Hi there, I'm new

Hi... I'm 40 years old, married, work full time as a hospital nurse, 2nd year grad student (currently on-hold because I can't get it together at all.. about to fail out when my incompletes turn to Fs soon-- even though I have all As & 1 B up til now), mom to 2 sons (23 & 11--youngest has severe ADHD), I'm a new grandmother, wife to an online sex addict, totally neglectful husband, I've been battling severe anxiety for 2 years... (wonder why? :) with a few bouts of minor depression, got quite a bit of chronic health problems, but I'm compliant and do the best I can with them... My dad is an alcoholic & sex addict. My mom is on her last leg from end stage COPD. They are both elderly and sick. I'm an only child.

I've been trying to get someone to work out what all is in my head for a while.. Anxiety has been pretty debilitating for the last 2 years. The LCSW counselor I saw this past spring (once) referred me to a pysch (who I saw only once) who referred me to a PhD psych examiner who had retired & wasn't even practicing anymore.. and my quest kinda stopped there because that is where they led me and the road ended. My primary care doc has been trying me on different SSRIs. All in all I've had 4 long trials that totally failed with SSRIs from 2000 thru 2011. They completely shut me down. I nearly have lost my job from being late. They made me where I couldn't do my school work at all. I was confused & disoriented.. didn't even go to my clinicals I should have after 2 weeks of taking the last one. I went to dentist and doctor appointments I didn't even have, and missed the ones I had. Finally the psych told me never to take an SSRI again (just take Xanax instead).. and my PCP has been giving me Xanax 0.25 mg 2x day since, which barely helps the anxiety and has none nothing to help my jumbled up thoughts and overall feelings of desperation get expressed productively.

To try to make a long story shorter... I found the psych examiner that had retired. He lives about 2 hours away from me, and I was able to get his cell phone number. He agreed to see me at his house yesterday for an eval. I was referred basically because no one knew what to do with me, and the LCSW and psych thought I may have ADHD as the underlying problem, but at 40... they were hesitant to give me that diagnosis without seeing a "guru" in it. He is apparently the guru in this area. After nearly 3 hours with him yesterday at his house, he thinks I have " a very atypical bipolar disorder II." He said that is the most obvious to him, and after I get a mood stabilizer, we'll go from there. He thinks I have other comorbidities, but he said we have to treat the most obvious & likely the most debilitating first.

I'm waiting to see if the psych and counselor will see me again... I've been trying to make appointments for days. The "guru" said I need to see a counselor no less than every 1 to 2 weeks for a long, long time. I didn't even realize I likely have a mental illness, and I feel like I've already fallen through the cracks so many times with these professional people already. If you miss 2 appointments, they drop you as a patient. I've missed 2 appointments, but when you are confused and all cluttered in your head... it's hard to not be confused selectively for them. They have also missed return appointments with me, but I guess that's ok by them.

Anyway.. Hi. I hope to learn something today reading this board. I just want someone to help me out of this muck I'm stuck in. I feel like I've begged for help for 2 years, and not one single person has really helped. It's frustrating & tiring.

I hope you don't mind the long, rambling post, but this guru I saw yesterday called me hypomanic all the time.. but yet he says it seems my mood is always somewhat depressed. He said he doesn't see a lot of cycles with me.. they seem to occur at the same time. I feel badly/low/sad, but then when I open my mouth, I have fast, pressured speech & flight of ideas almost constantly.. People at work say they can ask me what time it is, and I'll tell them how to build a watch. That's me.

Nice to meet y'all.

Hello, Elsm, please keep trying to establish contact with the psychiatrist who diagnosed you as bipolar, type II. One of the newer mood stabilizers may be remarkably helpful for you, and you should definitely consider taking one if you have bipolar giftedness. (Your high grades indicate you may be gifted, as well.) Lamictal is a good one, although some people have had side effects. I won't discuss Abilify because it is so expensive, but it also is one of the newer mood stabilizers.

The next thing that helps is to get your diet straightened out. Please don't use alcohol or anything containing caffeine. They both make bipolar illness or depression worse. That means no coffee, tea, chocolate, sodas (that contain caffeine), or anything else with caffeine in it. Drink pure water, please, and only water at least until your system has a chance to recover from the effects of caffeine and alcohol if you use it at all. Keep your diet on a slightly alkaline state by avoiding milk products (cheese is especially high in acidic reaction and is irritating to the system.) Go to alkaline foods.com to see which ones are good to use; eat a salad once a day until you feel calm again inside. Having one daily is really good for you.  Lemon water is also helpful for calming because it is digested as highly alkaline even though it tastes very acidic.  Sugar will cause highs and lows, so avoid it if possible; in addition, it has no nutritional value, and you need really good nutrition to keep strong.  Like caffeine, sugar is addictive.  (So are grains for some people.) Please take a look at the website  ruthwhalen.com to learn more about the role of caffeine in damage to the brain when it is used for years and abused as a psychoactive drug. 

