Mental Health Bipolar Disorder Mega Thread

[prayersfor.rain]

Ah when I'm manic I rarely know what I'm doing. I'm just doing, without thinking. I'm just going too fast to remember anything.

Lithium did NOT work for me, and I got terrible side effects that literally made me feel like I was falling apart physically and dying.
Also, life was boring on it.

I'm stable now, been stable for more than a year, on risperdal, wellbutrin and xanax as needed (approx 2x a month) and I go to therapy every other week. Thank goodness I have insurance. I also keep a regular sleep and eating schedule.
I have changed things, like, I don't do coke or meth anymore, I don't take mushrooms/lsd () but I still drink and smoke pot.
And you know sometimes I miss the drugs because they're fun. But the after effects really screw me up. They're just not worth it. And I never liked ecstasy so that was really no loss.

For the first time in my life, this past year and half, I've been happy. Life is fun. Life is hilarious sometimes. It's sad, it's crappy. It's everything. And that's ok. I like it. But before that when I was on lithium, I was just in the middle and it was boring as fuck. And before that my brain was all over the place.

 

[Eyes On the Roll]

OK guys ive been on Lamictal for about 3 weeks.

I do notice a difference. Before Lamictal I would have extreme mood swings daily.. feelings of extreme rage over nonsense, feelings of sorrow, feelings of over stimulation, and slightly delusional.

My moodswings have abated for the most part. I still get a slight rage at nonsense, but it is short lived. I'm not depressed anymore, yet i'm not exactly happy. My hair has been falling out like crazy and because of this I will ask to discontinue Lamictal in 2 weeks at my next appointment.

To be honest, I don't know how well I like being medicated. I feel like my moodswings made me feel alive. Like it was a feel good pain.. When depression goes away I sometimes miss it for some reason. I miss the deep emotional pain I would feel, it feels good in a way i can't explain. Music has more meaning, and Im touched with a deep passion.

Now I feel like I can't feel. I miss the sorrow, the mood swings, the grandiosity. I kind of like being sick better... I dont know. Does anyone understand what im saying?

 

[ColdNorth]

Good day fellow roller coaster riders. I got prescribed sodium valproate today after complaining about lithium and asking for lamotrigine which I understand is relatively safe with many drugs. I trust my doctor is far more qualified to decide what I need than I am but I don't remember that substance at all. I remember the HUGE box from my teenage years and everything I had back then had that zombie effect. He knows I intend to do psychedelics and claimed it's very friendly with interactions but I'll triple check that, he's an old man (great doc though) and in general the doctors in my country seem very ignorant about the pharmacology of illicit drugs.

So I wanted to ask your experiences on this. Does it kill you inside like lithium did very sneakily? Or make you a zombie like neuroleptics? Do any possible bad effects go away with time? I'm facing the worst hell (not directly drug related) and I need a decent bipolar medication, one less thing to worry about.

Also he gave me l-DOPA on request to help deal with giving up bupre. Wasn't really expecting to get it but I'm glad he listens to my amateurish ideas.

 

[Eyes On the Roll]

Ok so i switched to Depakote, and got prescribed xanax 0.5 mgs 3 times dayily

I had a weird psychotic episode on the lamictal and i was hallucinating while driving and scratched the side of my fucking cadillac on a cement barrier and went into hysteria.

2 days into depakote, not noticing any change and i know i probably shouldn't yet. I love the xanax except the metallic taste i get in my mouth, and my tollerance has rapildy built up already after a week.. 1 .5 now does nothing, i need at least 2 or 3 for class.

What is another good benzo for Bipolar related anxiety? that still gives a good recreational feeling so i dont have to seek drugs from an outside source (i have a compulsion to feel high/slightly sedated)

 

[ColdNorth]

Ok so i switched to Depakote, and got prescribed xanax 0.5 mgs 3 times dayily

I had a weird psychotic episode on the lamictal and i was hallucinating while driving and scratched the side of my fucking cadillac on a cement barrier and went into hysteria.

2 days into depakote, not noticing any change and i know i probably shouldn't yet. I love the xanax except the metallic taste i get in my mouth, and my tollerance has rapildy built up already after a week.. 1 .5 now does nothing, i need at least 2 or 3 for class.

What is another good benzo for Bipolar related anxiety? that still gives a good recreational feeling so i dont have to seek drugs from an outside source (i have a compulsion to feel high/slightly sedated)

I remember clonazepam (klonopin in U.S?) was the only benzo that came close to alprazolam in recreational effect for me. For potency and half life it was in the same class IIRC.

Deprakine had me thinking of ways to kill myself the first morning after taking it (yesterday). Didn't much like the effect either but I guess there's no choice.

