Category: bipolar

Pink pill side effects

by Midnight Demon, posted in bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, blogging, Chronic pain, depression, medical

So I was minding my own business tonight while babysitting. My niece was doing her thing. I was doing mine. When my left arm started to feel like spaghetti. It was close to 1900, way too early to take my meds. But I had to do something about the spaghetti feeling and the subsequent spasms that followed. I went up to my room for a  ativan as that is the only drug that will work to counter the effects of the pink pill.

I haven’t had these symptoms in a long time. I wonder if it’s because I’m not eating full meals at night. I emailed my psychiatrist. I hope I hear back from her because typing is a strain.

I also emailed my friend about the depression.  I am tempted to ask my psych about the sertraline. I still think I should do it in person though.

My sister gave me some left over steak tips when she came back from her outing. Surprisingly, I hate them. There were 3 pieces. Not the best in the world but good enough. I also had some gooey bread. So that was my dinner. I still feel dizzy. I don’t know what is wrong with me. Everything was normal last week except my potassium level. Maybe it is low again. I don’t know. I just feel shitty.

I hope my psychiatrist writes back but I’m not holding my breath.

A letter to bozo

by Midnight Demon, posted in bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, blogging, cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, depression, mental illness, mood disorders, physical pain

Dear Bozo,

It’s after midnight. I am really tired but I am in a lot of pain. I am feeling depressed because a fellow blogger wants to end her life. I have become good friends with her and it makes me sad that there is nothing I can do for her except be there. I hope she doesn’t hurt herself tonight.

Sox are back in last place. I feel like I am, too. I feel like I am at the bottom of the barrel and I can’t get out. The shit just keeps piling on and I can’t get out from under.  Foot is absolutely killing me despite taking pain meds. I just took some ativan because I got a cramp in my other foot. That is all I need, both feet to be against me. I am such a shit.

I’m supposed to go out tonight with some friends. I always have a good time even though it wears me out. My friends don’t know this.  I have never told them. They are the only friends that I have kept in touch with since my disability and loss of work. I would hate to lose them or be left out of having dinner with them once in a while. It really is the only time I socialize.

I just don’t know what has brought on these feelings of worthlessness and insecurity.  Someone liked my commonalities of suicide and placed it on Reddit. Whatever that is. I have heard about it but don’t know more than that.  I just know I feel like the biggest asshole on the planet right now. If I was suicidal, I’d probably plan something. It gives me comfort knowing I am going to try and end my life. I don’t know why that is.  Maybe because it gives me an option and a way out of this darkness. I am so tired of fighting it. Why do I have to continue to live when I don’t want to?  It’s your fault I’m still here. And I hate you for it right now. I hate this guilt trip you have me bonded into. I don’t want to hurt you, yet you say that I will if I kill myself. I just want the pain to stop. If the pain stopped, both physically and mentally I wouldn’t be thinking of ending my life. I am just a scumbag that doesn’t deserve your care.

I didn’t bring the depression on. Unless the pain meds did, which they could have. Course, I am very tired right now and fear that if I don’t go to sleep soon, Hyde might come out. So I’ll stop here for now.

But before I do, my CES anniversary  is coming up in two weeks. I am feeling anxious about it for some reason.  I keep having the memory of when I was told and having to pull over because I was driving to see you at the time. How I managed to drive without injuring myself I have no clue. My back was pretty bad. I still think if i didn’t get it the 2nd time, I wouldn’t be disabled like I am today. I have huge anger that I don’t know what to do with. The stages of grief I guess. But I refuse to accept this. This should not have happened. Someone should have noticed me walking improperly after all those PT sessions I had. Maybe I should have been in an AFO then. I don’t know.  It’s all hindsight now. And it makes me very angry.

I know I’ll never be normal again, that I think I can live with. But being in pain is not part of the deal. Especially when they are making it harder to get pain meds. If I dont ever get my meds, it will be my death sentence.