 Psychiatrists know now that bipolar illness is an irritation of the brain and that simple aspirin will help remove some symptoms for some people. If you watch your diet and consider aspirin while you're waiting for your mood stabilizer to come through, you might be helping yourself--possibly.

We are not doctors here, so we can say only what has worked for us.
It was my psychiatrist who recommended the use of aspirin and I found it very helpful. She is also the one who told me that doctors know now that bipolar illness is an irritation of the brain. I found that taking an antihistamine (of prescribed potency) helped tremendously as a sleep aid. (I take Xyzal.)

My psychiatrist recommended also that getting one's rest is very important to stabilizing bipolar illness. So please set aside a definite routine to ensure that you get proper amount and quality of sleep each night.

You will find that the other multiple problems in your life will begin to assuage once your moods are calm and stabilized, so I won't try to give you too much to think about right now except taking care of your health first so that you may help others later.

Keep trying to get that mood stabilizer, please, and continue to post
as you need to vent.

Take care.

It's Genetic

Post Edited (It's Genetic) : 8/24/2011 8:49:03 AM (GMT-6)

You're heading in the right direction, Elsm. Keep working on reducing the
caffeine with the hope of eliminating it completely. Please read Ruth Whalen's work on the website called ruthwhalen.com/caffeine.

Your doctors are trying with the addition of vitamins and minerals to boost

your system's functioning level.  The fewer medications you have to take and

still maintain a comfortable level of feeling tone, the better you will be. Keep trying to get that mood stabilizer and continue to post to us as you need to review things, please.  Drinking water is so good for you and it will help your

feeling tone, too, enabling your kidneys to manage its work so much more

effectively, and that will mean better feeling capacity for you. 

Nice to talk to you again; thank you for keeping in touch.  If you have any

additional questions that we might help you answer, we'll try our best for you.

Take care.

It's Genetic

Post Edited (It's Genetic) : 8/24/2011 3:13:42 PM (GMT-6)

Just a quick update. I know it's been a couple of months since I posted anything here, but I was going to give some basic happenings in my psych diagnosis/treatment in case it might help someone out there in the future. After about several failed trials on SSRIs over the last few years, finally a psych NP determined that I just completely intolerant to them. Although I didn't have a typical mania/hypomania presentation of someone with BP disorder that started on SSRIs, I was still confused and completely scattered. I also wanted to sleep all the time uncontrollably. SSRIs just totally shut me down. I had to take a year-long hiatus from graduate school because I have not been able to function. Undiagnosed BP II and the hypomania/depressive episodes have affected my work, my family, everything..

After months of unsuccessful attempts to get someone to help me with some severe anxiety and what was eventually determined to be hypomania, I finally got referred to the right person I think that actually DID something. I saw a psychiatrist (he was the 5th or 6th person I've been referred to in the last 6 months by a multitude of psych providers). It's like everyone was skeptical to put a diagnosis on a 40 year old with no history of any psych problems til 2 years ago. My mental state has felt like it's in shambles for more than 2 years, and this was totally out of character for me. The psych I saw 2 weeks ago finally diagnosed me with BP II, and started me on generic Depakote, trazodone for sleep, and Wellbutrin SR once a day. I can't tell I feel a whole lot better yet, but I think he is on the right track. I know Depakote takes a few weeks to reach a therapeutic level, and I'm only on 250 mg 2xday. Even though I'm a healthcare provider myself, it's funny that you don't even recognize obvious symptoms in yourself. Staying awake 4 days at a time (I never get sleepy, ever)... racing thoughts nonstop to the point that I couldn't prioritize anymore. Every task felt way too big to tackle. My irritability has just skyrocketed over the past 2 years... Saying I have a short fuse would be an understatement. There is almost no delay from my brain to my mouth, despite hurting others with what I say. If I think it, I am very likely to tell them exactly what I think immediately. I have never been like this before the past 2 years. I was a super easy going & sweet person. Everything rolled off my back. Not anymore.

Maybe someone will recognize these symptoms in himself or herself and not go through what I've gone through for 2.5 years trying to get the right help for myself. Right now it feels like I am cycling from crying to b*tch back to crying about 2 x daily. It's like my moods are off the charts, but I feel confident it's my body trying to adjust to the mood stabilizing med. I almost feel like it's saying, "NOOOOOO!!!!" lol well, thanks for listening. If I can help anyone in the future, please let me know. Also, if you have any suggestions or experience I need to know about, please let me know.

Right now:
Depakote 250mg 2 x daily
Wellbutrin SR 150mg daily
Trazodone 50-100 mg or Ambien 10 mg at night for sleep
Xanax 0.25mg 2 x daily as needed
plus my usual Diovan, metoprolol, HCTZ for blood pressure & Synthroid for hypothyroidism

Post Edited (elsrn) : 10/18/2011 7:56:30 PM (GMT-6)