[MuddyBoots]

I've tried writing things down but I feel like I look at the paper and it says "TELL HER YOU WANT TO COMMIT SPECIFIC FELONOUS ACTS" and I just think "nah, I don't want to right now. Haven't the entire 2 hours I've been up today, so I guess I'm better."

I never explicitly tell her a lie (if she asks about specific behaviors I'll say, "Yeah, was sleeping a lot, now a little," or "yeah, did a shyt ton of drugs."), but I might be in the midst of a two hour mood swing and of course that'll paint things differently than how the rest of the weeks/months looked and nothing else will seem to matter.

I feel like if I'm just straight up facts and don't lay on the pathos, I'm gonna get a Depakote increase especially considering I'm about to freak tf out

[Yaowen]

Originally Posted by MuddyBoots

I've tried writing things down but I feel like I look at the paper and it says "TELL HER YOU WANT TO COMMIT SPECIFIC FELONOUS ACTS" and I just think "nah, I don't want to right now. Haven't the entire 2 hours I've been up today, so I guess I'm better."

I never explicitly tell her a lie (if she asks about specific behaviors I'll say, "Yeah, was sleeping a lot, now a little," or "yeah, did a shyt ton of drugs."), but I might be in the midst of a two hour mood swing and of course that'll paint things differently than how the rest of the weeks/months looked and nothing else will seem to matter.

I feel like if I'm just straight up facts and don't lay on the pathos, I'm gonna get a Depakote increase especially considering I'm about to freak tf out

Hi.

If there is a secret to communicating with PDOCS, I don't know it. Most PDOCS are intelligent, educated, well-trained, experienced and can be helpful. Compassion and empathy, however can not be learned in school if there is not something to build on. PDOCS are human though and not gods.

I can understand one's reluctance to not share some things with them. Don't know how helpful that is to the process. I imagine it is best determined on a case by case basis, but I could be wrong. I am often wrong about things.

So sorry I could not be helpful to you in this matter!!!

[Crazy Hitch]

I usually make a list of 2 or 3 things in my head and memorise them and make sure I bring them up. Although I'm not perfect so I'm sure there's one or 2 things I've occassionally forgotten off my imaginery list.

[Victoria'smom]

My therapist always asks about symptoms. She is urging to write to my pdoc my symptoms. I explained why I didn't want to and she said whether I say it or write it it's all gets wrote down. So just say what needs to be said in as little words as possible.

[MuddyBoots]

But I don’t want to haha. At this point I’m worried if I say certain things and they ask follow up questions I’m not prepped on exact wording I’ll either be sent IP or have to outright lie.

But it’s okay because I accidentally missed my appointment, and now I have until next year to get my shyt together myself.

[Victoria'smom]

If you say certain things they can hospitalize you. But saying those things, without saying them, is a practiced skill.

[MuddyBoots]

Yeah, I can only do that when I have impulse control

[raspberrytorte]

I don't know if you can do this, Muddy, but can your therapist come to your psychiatrist appointments with you? I usually bring my therapist along and she remembers things that I forget, or helps me talk about things that I'd normally be too shy to bring up because I have a new psychiatrist I don't know very well.

[MuddyBoots]

I don't know if my therapist can, but there's a good chance someone from the ACT team can. The whole of them (T, CM, pdoc, others I sporadically talk to on the crisis line or for meds or whatever) get together and have a weekly meeting anyways. My CM said the team was a little horrified by some of the content of my dreams this week. There's nightmares, and then there's....why I'm so "creative."

[Frog4Life]

I have been with my psych for a long time and with him it is straight and to the point. I mean he doesn't have the time a therapist has to listen to all the gory details. I go in, tell him if symptoms have changed and whether they could be situational. I have become self aware through the guidance of my therapists. Appts are closer with med changes or mood changes. Longer apart if things are going "smoothly", although that is an exaggerated term. I believe in honesty as that is going to be the only way I am going to have appropriate care. Going ip sucks, but if I need it so be it. I like having some normalcy in my life. the roller coaster ride is never ending, but at least the track is not as bad.

[MuddyBoots]

Most of the time I'm certain if I'm honest without making them see things through my (maybe delusional, maybe on-point) eyes, they're going to use that against me. Like right now I if I mention my mood is very unstable, my pdoc is going to increase my Depakote even if I press that higher doses of Depakote than what I'm on reduce my life to sleeping, attempting to eat, puking, and becoming the loneliest person I've ever been because, surprise, people can't keep relationships if they don't talk or get out of bed for anything other than diarrhea and consuming more poison, oops, I mean the two grams of Depakote that is "totally okay to take because I probably just took it wrong before I did bloodwork and that's why my levels came back high." (Then I was given the wrong directions for bloodwork... )

The word "honest" implies telling the truth. How do you do that if you don't know the truth, and, unlike many others, don't pretend to know it so you let your head go beyond what you're told to accept as fact without any evidence? Is there a difference between that and "delusional"? What if you reach your own conclusions with what evidence you, yourself, saw and have learned through trial and error or taking notice of patterns, but that goes against what someone told someone else that told someone else that they saw on a bumper sticker with a grammar error?

If someone says "he's cheating on you." I don't think "he's cheating on me." I think "that person says he's cheating on me." Does that person believe that statement? Or does that person want me to believe that? Or is that person testing my response to that statement? etc.

So, when I see my pdoc, I'll say it's the norm:
lowest low: low
highest high: high
sleep: have slept none some nights, have slept 16 hours in a 24 hr period others, lots of nightmares
food: fk off and let me starve to death and no I'm not going to have any more fking protein shakes
suicidal? Would LOVE LOVE LOVE to, except I KNOW I could probably swallow a lit cherry bomb that goes off in me and wake up wondering why drinking hurts more than usual.
Substance use? Why do you think I'm not losing *an absurd amount* of weight since the last appointment? Munchies!!!!
At a subjective level, how do I feel? Like I'm microdosing bath salts.

[Victoria'smom]

What you're describing I tell them I'm all over the place and it's uncomfortable. That's enough. I don't have to go into detail. They'll ask me if I'm delusional and I'll tell them I don't know but xyz happened so there's that.

[MuddyBoots]

Nah. I'll probably be fine by the time I see pdoc. Either way I'll just tell her "all is tickety-boo except side effects, can I go down on the dep?" I know if I don't say I'm fan-friggin-tastic she'll want to kill me with the depakote (still kinda think she does at my current dose). My phone is saying I'm due to start my period soon too so maybe in a couple days I'll be kinda sane. I don't know how it can say that though. It's been 93 days, and before that it was 27 days, and before that it was like 5 or 6 months so...I don't think a fancy "pattern recognizer" can predict that.

I'm not going to tell them stuff that's going to be detrimental to my wellbeing.