Posted by jay on October 28, 2002, at 16:35:36
Roo:I know this is for Dinah..but..I feel I have some very useful information you can use. According to some great research I have been reading, for those who fall into BPII category, adding a small dose of an antidepressant, and MAYBE even ANOTHER mood stabilizer, are needed to prevent the depression part of the problem. It's VERY tricky.
I too was once just on a mood stabilizer...and I went DOWN..really fast. If you can pick an a.d. you did best on, try it with the mood stabilizer. You will need some time to adjust doses, but believe me, you will feel almost 100 percent better. I have also found the occasional use of a good dose of a benzo, especially at the start of the two or three new drugs, makes things move along quicker.
Somebody posted an excellent website about how being BP is more of a 'degree'...and we all fall on different parts of this spectrum. In fact, the author even suggest we treat ALL depression in this fashion, and it may seem like 'too much', but it really does seem like the majority of us has even the slightest tendency to fall into manic symptoms, even if drug induced. A mood stabilizer WITH an antidepressant may just make ALL a.d. users feel more 'balanced'.
For those who can't tolerate or find mood stabilizers don't work, a couple of the new atypical antipsychotics seem to work *excellent*, and appear very safe.
I have come close to having this all worked out and figured out for myself. It is VERY much a tricky use of medications, and the combination of a few is the ONLY thing that keeps me stable and feeling like the 'old me'...much better actually..like a new person with the wisdom of living and surviving some of the deepest darkest points in life. There IS hope..and things CAN and WILL get better with some creative med tinkering. Ya, I know what you are thinking..telling me to "Shut up with your stupid happiness.."..heh. That's what I might have said anyways...heh.
Let me know what you think..
Best wishes,
Jay> If I may have to add a damn antidepressant to
> the old mood stabilizer....I'm stable...not suicidal...
> but I often think dark thoughts and life seems depleted a
> and bleak....I lack joy....I don't know what to think...I hate
> the side effects....but I don't like these feelings either....
> what do you think....tell me what to do...how to live my life...
> (just kidding)....there's this feeling I get when I know I'm clinically
> depressed...it's this feeling that we're all just these amoeba's (spelling?)...
> really existential...just these bags of blood and tissue and nerves and cells moving
> through life....and that's how I kind of feel lately....I know that when I take
> an antidepressant and the ole seratonin gets pumping those feelings go away and I
> feel peace and some joy again...but then there's the price....
> I feel really torn....
> Part of it is circumstantial....I'm really at a job that is completely unhealthy for me....
> mind deadening and isolating...then I come home and i'm alone....my life is really isolating....
> so that contributes ALOT...my psychiatrist says to do things that NURTURE me, that feed me, etc...but
> I don't have the energy...I mean I hardly have the energy sometimes to even put a cd in the stereo!! That's
> bad! That seems really depressed to me....
>
> Any insight?
>
> Thanks for listening...
>
> I'm glad not to be in the suicidal pits of hell...but this isn't exactly what I had in mind either...
poster:jay
thread:125571
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021025/msgs/125571.html