Hypos Return, Again

by Midnight Demon, posted in bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, blogging, depression, mood disorders, suicide

Hypos return, Again

I thought after last night’s episode with depression, I was DONE with being hypo but as I was talking with my therapist today, it came back. I hadn’t yet taken my morning dose of my mood stabilizer so I took half of it while we were talking. I didn’t want to be sleepy the whole day so I just took half. It worked. I am calmer than I was even though my thoughts are still kind of racy.

I was going to write a paper on no-suicide contracts but while I was reading the paper, I remember writing about it. Sure enough, I did, two years ago. I sent it to my fellow psych people on Twitter and wow did my phone blow up with retweets and replies! Someone (not a psych person) read the paper and thought it was not worth reading. She only read the first paragraph and thought it was like “plaster on an old wound”. She then says how she “wasted her life being depressed”. Issues? I think so. No one chooses to be depressed and if they think this way, someone is telling them this. I have been depressed most of my life (minus these hypomanic episode the past three weeks). I started keeping track of them because I think it’s important as I might not remember I have been “happy” or “content” when I get back to my depressive state. But getting back to this woman, who I did not respond to, I just was taken aback. Did she think that I could just will myself happy? What does that mean and how do you do it? Is it a switch? I don’t think it is. I think she is just fooling herself. I have seen people pretend they are not depressed and it just makes them more miserable when their positivity ends and they are overwhelmed with depressive thoughts. I have a friend that is like that. To me that is just hurting yourself if you are not being true to yourself. I stopped caring what other people think about my depression. Either people are going to be supportive of it or they are not because they are ignorant. In their world, they like to think that depression doesn’t exist because they don’t want to catch it. I have a cousin that is like that. Drives me crazy. I love her to death but when we were talking about my book, it was like she wanted me to pull a switch and not think about suicide.

I asked my therapist if she forgot I code word when she was being frantic when I brought up being suicidal. She did. She is a ditz. So I had to explain to her that it was “baseball on her desk”. I couldn’t just say “baseball” because I talk about baseball for a good six months during the season and off-season. I am a baseball junkie. But there is a baseball on her desk that I think I gave her. I can’t remember how it got there now. I know that she had to get a replacement because the first one the ball melted after a little while. It was sad to see. I thought that would be her centering point. We haven’t tried it out because I haven’t been too suicidal and she has been more aware of her anxiety when I talk about being suicidal.

My pdoc got back to me about taking my PRN trilafon. I prefaced it with I know you don’t want me to be taking it but I need it. She writes back she doesn’t want me to take it every day, only when I need it. UM, isn’t that the whole idea behind PRN (take as needed)?? Or am I missing something? I want to write back to her but given my current agitation levels, I will let it go. Or try to. It really pissed me off.

I got such a headache for some reason. I am not tired, though I should be. I have been on the go, so to speak, since 0800. I am glad that I didn’t have to rewrite that paper. That would have really given me a headache. I took some Tylenol. I can’t take an NSAID because I am on an extended release one. And this one is not one to mess around with because it can cause gastric bleeding. I don’t want gastric bleeding. My mind is going to fast for the keyboard. I have been typing every word twice because of typos or misspellings of words. Ok, that was redundant, LOL. See I am not in my right mind right now. I have stopped listening to “just over” by Luke Bryan. I have been playing it all day because it is a good tune and it’s lyrics are stuck in my head. Another reason I need trilafon. It will break the cycle. I know people get songs stuck in their heads all the time, but with me, right now with this hypo business, it can lead to psychosis very quickly.

“Plaster in the wound”. Seriously, this person wanted to read my paper and then insulted it. I should be offended but I am too goofy to really care. I am just shaking my head because I know I wrote a good paper and if it wasn’t up to tuff with her, then so be it. Sometimes my writings are too powerful for laypeople to read. It can be technical or to emotional, depends on what I write. My blog covers a wide range of writings. It has been the place where I can publish my thoughts about scientific papers using MY experience as a reference sometimes and I know it is different for other people. My experience with something similar might not be the same as the next. I am not writing in a general way because there are no general ways. Everyone is their own expert in their illness and I respect that despite our same diagnoses. I really wish these hypos would go away, and soon. Not that I want to be depressed again, but I don’t want to run the risk of being in the hospital. I might crash tonight, again. There is no way of knowing where this is going or if I am cycling. I am kind of scared. It would be helpful to talk to another bipolar person who has experienced this. I am getting no help from my treaters. They have never seen me this way before for so long. They are worried, too. Though I can’t tell if my pdoc is. It’s hard to discern through an email in my current condition. I am too agitated to read the words, other than this is only for as needed. Like I am an idiot or something. UGH. Shaking my head again.