 

[Eyes On the Roll]

I remember clonazepam (klonopin in U.S?) was the only benzo that came close to alprazolam in recreational effect for me. For potency and half life it was in the same class IIRC.

Deprakine had me thinking of ways to kill myself the first morning after taking it (yesterday). Didn't much like the effect either but I guess there's no choice.

yea ive been thinking about asking my pdoc to switch to klonopin or valium.

I've just been reading up on depakote and they have mostly been horror stories.. fuck.. i don't want to be medicated anymore. I hear how bad this med ages your face and i'm still only 20 and above average in looks, i hope this doesn't make my hair fall out. but looking back now somewhat stabilized from the benzos i can see just how severe and insane my moods were. not just long term depression/mania, but day to day mood shifts are what killed me. But it seems like these drugs are going to kill me. on the lamictal i broke out in hives and went psychotic and hallucinated, i can only wonder what depakote will do to me compared to the wonder drug of lamictal.

Im thinking of just never going back and quitting all my meds. and running away from it all, this is too much to deal with at my age trying to go to school, trying to find a social life in a new town.. I can't find my place in the world and i fear i never will. I used to be so well rounded, up until 2 years ago, now i tiptoe on hells boundaries..

FML8(

 

[paranoid android]

Does anyone else find that with summer comes mania? I just started taking seroquel again but since I'm at the 200mg mark (300mg's tonight i guess) it's not working yet and it usually takes about a week for me to feel the anti-manic effects anyway. I had to work out like crazy today because i just felt so wired.

Fuck mania right off

 

[nuttynutskin]

I feel like I have reverse SAD. I usually feel agitated when it starts getting hot out and I can't sleep well. I'm a fall/winter person.

 

[paranoid android]

I feel like I have reverse SAD. I usually feel agitated when it starts getting hot out and I can't sleep well. I'm a fall/winter person.

I am very much a summer person. Fuck i hate winter it just makes me sad now and brings with it SAD which thankfully is helped by wellbutrin which usually works although i do have my moments fuck knows 8) .

This edgy mania sucks and even with the seroquel i still end up only sleeping for maybe 6 hours. My shrink was too much of a bitch to send a script for a fast acting anti-psychotic to the pharmacy i go to. That fuckin cow

 

[ColdNorth]

Does anyone else find that with summer comes mania?

Yes, especially the first few weeks of that annoying endless light in Scandinavia. Something's wrong with me this summer though, nothing so far and haven't been on any meds in soon 3 months.

 

[paranoid android]

Yes, especially the first few weeks of that annoying endless light in Scandinavia. Something's wrong with me this summer though, nothing so far and haven't been on any meds in soon 3 months.

Well thank fuck i don't live that far north oh jesus id loose it . The fairly brief amounts of sunlight we get here in my part of Canada in winter drive me right into SAD central and often full on major depression. The opposite happens in summer when it warms up but thankfully we don't get the never ending sunlight where i live as i don't think id ever fucking sleep . I think my spirits go up anyway with the warm weather and my mania just goes up with it. Thankfully i haven't been dumb enough to go off my meds in a long time so that's good since i was much worse last summer. The seroquel seems to be calming me down abit so far which is good

What meds are you supposed to be taking by the way?

 

[ColdNorth]

Lithium is my regular poison, got put on Deprakine but that made me suicidal so I quit. Oddly buprenorphine is what seems to help the most but after 15 mostly drug free months I was left without a prescription or any kind of future plan. I'd call that results after a decade of nothing else working for me but it's such a taboo everyone is afraid to prescribe it. So it's back to whatever I can get and most likely the same old up and down. I don't even want to be wasted and buprenorphine lost that effect long ago, but those other meds come at too high a price.

 

[paranoid android]

Lithium is my regular poison, got put on Deprakine but that made me suicidal so I quit. Oddly buprenorphine is what seems to help the most but after 15 mostly drug free months I was left without a prescription or any kind of future plan. I'd call that results after a decade of nothing else working for me but it's such a taboo everyone is afraid to prescribe it. So it's back to whatever I can get and most likely the same old up and down. I don't even want to be wasted and buprenorphine lost that effect long ago, but those other meds come at too high a price.

What type of bipolar are you diagnosed with? I am diagnosed with bipolar NOS because i didn't fit into the neat little categories but i could fit the bipolar 1 type. In the past i tried depakote which is called epival here in Canada and yeah it didn't work well for me either . I was going to go on lithium but i decided for lamotrigine instead which is a fucking wonder drug for me thankfully. It regulates my moods to the point of being evened out to the point of where I'm functional and does not give me any side effects that i notice. But i still need anti-psychotics sometimes because i do get manic now and again and i don't care for mania much

 

[ColdNorth]

Type 1, along with a bunch of other 'disorders' (aka personality traits) to further clarify it but until now I bet it's been hard to tell what comes from drugs. It's just ridiculous to ignore the fact that buprenorphine at the very least keeps me away from self-medicating the acute stuff that other meds do nothing about. Have you tried it for this purpose? Apparently the majority of bipolar patients get manic symptoms from it but I've never had anything quite as effective for depression.

