everyone a very peaceful and calm Monday - I have a lot going on today, including meeting with a new sponsee and therapy later. Hugs and stuff!!

I love non-alcoholic beverages. I LOATHE feeling drunk!

@Blueberrybook

No. It's not because I'm scared I'll gain weight. It's just because I like the nicotine high, so to speak, but I've decided that I'm going to buy myself something else with the twenty dollars I'd normally spend on an ecig on Wednesday. I'm already shopping online, trying to find something. Want to get some more Sleep Token merch. Looking at bracelets, but I already have four handmade ones coming in the mail. Yippie! But you can never have too many Sleep Token bracelets. 😍 Figure I'll "reward" myself each week I don't buy an ecig. And NOT with stupid things like food. Eventually I want to start saving money, but the first month is going to REALLY suck, so I want to treat myself each week.

@Scooter9

It sucks the gabby didn't work out for you. I have a MASSIVE gabby tolerance and take 800mg 4x a day. It kinda sucks. 😞

@LadyShadow

I have to stop at the pharmacy today. 🙄 Need to pick up loxapine, diazepam and seroquel. Ugh. I hate going to the pharmacy. I'm happy you had fun at Galaxy Con!!!

The SI has been wayyyyy too much lately. I just want to hike the Osceolas but I'm too tired to even drive there earlier enough to not park a mile away. Any other hike without overflow parking is off limits too. I wanted to knock the Franconia Ridge off my list this summer, but no way is that happening. Contemplated another T25, but I'd definitely not be able to do one of those even if my muscles did suddenly become as strong as an ox.

I need sleeeeeep, but I'm supposed to meet with my CM in a bit. Gonna treat myself to $.70 wings for lunch and get the hottest sauce and maybe I'll wake up a bit.

My anxiety is getting better. I found out Pepcid can cause panic attacks and anxiety and a whole bunch of other mental health stuff. So I stopped it and went back to my dramamine and zofran. I'm tired today from sleeping from 10:30 last night until 4:30 this morning and taking my meds without going back to sleep. I did 10 minutes on my treadmill and I drank an iced tea but I'm still pretty tired. Idk if I'll take a nap or not. Lately 40 minute naps have helped a ton with my physical and mental health.

drinking a mocha coffee shake and eating lunch at work. ugh so ready to be done with today. on another note its my nephews 15th bday! i cant beleieve hes so grown

Good morning/afternoon!

I slept really well last night, slept till almost 11am and I went to bed early, so it was a lot of good sleep. I have my volunteer shift with the rescue cats tonight from 6pm to 8pm. I feel pretty good today! I had some anxiety yesterday but I got through it. Meditating helped. I took a walk yesterday too and that was nice.

Tomorrow I have the adult coloring night at my library. Looking forward to it!

Right now I'm listening to music and enjoying coffee while I decide what to do today until my volunteer shift tonight. I have like 5 hours till I have to head out to it. So I might try to clean a bit. Maybe at least vacuum a bit. I finally got new filters for my vacuum, so I'm happy to try those out. Sometimes I get overwhelmed when I try to clean my entire apartment at once so I try to do some every day then do a larger cleaning at the end of the week/weekend. Trying to stay on top of it better because I was slacking on it a lot.

I have so much more energy since I started the vitamin D supplement my psychiatrist prescribed two weeks ago. I don't feel tired all day everyday anymore, I feel awake and alert during the day. I didn't know if it'd make a big difference but he said it could help that and I was very deficient in it anyway according to my bloodwork, so I'm glad he prescribed it. Also my mood is better, I feel less blah if that makes sense. Anyway, yeah it's nice Also I''m doing well on my meds in general. The abilify increase to 30mg and decrease in zoloft stopped the mania. I feel a lot calmer, and a lot more rational and am able to make better decisions that aren't impulsive or reckless. I also stopped overspending so I'm glad about that too.

I'm super excited to go see that movie I got tickets for on Wednesday. Thursday I have a therapy appointment. Friday I'm going grocery shopping. I invited my sister over not this coming weekend but the weekend after that. I'm gonna cook or bake something for us to have and have coffee together while she's here. Will be nice to see her.

Hope you all have a wonderful day

omg the drama of our business staff. they put a huge bean bag and a tv in oen of the cubbies. i was gonna move into that one bc im losing my office. all the others have names on them plus stuff in them. i said its fine ill jsut move over to the end but the office manager was liek nope take it. i said i am NOT gonna be the reason they get mad. they even had plans to bring in a fire stick for break. like wtf people need a space to work not sleep. such drama i swear.

As a result of my ridiculous anxiety, I have been having multiple BMs per day, which led to a case of hemorrhoids. I have been treating them with ointment but it hasn't been very helpful - lots of pain and discomfort pretty much all the time.