A Productive Day

by Midnight Demon, posted in bipolar, Bipolar Disorder, blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, suicidality

A Productive Day

For the first time all year, I was able to shower, get dressed, and go out. I went to Starbucks, had my coffee, and edited one of my blogs that I hope to put in my short story book. I then picked up my niece and to my surprise, I wasn’t fatigued, horribly, when I got home. My ankle was aching but it was not killing me. I feel pretty good about this. It remains to be seen whether I will have pain later tonight.

I had a bit of a scare today. When I came to my room to work on my blog, I found that WordPress was down. I still cannot load it on IE (internet Explorer) but it loads on my phone so that is good. And I can get the operational aspect of the blog working in Chrome, so I am hoping this post posts without difficulty.

I got new music today from Luke Bryan. I really shouldn’t have, but I love Luke and his music. I also am planning on trying to finish this Civil War book sometime in the next week or so. I am up to page 700 and have about 100 or so pages to finish it. I am not going to read the afterword or Epilogue. I am just going to read the chapters of the book and that is all. Then I am going to start Dostoevsky’s “Idiot”. I am going to take a break from history for a while after this Civil War book. It has been so tedious. I was thinking about writing a review for it but someone already wrote what I was thinking! Great minds think alike.

I am glad I got to edit one of my blogs that I am putting in my new book. Now I just have to enter the edits. It shouldn’t take long. I just have one line that I need to rewrite. I highlighted to have me thinking about rewording it. It definitely needs some work, so I will try and work on it sometime this week.

I hope this productivity that I am feeling lasts. The last few days had sucked because I could barely get myself out of bed. All I wanted to do was sleep and today I was able to do things. I am not manic or even hypomanic but I am feeling good. I still feel sort of depressed, though. At least twice today, I have thought about killing myself or just wondering what it would be like not to be alive anymore. It’s hard to believe that it’s now 2000 and I am not tired or sleepy like I have been in the past. I had a coffee today rather than an espresso drink. I am feeling wired. Maybe I am in a mixed state, but without the agitation.

I was able to get my recycles and a box out of my room. I hope to get another box out of my room tomorrow. I think that will help ease some of the clutter in my room. I can’t do anything about the clothes in my room. I have no where to put them so they will have to stay where they are.

Last night I was so depressed, I couldn’t bring myself to print out my blogs and the short story I just finished. Every time I thought about getting out of bed to put the paper in the printer, plug in the printer to my laptop, just wore me out just thinking about it. This morning, I had more energy so was able to print off the stuff I needed to. It didn’t seem like a chore like it was last night.

Last night I was in a very depressed mood. If I had a place to hang myself in my room, I probably would have gone through with it. I was in such a nasty depressed/suicidal mood. And today it is like night and day. I am feeling good but in a down sort of way. I don’t know what causes me to feel so bad at times. My appetite is still down. All I had to eat today was a sandwich at Starbucks. I am not really hungry for anything, though I am thinking about the jelly donut my brother-in-law gave me. I was going to have that in the morning but it might be my supper. But if I do eat, I think I will have a protein bar. I think that will be a better idea than a jelly donut. I just don’t feel hungry and food is the furthest thing from my mind. I would rather contemplate killing myself than eat something. I don’t know. It’s not like I have lost weight. My pants still fit me the same. I never lose weight like I used to. I think if I was more active, I might be able to lose more weight. But with a bum ankle, being active is difficult.

I don’t know why I feel really good today. I don’t even feel tired. I feel kind of like on cloud nine but I haven’t taken anything to make me feel this way. I hope this lasts. If I feel down tomorrow, I might be cycling, which is not good. Being bipolar sucks. You never know what kind of mood you are going to be in.