Hiding my depression is exhausting

Yep it’s back the overwhelming feeling of anxiety and a low that feels impossible. There is so much going on around me with everyone who knows and helps with my illness I haven’t said anything. I don’t want anyone to know that I’m starting to get bad again. I don’t know if it’s because of the job change though I think that might have something to do with it. I knew at my old job I could be honest about my feelings and I can’t here this isn’t the type of place where you openly share this information. I made the decision not to disclose my illness and I still stand with that decision. I try to explain it to my husband but how do you put it into words even if I start there aren’t words it’s like my brain just stops working. I get up some mornings not knowing what to expect and I thought with all the medicine that I would have the ability to control the moods and know who I am in the morning but that isn’t always the case.  I know that it takes more than medicine for it to work but I openly refuse therapy. Therapy has do nothing over time but cause me more issues maybe it is because I can’t handle the issues and my coping mechanisms suck. I don’t know what to do I’m just so frustrated right now. This was really for me just to vent because I don’t know what else to do. My brain isn’t firing on all cylinders right now. Does anyone else have this problem or understand? 

 

19%

I had my 6 month check up with my psychiatrist today and we were speaking openly about suicide after admitting that I was having suicidal thoughts. We were also discussing the differences in being suicidal and having suicidal thoughts (that is a different post.) He said that 19% of people diagnosed with bipolar disorder take their own life and that equals like 1 in 5. Those odds are shocking for some reason. If you think about the big picture 2.3 million Americans are diagnosed with bipolar disorder. If I did my math right that equals out to 437,000 people. That means there are 437,000 people contemplating suicide most with no support from anyone.I am one of the biggest supporters for the AFSP but how do we fix this? What can we as the mental health community do to combat these odds? There are so many people who can’t afford medicine, therapy let alone see a psychiatrist to properly diagnose and help them. This is something we need to recognize and help each other. We aren’t going to receive any help from the government and there is so much of a stigma attached to us people refuse to publicly support it unless it is a celebrity who claimed to “recover” from it. We need to speak openly and honestly about our struggles. I think we can be the change if we become more comfortable being open and knowing even though they might not understand we can make them care. 1 person loss to suicide is 1 too many. Let’s start the conversation and help decrease these numbers.

Bipolar Chronicles- medication

I made a list of every anti psychotic, antidepressant, anxiety, mood stabilizer I could think of and when I hit 20 I just stopped because I know how high the number will get then there is how many different doses of that medication I was on. PLEASE DO NOT MAKE COMMENTS TO PEOPLE ABOUT HOW MUCH MEDICINE THEY TAKE. THERE IS NO SHAME IN TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF. I can remember most of them and I have listed it for you below. My medication process has been horrible. I have gone through 3 different insurance companies and with none for awhile. I do realize that this medication works better with therapy but I don’t like therapy so I just take meds. It may not seem like a lot 20 different prescriptions but really it is, see each one wasn’t a time shot and that was it we went back and forth on dosage over and over again when that one stopped working we weaned off of it onto another one. It is a never ending cycle of figuring out which ones work together and then praying that you don’t build a tolerance for it. Per the FDA I am maxed out on the medication I am currently on so if stuff starts to change I have to go through the process again and I hate weaning myself off of medication especially benzos. The pain of withdrawals to me is like someone slowly pulling off toe nails. Every medicine has a story and a memory those benzodiazepines are going to have the best stories.