I read some articles last night, and they pointed me to suppositories. I went to the pharmacy early this morning and picked up a pack, and Hallelujah it worked! After weeks of suffering with these hemorrhoids, I finally have some relief! Looking forward to them finally healing!

Mood-wise, the absence of pain and discomfort is helping - I'm still low but not as low as before. I remembered my Klonopin today, so at least physically, the anxiety symptoms are a little lower, too. I'm still paranoid, and my head tells me everything is ok, but my emotional side is saying 'Beware!'.

I went to some dude's apartment after lunch (I met him before, I'm not going to get attached, we're good. Also my spicy af wings woke me up a little.), and he got a call, answered it on speaker, and who is it??? My/our therapist! He told her he's with Kamala Harris.. bit of a pause after that I feel like that whole thing violated HIPAA, but I don't think any of us cared (except T would but she won't know).

Now waiting for whenever my CM calls to meet up. She's always as early as 3 and as late as 4:30. Watch her show up as I'm sleeping in a Dunk's

I have to say I'm loving stability right now. It's not as exciting as mania, but what I relief not to have all those racing thoughts crowding each other out in my head. And I'm able to read and concentrate on TV shows again! H says I still have more energy than usual and sometimes he'll think oh, it's great, she has energy again and other times he'll think, oh, no it's still from the mania. So IDK, but I feel calmer and I definitely am calmer than I was, not sure if it's still some hypomania. I hope not and would like this energy to last.

I am doing my best to limit my caffeine. I am still drinking decaf coffee in the morning, and lately, I haven't had any panic attacks in the AM. By afternoon, I usually give in and have a diet Coke, but that is much less than 3 or 4 in a day. I'm trying to drink more water even if I find water pretty boring. I squeezed some lime & lemon into my water today, and that's helped some.

Speaking of how I have no money and a huge credit card bill I spent $177 on Whole Foods today! Who cares?? I had over $1700 on my EBT card! I know I can’t shop at Whole Foods like that all the time but it was fun and I got some suckers and popsicles that should help my dry mouth!

Damn. I'm getting overly excitable right now, to the point where I feel like I'm about to have a panic attack or something. Took a prn seroquel. Laying in bed in our darkened room, listening to music with my headphones on, trying to make myself relax. Jeez Louise! That extra 100mg of sertraline is definitely packing a punch now! Hopefully the seroquel calms me the fukk down.

Busy today. Had several errands to run before dropping off my car so the oowy can be repaired. The body shop is easy to work with. They had my rental waiting for me. Unfortunately it’s a black car. Aside from black being very hot, it’s harder to be seen. It’s also several years newer and has a ton of features on it that I’m not familiar with. Ugh, makes me nervous, sooo nervous. Called my daughter and canceled our standing Tuesday date. I’m not driving that car on the interstate with all the construction. I’ll just wait until I get my car back. I’m nervous enough driving my familiar car. I have a few appointments this week so I’ll just go to those and back. Ohh good news! A resident is going on vacation and said I can use her parking spot while they’re gone. Whoo no more stairs for a week or parking on the street!

My sleep continues to be awful. But I do get enough to keep me stable. I’m taking the increase on Wednesday night so I’m awake bright and bushy tailed for the yearly nurse assessment on Thursday . I have things I want to talk about with her and don’t want to be forgetful.

Boots, I’m so sorry you’re having such a hard time.

Scooter,

@MuddyBoots
Sorry things have been so hard for you lately When do you see your T again?

@Scooter9
Sorry about the anxiety. You have a lot going on right now, I'm sure that doesn't help.

@raspberrytorte
Sorry about the sertaline causing anxiety Did your dose increase recently? I know you have to be careful about AD triggering mania and anxiety if the dosage isn't right.

@Nammu
I'm sorry about your sleep. I hate it when I can't sleep. I have to be careful with sleep b/c if I get too little sleep, I become manic pretty quickly. Not sleeping well always scares me b/c of that.

@Blue_Bird
Sounds like you have a lot of good stuff going on!

HUGS to everyone having a hard time lately! Sorry to anyone I missed! It's a lot to keep up with! Hope everyone has a wonderful evening!

Today is hard I feel like a bad guy. My mom is crying a lot. I'm trying to get them to keep the dog. Dad worries she'll get stolen. I'm more worried she'll get hit or her skin condition will get out of control.

So a student has accused me of some horrible things at work yesterday. None of which are true. I'm getting a lot of support from the assistant principal who is backing me 100%. I've been on and off awake since midnight. I don't want to take my valium equivelant because I don't want to start falling asleep.

Going to see if I can talk to the principal tomorrow to put my side in perspective.

