Let's call it the kiddie roller coaster
Had a meltdown today - this time, I was working on this crazy project on SEO stuff that I've been working on this summer, and I was coming down to the wire with a sick pile of notes and the need to organize them. And one of my main notebooks wasn't anywhere to be found.
I flipped. Life was a worthless pile of shit and the joke was on me. The whole thing lasted about twenty minutes, me convinced that even when I find work that suits me, I'm gonna fuck it up because I'm such a loser and I'm never going to get off disability. Yadda yadda yadda.
I collapsed into a heap on the couch with my stuffed dolphin. Yes, I really own such a thing, and Lauren brought me a valium as I lamented all the times I could've offed myself but someone (usually me) intervened. By the time I found the notebook the Valium kicked in, and working seemed like a kinda pointless thing to do.
Oh yeah....the trials and tribs of the mentally ill. Thanks for all the fish.
The Icarus Project .net
I honestly don't have time to figure out
what this is all about right now, but it was recommended to me by a wild-eyed fellow patient on the porch at the Aztec, who suggested that we start a local chapter of this organization dedicated to "radical mental health," whatever the hell that means. Something tells me I'd end up hospitalized again - but at least I'd have friends on that med vacation....
San Francisco Offers Health Care to the Uninsured!
Yes, it is true. The community that I spent a good bulk of my madness in is offering hea
lth care to all uninsured adults. That's right - grownups can now get health care if they are uninsured. This is SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Whoo-pee!
Scopolamine Offers Hope for Manic-Depressives
Give Us The Patch or a Shot
Scopolamine Offers New Hope for BiPolarsFrom Scientist, Interrupted
I had vaguely heard of this last week, and the thing that intrigues me most is the skin patch administration. If the gastro-intestinal side effects of my meds could be eliminated...or better still, if a patch could last for a period of days, that would be a *tremendous* boon...
After my episode last week (and trust me, it was a goddamn lulu, on par with my first break but slightly less scary because now I know what I've got and slightly more scary because it gave me a real sense of futility about the illness...) I am *terrified* to have another break. But pill meds...are so complicated. You have to take them every day, and in my case, you have to take two different sets, one in the morning, one in the evening.
This very morning, I couldn't find my pill box. I have just added 5mg of Abilify to my daily regimen, which also includes 1200mg of lithium and 10 mg of Lexapro. I got two weeks worth of Abilify and loaded up the pill box, then mislaid it. This morning, I couldn't find it and I began to panic. Rage attack came on fairly quickly after that. Sucks...
I found them eventually, but by then I had elevated heart rate, anxiety, anger, blah blah blah. I called my doctor and told him, "Fuck side effects, I'm taking the whole day's dose in the mornings," because while it's *easy* to remember taking pills in the morning (you feel weird if you don't) it's hard to remember at night and I *frequently* accidentally "skip" my evening meds because I just forget. That certainly was the cause of last week's episode.
Improvements in meds are great. Improvements in administration - I keep telling my doctor I "want Norplant for lithium" (with a shot once a year) - would be even better.
