[Brentus]

Any good treatment plan is multimodal and have “pillars” .

Education — learn all you can about your condition and how to manage it

Medication — Crux for most conditions and being able to have quality of life.

Social support - having therapists, mental health forums, friends and family etc. to help you.

Self-care — diet, exercise, sleep etc. all play into mental healthy integrally and aré important.


Where do you have the strongest connections? What “pillar” carries you? Where do you lack?

Curious to read answers!

[Mountaindewed]

My strongest connection is social support

I'm lacking in self care

[Moose72]

I have some key people in my life for social support. One happens to be a therapist MSW in addition to formerly being a behavioral pharmacologist- he researched new psych drugs! I also have a good friend that I talk with on the phone every night for an hour before bed.

I’m terrible on self care though I do tend to eat healthfully. I am creative so I enjoyed videoing my son and his dad singing together this past Sunday.

I’ve been diagnosed bipolar 1/sza for 20 years now so I’m pretty well versed on the disorder. I’ve run through just about all the meds out there, unfortunately. My next option is ECT. Pnurse and I have yet to have a serious talk about it but she did mention it at one point.

[June08]

My strongest one is medication. It took forever to find a med combo that mostly works for me and, without it, I'm a mess.

My weakest spot is social support. I don't have any close friends and, outside of this forum, the only person I talk to about my mental health is my pdoc. And, while I feel very seen/understood by him, it's not a very long or in depth conversation since appointments are usually only 20ish minutes and we have a lot to cover.

[Blue_Bird]

I would say I’m good on medication, education and self care. The one that’s lacking a bit is social supports cause I don’t really have many IRL friends

[Moose72]

Originally Posted by Moose72

I have some key people in my life for social support. One happens to be a therapist MSW in addition to formerly being a behavioral pharmacologist- he researched new psych drugs! I also have a good friend that I talk with on the phone every night for an hour before bed.

I’m terrible on self care though I do tend to eat healthfully. I am creative so I enjoyed videoing my son and his dad singing together this past Sunday.

I’ve been diagnosed bipolar 1/sza for 20 years now so I’m pretty well versed on the disorder. I’ve run through just about all the meds out there, unfortunately. My next option is ECT. Pnurse and I have yet to have a serious talk about it but she did mention it at one point.

I should add that my friend that I talk to every night before bed also comes to visit me once or twice a month. (He lives 2 1/2 hours away.)

[raspberrytorte]

I'd say my strongest is social support. I have a very supportive family and I have my therapist/case manager and my psychiatrist.

I think what I'm lacking in is self care, but only in the exercise aspect. I eat healthy and have been getting enough sleep as of late.

Also, I'm pretty stable on my MASSIVE med combo. I'm good as long as I don't try going off something.

[MuddyBoots]

Ha, my “official” treatment plan has practically none of these other than “will be compliant with med management,” but has “decrease drug/alcohol use to less than 3x a week,” “use DBT skills 2-3x a week,” “use CBT skills 2-3x a week.”
(Why my treatment plan makes it okay to do meth as long as it’s only 2x in a week, I don’t know). (Why it says use DBT 2-3x a week vs a day idk either)

Out of the pillars you listed though, I’d say I’m best at education (at least I know enough that I know jack), and worst at self-care.

[bizi]

I would say that I am stable on my meds now that we found the correct dosages. I was hospitalized for a month until they found the right doses of my new meds. I got off of geodon because it stopped working.It was so hard being psychotic but I was safe in the hospital.

My support system is good I suppose. My immediate family does accept the fact that I can be cruel and not really explain mys elf. Why would I hurt my mother verbally when my anger was at my father. They could not see I was hypomanic. my sisters abandoned me. You would think that I had not been cruel to my family, and that was against my nature to do that. They thought I was evil.
anyway I skipped christmas that year. And went on a cruise with my friend and we had all kinds of fun together.
any ways I have not spoken to my friend in years. she moved to atlanta. my other friend moved to TN. we try to talk on the phone at least monthly. some times2 months. She says she wants to move back here to lafayette LA.
I would be thrilled for that. She has a lot of friends here. and she and I can get back into our friendship.
I have one friend that we get together every so often for lunch. She is taking the weight loss injections and has lost 42 pounds.She takes the minimal amount for maintenance But she still is losing weight. She looks great You can really tell that she has lost weight.

any ways. my husband is my primary support person but he doesn't get it all of the time.
He doesn't recognize when I am hypo, I have to tell him. I can go from hypo to full blown manic in a short amount of time. I have lost 24 pounds in 5 months. I still look pregnant. I am no longer in the obese range for my bmi I am in the overweight charts. So I am happy about that.
I am eating well trying to find a happy medium with food.
I love to eat. but my self care is lacking. I am off work today and tomorrow
I took a nice shower and washed my hair it had been 5 days.
My house needs cleaning top to bottom and I am not much into it but this is
a day that I could make a dent in the unofficial list of things that need to be cleaned. I will start in the kitchen. I slept a lot today.I need 8-9 hours and usually get that. With meds I can get to sleep pretty quickly. I have been taking my requipt wrong. I was kept awake at night for hours with restless leg syndrome. I read the directions and it said to take it 1-3 hours before lights out. SO since I have been doing that I sleep like a baby.
sleep is so needed for my being stable.
although I say that. I was put on prosac and went manic and was sleeping well!!!
sorry you got more than You bargained for sorry to high jack your thread.