@Blueberrybook

I was weaning off cymbalta, so we had me on 30mg of cymbalta and 100mg of sertraline. At my last appointment we took me off the cymbalta and increased my sertraline dose to 200mg. Maybe I'm just going through cymbalta withdrawal. I don't know, but jeez! It's awful. I feel so weird! I'm also anxious about quitting vaping, so that doesn't help, and allergies are kicking my booty today. I'm laying in the dark again listening to music and took another 100mg of seroquel and 10mg of diazepam. Hopefully THAT combo will calm me down. For f's sake! For the love of Pete! I've also been getting minimal amount of sleep the past four nights because of my stupid period, which isn't good. Hopefully tonight I sleep better.

@raspberrytorte If your period is keeping you from sleeping that sounds like it may be a problem. It's been a long time since I had a period because I had a hysterectomy when I was 36 due to crazy periods with very heavy bleeding and pain so I don't remember what normal was like really but not like that... They thought I was going through early menopause but now it's been 12 years and I NEED to get through menopause to get on a drug to help prevent breast cancer and my hormones are still there although gradually things seem to be happening. But before my hysterectomy I had a Mirena IUD put in that they hoped would just control things until I got through menopause. For me it did not work because I seem to be very sensitive to hormones and it made my bipolar spin out of control until it was removed and then my bipolar immediately improved. But that's really rare, the first time my gyn or pdoc had seen it (although they found a 2nd case soon after with the new awareness from me so it does happen). I just bring it up because it sounds like you are suffering and there are ways to help.

For the first time since I was diagnosed just under 3 years ago, I heard my pdoc say the glorious words "You're in remission." I'm so excited about this! I'm choosing to keep seeing him once a month since this is new found stability. It turns out I can get a free drink at Panera every two hours, so I celebrated by getting myself a second drink (I had already gotten one on my way to my pdoc appointment).

Tomorrow is my last day of summer vacation. I'm hoping to get some final tasks done. I also have a chiropractor appointment.

Side note: I'm so grateful to have you all to share this remission news with. Outside of my counselor, who I don't see for a couple of weeks, I don't have anyone in person I can share this with.

I had a nice day. I didn't play my video game today as i'm frustrated with it. I'll leave it for the moment. It makes me dizzy and disoriented anyways. I noticed that with fractal videos as well. It makes it hard to get to sleep, too. Not sure what the future holds for my new discovery. I might be too old to take up video games.

I had a nice conversation with a handsome blonde blue-eyed man who came into the dog park this evening, about homeowning. He's excited because he just sold for $300,000+. He was impressed that i am a solo woman approaching the end of my mortgage. He said congratulations! It was nice to hear.

I took a shower and i am just so very pleased with my hair, which continues to shape up. It sure makes me unhappy to have ugly hair. I've shaved my head several times in my life due to bipolar and despaired after, it's so hideous. Hopefully i have learned my lesson this time. Act in haste, repent in leisure.

I slept from 4:30 until almost 7 and I woke up feeling perfectly fine. So I am guessing it was the pepcid causing the anxiety mixed with being off schedule with my meds that was causing the bad fatigue.

I see my kidney doctor tommorow and then my therapist after. And I'll have to explain to her how I was having a med reaction and thats why I was freaking out on Sunday in my email. I hope she takes It well. So far I haven't had an issue.

Very long exhausting day. I even had a nap at 6pm which is not doing me any favors right now because its almost 11:30pm and I am still wide awake. No naps!

I wore a pretty purple dress today with my purple eyeshadow and felt really good. I also met with a new girl I am sponsoring who is very new in sobriety and very nervous - we had a very nice first meeting and gave her some homework to do that my sponsor had suggested I start with for her. I think it's beautiful what we do in AA - I wish we had some kind of sponsorship when dealing with mental illness, like kind of an accountability buddy to help us go through hard times maybe that's what we have here on this thread? Either way I love it here!

My irritability is getting worse. Spoke to my T today and we discussed why I am so unfulfilled and irritable. I have always believed I was never bipolar and that I am just a straight up alcoholic because all of this started years ago

Possible trigger:

when I was first given pills from a careless psychiatrist, and I drank with them sending me in a downward spiral that lasted close to 20 years.

And honestly, I think all of this irritability is coming from the fact that I can't drink anymore, because that's how I've been used to dealing with my feelings for years. Now I have to find another way to deal with all this emotion. So exhausting!

Anyway, wishing everyone a good night and wishing all of you a good day tomorrow. May Tuesday be good to us! How crazy is it that August 2024 is two days away???

If the Pepcid is a problem then you need to call your GI. Pepcid helps either reduce or neutralize stomach acid (I don't remember which) and that helps heal your ulcers. Zofran and dramamine only treat nausea. They will not do anything to get rid of the ulcers.