I have been lucky…the first med professional to realize I had bipolar II is a pretty amazing person. I wish I had met her earlier.

She meets the requirements listed in the post except for the affiliation with a psych facility. But there are only two facilities in my area and they are okay. Hopefully I won’t need one!!!!

She also provides my therapy, so I am lucky. My insurance only provides 25 visits a year, and I have blown through 16….my mood still isn’t all that stable due to some rare side effects I had with meds. Not my NP’s fault at all! This round of meds seems to be working.

Hugs to all of us who are still looking for our moods to stop spinning.

(Joe and I worked at Que/SAMS in 90/91.) I was diagnosed with BP in 2002 but now understand my lifetime pattern. I’m medicated to the hilt, which keeps me comatose most of the time. Because I also have fibromyalgia, am obese and had a heart attack (at 54), at the age of 57 I struggle with quality-of-life issues. Anyone else?
Good luck with your column Joe.
Dan
P.S. Have also spent time at St.V.)

I am lucky, I only had to go through one medicine before findinig the right one. I thank god for my abilify everyday!

From the age of 7, I had racing thoughts, pressured speech, severe insomnia, all the hallmarks of manic-depression/bipolar disorder. I was mostly way UP but my downs were rages (like my father). I wasn’t properly diag. until age 45, altho’ I saw 12 psychotherapists/psychiatrists.
The first was court-ordered (for family therapy) after I was arrested for “crimes against the state” (protesting at an anti-war rally May Day 1971). That MD psych’ diag. me as schitzophrenic but 3 months later told my parents I needed to “get away from their hovering & go to college.”
I did that, put myself thru’ got 3 degrees but every Spring, I’d be super hyper, doing way too many projects & crash with severe illnesses (pneumonia, strep throat), ending up in the hospital (not the psych’ ward, regular hospital).
I’d recover from the illness & continue taking FT courses, working 3 PT jobs, doing art shows, working on journals, etc.
I saw so many psychs who said things like “you are just creative. you need more rest.” or things to that effect.
I was always well dressed, clean, attractive, enthusiastic & have a high IQ. So I “presented” well & it wasn’t until a huge breakdown at 45 that an MD finally listened to my husband & me & sent me for testing.
Viola! the right diag, meds, therapy, different meds. Trial & error for 5 years until I got a medications specialist (an RN who could prescribe & who was very familiar w/all brain disorders).
Please try to find an MD who can work with a medications specialist & therapist.
My therapist released me 6 mo. ago. I’ve been faithfully on my meds for almost 15 years. I go to a free group therapy every week. I retired early because working was causing me to be super manic. So many businesses are running on “skeleton crews” & each worker is responsible for the work of 3-5 people. So it’s not possible for me, in my late 50s, to work.
However, many people w/this disorder can work & will do very well if the right meds are found.

My experience has been mixed. Neither of my p-docs have worked with my therapist that I am aware of.

Its so hard because my therapist knows me and the p-doc only sees me monthly for 15 minutes. I don’t think they want to work together…I think the p-docs don’t want to work with the therapists…that is my opinion.

The medicine cocktails and the changing are the worst. I’ve had car accidents, its affected my work and overall well being. They’ll never admit it though.

I had for many years a psychiatrist who refused to admit I was bipolar. He insisted, in the face of increasing evidence such as my reports of days spent unable to speak English, my thoughts were racing so fast I’d leave out words all over the sentences, my writing was shorthand, and I was so sexually reckless it was unbelievable, that I just had psychotic depression. Now his eventual excuse for that was I could still sit on a chair. I couldn’t change that psychiatrist because I live in Canada and when I’d go to my gp and ask for another doctor he’d say nobody else is available. I finally do have somebody else, who is actually helping me (miraculous to me, unbelievable) but all those years on the wrong medicines turned my bipolar into ultra rapid cycle with intense psychosis, and destroyed most of my teeth. It also led to my bankruptcy, the loss of all of my investments, and some problems with my career since I was too sick to do all the upgrading I should have. This psychiatrist I had was so far behind on his continuing education he didn’t even know the names of drugs like Lamictal and Topomax. Yet he felt comfortable practicing while in fact knowing nothing about contemporary bipolar treatment. I went broke while he lives in comfort on fees paid by the government for what? Who should be allowed to work they are a minimum of 10 years out of date on their specialty and their listening skills are so poor they make serious clinical judgments by chair sitting ability?