I just found this:
http://www.sumobrain.com/patents/wipo/Therapy-bipolar-disorder-mania-with/WO2009126931.html

 

[paranoid android]

Type 1, along with a bunch of other 'disorders' (aka personality traits) to further clarify it but until now I bet it's been hard to tell what comes from drugs. It's just ridiculous to ignore the fact that buprenorphine at the very least keeps me away from self-medicating the acute stuff that other meds do nothing about. Have you tried it for this purpose? Apparently the majority of bipolar patients get manic symptoms from it but I've never had anything quite as effective for depression.

I just found this:
http://www.sumobrain.com/patents/wipo/Therapy-bipolar-disorder-mania-with/WO2009126931.html

I haven't tried bupe because since i am on morphine that makes it pretty much out of the question unless i want to start taking bupe patches that cost a fortune for moderate pain as opposed to my morphine which is for severe pain and covered. So yeah my doc would get pretty suspicious at that.

The opiates that fuck with my bipolar are demerol (meperidine/pethidine) and tramadol due to it's SNRI properties i guess. Either can make me manic (not in any good way either) or depressed so yeah I'm not sure if bupe would be for me at all especially since i need something for neuropathic pain.

 

[Teknique]

Does anyone else find that with summer comes mania?

Reply to paranoid android

Nuh it hits me in the winter (its winter here atm) ,funny you mention that your feeling a little mania as ive felt an awesome boost with my moods as of this week.Ive got out of hospital about 6 months ago, they had me on 1600mg seroquel per day for a few weeks and still totally destroyed the nurses in chess and mindful games haha... Im type 1 and feel only positive reactions when im ill but trip out hard when im all burnt out.I get a good few months of feeling awesome , indestructible, smart, prediction in things gets insanely accurate before it becomes obvious to others ive lost it...prediction thinking starts to over lap, reality and fantasy blend into one, forget to sleep, then start hearing and seeing fucked up shit.

At the moment im taking 1500mg valpro 200mg seroquel , alot of the time things seem dull and numb buts its the meds doing its job i suppose. Hopes all well for you and everyone else in this thread. Peace.

 

[paranoid android]

Reply to paranoid android

Nuh it hits me in the winter (its winter here atm) ,funny you mention that your feeling a little mania as ive felt an awesome boost with my moods as of this week.Ive got out of hospital about 6 months ago, they had me on 1600mg seroquel per day for a few weeks and still totally destroyed the nurses in chess and mindful games haha... Im type 1 and feel only positive reactions when im ill but trip out hard when im all burnt out.I get a good few months of feeling awesome , indestructible, smart, prediction in things gets insanely accurate before it becomes obvious to others ive lost it...prediction thinking starts to over lap, reality and fantasy blend into one, forget to sleep, then start hearing and seeing fucked up shit.

At the moment im taking 1500mg valpro 200mg seroquel , alot of the time things seem dull and numb buts its the meds doing its job i suppose. Hopes all well for you and everyone else in this thread. Peace.

You where on 1600mg's of seroquel a day? Wow that is more then i have ever heard of anyone being on . I think that is abit outrageous really but whatever.

Ive never really been blessed much with happy mania. I do get some manic episodes where i am in a good mood and running around like the energizer bunny rabbit wanting to shag everything in sight but not often. Also these episodes tend to deplete my bank account . So yeah even those episodes end up sucking plus it doesn't take long before i get super irritable and plunge into bad mania.

Glad your meds seem to be working but watch that boost in mood none the less. It is confusing as hell sometimes because you can't tell if you are feeling good or are actually manic. Atleast that is the way i feel anyway as i end up feeling abit too good maybe

 

[bec.x]

just asking for a bit of advice...

so, i have a doctor's appontment for what i think might be bipolar disorder and/or severe adhd. should i mention a past psychotic episode lasting 2-3 days (auditory hallucinations, people coming to get me, stuff like that)..? the thing is, while, thinking back, i could have been (hypo)manic at the time, i had also been previously awake and doing amps for 50 hours or so? i don't want to lie about possibly relevant information but i also don't want to come off as having substance abuse issues, especially since i've cut down the use quite a lot anyway.

 

[Mariposa]

I don't have my own story of bipolar disorder to share, so I will wander off to the anxiety and ADD thread soon.