1. Lexapro– I despise this medication. I think it should be taken off the market it is absolutely horrible and my psychiatrist from the Psychiatric hospital who diagnosed me incorrectly was a pill pusher and every time I told him I felt worse he kept upping the fucking dose. When I stopped seeing him I just stopped taking it all together which made me manic. You will see a manic trend continue. When I stopped taking it he in a mere 2 months had me taking 50 mg a day and we started at 10 mg. He was an asshole and a pill pusher. I was suicidal the entire time I was on the medication and my doctor just didn’t listen or care he kept trying to put me back in the hospital. This entire time with Lexapro was extremely emotionally and mentally exhausting. I was just diagnosed so everything felt like a nightmare.
2. Klonopin- I started again at .25 mg and ended at 4 mg because it just stopped working. I started abusing benzodiazepine with these.
3. Xanax– This is going to be a long and emotional journey. Klonopin and Valium didn’t work and yes I took them together and he prescribed .25 mg Xanax take as needed. Who knew it would start a 5 year journey with dependency and addiction. There will be an entire blog dedicated to my Xanax issues. .25 mg came to 2 mg ir and 2 mg er. You don’t ask to be addicted to anything. I never took Xanax and said, “This is fun lets fuck the rest of my life, money and almost my job to my benzodiazepine issues.” If you think that is how it works kindly go fuck yourself with cactus.
4. Ativan- I can’t take Ativan it makes me manic. I have Ativan to thank for the hospital visit. I went to the ER for anxiety and they gave me Ativan it was on a Friday by the time Monday came around my husband was exhausted trying to keep my ass out of trouble. There are stories and some are really funny like “sleeping” and jumping up running around naked, trying to leave and naked to go to work. I also called my boss consistently from about 2 am to 4:30 am to tell them I wouldn’t be at work the next day. (They knew that already but I apparently didn’t know that part.) They did play along until my husband took my phone away. These are the same reasons I can’t Ambien, (the ambien was not legally prescribed to me.)
5. Halcion- These tiny blue fuckers were my absolutely favorite to overdose on. They are strong sedative and I never actually took the FDA recommend dosage when I had them. I had .5 mg and would take 4 or 5 at a time because being numb felt better then anything else.
6. Haldol- This was a temp medicine in 2015 when I was having psychosis issues. It works but kind of zombie me out. I was in a drug induced psychosis.
7. Restoril- Helps me sleep. It is a sedative. I’ve been on it for about a year now and when I run out and CVS won’t fill it because they suck. I can feel the differences.
8. Lamictal– Old faithful; Lamictal and I have a long history together but it’s been the only medicine consistently helped with my moods (especially now since I take as directed.) I’ve been on Lamictal for about 3 years maybe a little longer. I started at 25 mg and now I am at 400 mg. When you face start Lamictal they tell you if you get a rash you need to go the ER immediately because it can eat flesh or some fucked up shit. When I tried to die by suicide in 2015 I would go days without taking my Lamictal and then I would take 600 to 700 mg at one time. The fact that after any of these stories I am still alive is amazing. So your mood stabilizer doesn’t work if you don’t take it correctly. It’s been good to me though and as it keeps working I will keep with it but the day it isn’t weaning myself off of it will be a bitch.
9. Lithium- It was like having the fucking flu. It made me feel horrible. I tried it for a short while at a small dose but I had bad reaction.
10. Seroquel- Started off with a low dose 2 years ago and now I am maxed out at 700 mg. You can get high from it (don’t get high) and it is the only thing that helps me sleep.
11. Fanapt- Antipsychotic never worked kept it because of insurance causes memory lapses and is some strange shit.
12. Geodon– This was a very short lived medication. This medicine had something to do with the “Affordable Care Act” which is pure bullshit. I paid $125 a month and it didn’t cover my doctor and the majority of medication. We had to adjust meds to they would be covered by the insurance company even with insurance I was still paying over $120 a month for medicine. My dr is awesome because I lived off samples for about 6 months. Geodon didn’t work. It was a crappy medicine that I had to be weaned off of to start a new one.
13. Thorazine- These pills are currently my new best friend. I have so many problems with dreams and they have helped and been a major improvement to my sleep and dreams.
14. Valium- It was good for snorting and that was about it.
15. Trazadone- My fucked up asshole hospital psychiatrist prescribed these with Lexapro because he is an idiot. I seriously think he printed out a degree from online because it takes a true idiot to prescribe medication the way he did.
16. Nuvigil– It taste horrible. It doesn’t matter if you have water in your mouth and when you swallow. It is for people with narcolepsy. They gave it to me to help wake me up because it is so hard for me to go to sleep. I used to take it with 3 20 ounce Redbulls and then I kept dealing with manic and psychosis issues.
17. Provigil- See Nuvigil same thing dosage of 500 mg mixed it with energy drinks fucked up my brain. I also want to point out that I am not responsible with medication.
18. Risperdal- Don’t remember much about it. This is one of the transitional medications because of insurance.
19. Latuda- This medicine was prescribed to me because of insurance reasons. I was on it for a couple of months until my insurance changed again. I didn’t like it and
20. Prazosin- I am on this for the second time the first time I was on a 5 mg dose with Lexapro and Klonopin, Now my smart dr has me on 2 mg to help with nightmares. They also give it to men with with prostate issues. It kind of works but I think the other pills with it make it better.

If you made it through the medicine history then you know this is just the tip of the iceberg for psychological medications. Every medicine is different depending on the person but this is my “LEGALLY” prescribed medication. I would love to hear you stories too.