I feel very lucky to have found a really great therapist and p-doc. Top it all off, they exchange information when needed to ensure I get a proper treatement.

When I was first dxed by my internal medicine doc (at my first appt. w/her; I had been going to a GP who dxed me w/depression–as I never went to see him when I was manic! Plus my mother had bp & committed suicide). The internal med doc said I was in a “mixed episode” as I was very depressed & very agitated. She sent me to a pdoc who started me on Depakote. That helped w/the agitation, but not the depression.

When I told him that, he asked if the radio was sending me “special messages”–which I had never had as a symptom! He just said I was fine & to stay on the Depakote. Well, I wasn’t “fine” so I “fired him.”

Went to an out-patient program affiliated w/a hospital. The pdoc there started me on Lithium (plus Provigil to combat the side effects of excessive daytime sleepiness). I felt GREAT on Lithium; have never felt that good. But I had kidney malfunction on Lithium. He sent me for an ultrasound to make sure I didn’t have a tumor on my kidney or something causing the bad test results.

No, it was the Lithium. By that time I was finished w/the out-patient program & went to a psychiatric nurse practitioner at the recommendation of my therapist. The np is not in my network, but I asked for special authorization so my insurance pays a pittance. However, I get more than my money’s worth in that she spends 45 min.-1 hr. w/me for $115.00.

She will see me immediately if necessary & managed to put a combo of meds together that allowed me to have a good quality of life. She & my therapist converse (with my permission). I’ve been w/her for 12 yrs. & am now happy to report that I’ve been able to get off some meds (Abilify, Trazodone) & lowered the dosages of others in the hopes of eventually getting off them or take as little as possible. I credit Dialectical Behavioral Therapy for helping me “retrain” my thinking & for teaching me much-needed coping skills, communication techniques, self care, etc.

My np actually took an afternoon off (for no charge)to accompany me to a doctor’s appt. that I was so anxious about that I kept canceling & rescheduling. But it was important for me to go as I have high blood pressure & cholesterol & needed to have my levels checked.

She has treated patients that she has had who have lost their jobs (one a friend of mine) & has not charged them. Somehow she has this “crazy” idea that her job is a calling to help people who are suffering from mental disorders. She’s given me her cell phone # & works in a collaborative way w/me.

When I wanted to start getting off certain meds & decreasing dosages, she was willing to work w/me. But I also respect her professional opinion so if I had trouble without the medication I was willing to go back on it, or try another if necessary. So I’m willing to forgo other things in life to see this wonderful provider. Also, I am blessed that my husband is willing to spend the extra money for my treatment. He does not begrudge me “costing” him money.

I’d been depressed from the age of 5 or 6 that I can recall. I had trouble sitting still in school. I slept a lot during the day or pretended to sleep so people would leave me alone. Yet at other times I had tons of energy and would turn silly and extroverted with thoughts racing, body bouncing, and telling jokes around people who did and didn’t know me.

I never put it all together because the depression was the most memorable and long lasting. I never wanted to be on medication and I didn’t like the couple of times that I had tried therapy because they wanted to rehash the past and I hated most of my childhood and just wanted to move forward.

When I was 20, I had a 6 month bout of insomnia and the doctor I went to put me on an anti-depressant because “it has a side effect of treating insomnia.” I told him I was depressed because I couldn’t sleep. Long story short, it made me manic in the sense that I was doing impulsive dangerous things. I vowed to never try medication again. I limped along battling depression, anxiety, and insomnia for years. Had another manic episode w/out being on any drugs or alcohol at age 23. I drove across the country and back in the course of 2 weeks with very little sleep. Sometimes I’d cross 3 states in one day, only stopping to fill up and use the restroom.

Still, no one knew, least of which me, that this was related to something called bipolar. It took a forced trip to the hospital late in 2008 for me to realize this was serious and I needed help for the debilitating depression and anxiety. I started therapy, I was going through all kinds of medication combos, but none were really helping to prevent the severe depression and mood swings. It was in therapy that we identified some of my manic episodes and I finally had a name for this…bipolar disorder. I wasn’t just dealing with major depression and there was a reason why I responded badly to SSRIs and other things designed for unipolar depression.