My s/o, however, does. He was diagnosed bipolar II well before I met him. His mother is bipolar I and is institutionalized. He is a brilliant writer with an English degree who would love to be in a master's level program to write professionally. His day job is that of a computer programmer for a university. Well before I met him, he was married to a psychologist, with whom he has two sons and shared custody. I love the children as though they were my own. I will take my own rant about her to the appropriate place, if at all.

My dude is having a terrible mixed episode that started yesterday. He is with his kids right now, and I'm going over to his place after he drops them off at their mother's. I was going to go over last night, but neither of us feels right about having sleepovers with the children around just yet, and due to bridge closures in the area, I wouldn't have been able to get home.

I'd like to know what I can do to support him. He is not a dependent person; he does talk openly about his conditions, at least with me, family, and close friends. He says he just wants to lay in bed and be moody. I think I am doing the right thing, as when he is manic, he has a history of self-harm and compulsive gambling. He agrees that I should be there in case he does anything he should not. Oddly, he's not much of a drinker and won't touch anything aside from the occasional beer or medicinal pot (he has in the past; drug use is not his thing). As with a couple other folks in TDS, he has a condition that causes his vertebrae to continue to fuse in places where they should bend. He is in constant pain, and he doesn't like the way pain pills make him feel, so he takes only ibuprofen. The pain clearly affects his mood adversely. It is going to take a team of doctors to get him to the point where he is able to be really active - and a partner at his side to make sure they 'don't fuck him up worse'.

About 6 weeks ago, he decided he didn't like the way lithium made him feel. He was taking 2.4g (yes, you read that correctly) PER DAY, in addition to 10 mg Abilify, 350 mg Wellbutrin XR, and 60 mg Adderall (as he's also got adult ADHD). He did a lightning-fast taper against medical advice and everything changed after that. The light in his beautiful eyes was back at first, but the other day he just looked dead inside. Our relationship has not been terribly adversely affected beyond that I am insistent that he find a competent psychiatrist and he doesn't want to take psych meds. Unless they're Adderall. Oh, he's fine with that.

He obsessively reads about the side effects of mood stabilizers (well, he was married to a psychologist ) and he refuses treatment. He will not get treatment from anyone other than the psychiatric nurse who feeds him his Adderall every month or so. As he has had a manic episode, SSRIs are totally out of the question - they're contraindicated, and Prozac was what he was on when he had his manic episode. I don't believe he has tried Lamictal, nor do I believe he would because of the potential allergic reaction that another poster mentioned above in the form of rash. I suggested that once, as it works for a LOT of people who are bipolar; it has changed their lives completely. He pooh-poohed that immediately.

I want to respect my boyfriend's desire to be off meds. We have known each other since late winter; didn't become involved until spring, and we've taken it slowly for obvious reasons. I hope he reaches the conclusion that he can't do this alone, and that he will talk to a psychiatrist fucking immediately. As he has a dental appointment, that he cannot reschedule (tooth crown), for tomorrow, it will have to be Tuesday. I will be staying with him aside from work until then, and as I make my own schedule, at least that is not a problem. I know what would happen otherwise.

I just want my boyfriend to get better. I don't want to see him manic or sad. He is worth it as a human being even if he were not my partner.

To the bipolar folks: much love. May your days be the right kind of happy and your nights awaken to happier days. Any insight that anyone has to offer would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ONCOR]

I have BP I. Lamictal cures me for all intents and purposes. I am, however, allergic. That was the most devastating moment in my BP career when I go the dreaded rash. I had felt so normal for the first time in 15 years. ... ... ...

So, now I take a crappy regimen of Tegretol - yes, dumbing pills at the super-dumb level of 600mg a day. Plus the wonderful Paxil, numbing pill and some Ativan so that I can escape both of those for 8 hours.

Not bitter!!!! :D

Ok, a bit. I want to be healthy. On top of that, I'm surviving a suicide of a close BP person. I am sick as well from some kind of autoimmune ailment. I have a hard time moving and get about 2-5 good hours a day to sit up, maybe 1/2 to 1 standing. The rest of the time I'm laying down.

I'm alive, though, as my WONDERFUL shrink pointed out.

Peace

Tegretol has what effect? I am very curious as I took it as a child for epilepsy and I notice that my memory is crap and I started showing social anxiety and paranoia symptoms after I started it. I always thought it was just me but I keep hearing bad things about it lately but I also hear good things.


I was thinking of suggesting Lamatil(sp?) or Tegretol for a mood stabilizer as I just found out they can be used as a mood stablizer.
I am sick of my rapid cycles, and my anger. I could be quite content if my damn pdoc would get me something for it. Is Clonazepam good for severe anger issues? or what has been good for people here...? I just want to calm the fuck down without having to smoke a J