Tag Archives: anxiety

Happy Stable New Year

Posted on
5
The New Year is here; 2012 has landed. I never make New Year resolutions but I always have a wish for the year ahead and this year I want to have the stablest year I’ve had for a very long time. Wouldn’t that be wonderful!
The constant cycling I was having has been replaced by depression and anxiety. An increase in Lamictal and Zyprexa helped to stop the jumping from one mood to another that I was having each day but hasn’t balanced me. I just wish my mood would become neutral. No matter what I do to distract myself or to increase my wellbeing, ie keeping busy, getting enough sleep and exercise, eating healthily, the depression just sits there like a log in a swamp. I keep trying to lift my mood and to avoid bad thoughts yet I lie in bed at night thinking of suicide and hoping I don’t wake in the morning. Oh God how bloody dismal! I have no idea where this post is going but I hope I’m not going to have you click exit because of my boring gloominess. Continue reading →

stupid drivers and foolhardy pedestrians

Posted on
4

I’ve been living recently with both depression and panic attacks but they’re not my friends, they’re my enemies. I have to fight them in order to function and gain some sort of normality in my life. The depression has been with me for a long time now, apart from one recent episode of full-on mania and time spent in a horrible mixed state, and it is proving to be hard to shift my mood. Because of this my psych has put me back on a low dose of Zoloft (sertraline). I feel slightly better after having taken it for a week and I’m hoping the improvement continues.

As for the panic attacks, Continue reading →

still here

Posted on
1

I’m still here struggling through the miasma that is BP, taking one step at a time and trying not to get lost in the fog. At least I wasn’t left behind by the predicted Rapture! I have no illusions that, had it happened, I would not have soared heaven-ward but rather have been left to languish until October. I would have chosen to stay earth-bound with my dogs anyway.

My weekly therapy with my psychiatrist continues, sometimes useful, sometimes not. Continue reading →

back at last

Posted on

I’ve been unable to find time to update because of my husband having major open heart surgery (aortic valve replacement). It was a very anxious time for both of us. He is now recovering well, much faster than I expected, but is starting to get bored at home all the time!

Meanwhile, I don’t know if I can describe what is happening with me. While D was in hospital I saw my stand-in pdoc as my usual one was away. He’s a nice guy and we get on well but the appointments are really only stop-gap ones with little covered. The past couple of weeks I’ve been seeing my usual pdoc and have had my meds “tweaked” each week as he tries to reduce the number of types of meds I’m taking while increasing the major ones.

I’m still not feeling good and I’m undecided what path to take to rectify that. During the past few sessions I’ve had the impression that my pdoc doesn’t really want me as a patient anymore. He seems more distant and just keeps repeating the same things to me. His advice is that I have to put all my troublesome feelings and emotions in a box, compartmentalise them, and basically ignore them. His message seems to be that I am more or less a miserable sod who also gets periods of depression and mania. The depression and mania should be under control by the meds so I need to consider all the other feelings as “normal” for me and accept them so that they don’t continue to overwhelm me with overlearned behaviour.

I’m finding this very hard to do.

I’m feeling paralysed; unable to function. If all the horrible emotions and thoughts I have are “just me” then where does that leave me? Is there any point in continuing therapy? Now I start to feel something and have to try to block it and put it back in the box. Because of this I am feeling disconnected with everything and often numb. I’m having great difficulty going anywhere because I’m having anxiety attacks and need to leave quickly and get home. At home all I want to do is sleep so that I don’t have to struggle with the emotions that I’m meant to be ignoring. I don’t know what to do and I feel like I have lost my one stable and safe place … my therapy session.

My gut feeling at the moment is to stop therapy as I feel like I’ve overstayed somewhere. Along with that I’d like to stop taking all my meds because I don’t want to see another pdoc for prescriptions and med checks. Also, if I’m just a miserable person what difference does it make if I still have depression or go into mania?

To make matters worse it is nearly December and I hate December. I hate hot weather, especially as my compression stockings and my meds make me sweat a lot and feel the heat more. I don’t like Christmas and dislike shopping in crowds for Christmas presents (there will be a lot of online shopping this year). I don’t like shopping centres at the best of times but December is the worst time.

What a non-positive post this has been! That is how I feel — not positive about anything :(

rock-bottom

Posted on

If it isn’t enough having bipolar depression, along comes another thing to send me spiralling further down. I’ve been having lymphoedema treatment for my legs (massaging, laser and daily heavy bandaging). After four weeks of treatment I now have compression stockings that I will have to wear forever. They are very thick and you need to be some sort of iron-woman, which I’m not, to get the damn things on.

 Not only that but they severely limit the type of shoes I can wear. For a start, I always have to have shoes or thick socks on — no going barefoot. Summer shoes are out because they won’t fit over the stockings. “Slide” type shoes are out because they cause too much wear on the stockings.

I’m imagining summer and having to wear big clumpy trainers all the time and not being able to wear light summer clothes and shoes. For someone who absolutely loathes the heat this is bothering me a lot.

So today I hit rock-bottom yet again. The whole deal is costing a small fortune (which I don’t have), and all I can see is a dismal future. This coming on top of already being so depressed is making me feel like I can’t go on.

Today someone said to me “well think of the others who are worse off than you”. Telling someone in the depths of depression something like that does NOT help! I know there are others worse off but that doesn’t help me.

My pdoc comes back next week and I know he is cutting back his hours, so if he tells me he is retiring soon, I won’t just be at rock-bottom, I’ll be tunnelling through it.

GIVE ME MORE MEDS!!

Solian out, Rivotril in

Posted on

Today I told my stand-in pdoc that I had stopped taking Solian and that my restless legs, while still occurring, had lessened in frequency and strength. He agreed with my decision to stop taking Solian as it has the known side-effect of restless legs or akathisia. He also suggested stopping the Benztropine  I was taking for the problem and he gave me a script for Rivitrol instead. I’m just hoping this doesn’t make me sleepy the next day as I have been so tired lately and I’d like that to change.

Other than the discussion about meds, my stand-in pdoc did not go into any of the issues that have been adding to my depression this week. It has been a bad week but he puts it down to my restlessness. I’ll be glad when July comes and my regular pdoc is back because I really need to talk through some stuff. Added to everything else, I was told today that my regular pdoc is cutting another morning from his schedule, meaning he’ll only be working two and a half days a week. I think he is easing himself into retirement and this makes me very anxious. I have never been able to trust anyone in the way I trust him and the thought of having to see someone new in the future is something that is so hard for me to face.

more from hospital

Posted on

Well, I can’t say I’m a fan of TMS. Seven treatments and no change at all. I’m still very depressed and more anxious thatI’ve ever been (but that could be just being in hospital). Tomorrow I start three days of unilateral TMS whereas I have been having bilateral. If there is no glimmer of any change after that I will probably drop out of the study I’m part of while on this treatment. My private psychiatrist has recommended that I don’t continue with a treatment that is not working.

put ada on your radar

Posted on

The above is the slogan for the beyondblue Anxiety and Depression Awareness Month, October 2009.

It provides an opportunity for people to raise awareness of anxiety and depression and to help reduce the stigma (www.beyondblue.org.au).  10 October World Mental Health Day and 4 to 10 October is Mental Health Week.

Free materials are available from beyondblue such as information leaflets on anxiety and depression; beyondblue enviro shopping bags; blue wristbands to wear for the month; fridge magnet and posters.