Now, just today I’ve started Lamictal and am hoping that at last I can get this disease under control and move on with my life.

It’s been a long journey, as I’ve heard so many express, and it’s far from over, but it’s good to know we’re not alone and that this is treatable. We’re very lucky to live in an era with medications, therapy, and far more understanding than even 50 years ago, let alone most of human history that locked up or killed the chemically unbalanced. I can’t wait for gene therapy and other technology that will revolutionize medicine. I want to get back to writing creatively, my passion!

Your story and quest for stability is valid. I love this site and the support of everyone here. Hugs!

I am familiar with cannabis being a good therapeutical substance when combating Bipolar II( rapid cycling ).

It alleviates symptoms, and brightens a mood when depressed.It offers introspection when manic.

Endocannabinoids may respond negatively on synthetic medicines.
Herbal cannabis seems to work well.

The main advantage is moods being guided better, and no adverse side effects occur, aside from slightly increased appetite at times, alight euphoria, and possibly brightening up altogether.

Marijuana or cannabis is contraindicated in treating mood disorders for a number of reasons, and I encourage all my patients to limit or eliminate their marijuana use as we try to treat their bipolar disorder.

There are no well controlled studies of marijuana in bipolar disorder, so I could not in any way recommend its use. The risks are many and include negative effects on mood and anxiety – paranoid thinking and triggering psychosis to name two I have seen on numerous occasions. Moods are not guided better but in fact become more loose and potentially dysregulated – inhibitory systems are reduced in power and this can add to problems with dysregulation. Long term use can lead to numbing and flattening the neurological systems related to motivation and reward. Individuals with bipolar disorder typically have associated deficits in thinking and attention – and marijuana clearly can make those much worse. Finally the interactions of marijuana with other bipolar medications can be complex and hard to predict so therefore high risk.

Similar to alcohol, there may be some immediate feelings of mood improvement but the bigger picture is much too risky to consider this a medically safe journey.

Joe Kraynak says: ‘I highly doubt that most psychiatrists would recommend medical marijuana for patients with depression or mania..’

I would highly doubt the same as well, but at the same time, their judgement about this really do not impress me in the least.

My son’s father was bipolar, although never officially diagnosed as such. He always self medicated with pot, and was indeed a lot more bearable with than without it.

If I was an ‘official researcher’, I would interview the patients and not the doctors.
After all, when a large majority of people self-medicate with pot, this means a lot more than when a doctor does not recommend this treatment. 9of course they do not!)

Same with something like hydrocodone, one of the most abused prescription drugs in the US. A doctor will explain that this medicine is only indicated for moderate physical pain. But the person who self-medicates with it uses it for psychological pain, or well being, and it works quite well for this, and also often, energy. (Oh, but it is supposed to make you drowsy, the leaflet says)

Anyway, I am sounding a little sarcastic because my son would be dead more than once had I not paid attention to his well being during these endless trials of varying mood stabilizers.

The point is, that many, many people are dead, and surely a lot more are dead from the combination of psychiatric drugs and those who prescribe them than from self medicating with pot.

Katrin,

Are you aware that hydrocodone contains acetaminpohen? In large doses, in the amounts people abuse, acetaminophen is EXTREMELY toxic.

Look, I am bipolar and I’ve abused most of the drugs under the sun, including marijuana and alcohol. Those drugs are like repairing your car with duct tape. It might hold you down for a few weeks, but they don’t help in the long run.

In the long run the drugs were less effective, more expensive, and had a plethora of side effects that made work and school difficult.

Contrast that with an old standby drug like lithium. If you are healthy and monitor your blood levels lithium is extremely safe with mild side effects. I feel soooo much better on lithium than I ever did on marijuana, alcohol, or any one of the other drugs I attempted to self medicate with.

Psychiatrists aren’t gurus, and it may take a few tries to get the drugs right. Psychiatrists aren’t all equal in quality, but generally speaking they are a hell of a lot better at helping people than all these anti-medicine nutjobs.

Marijuana as medicine? Do you use leeches to cure your influenza? Give me a break. Please.

Tyler, of course I am aware that hydrocodone contains tylenol and about the toxic effects. I was not advertizing wither for the treatment of bipolar, but just making a point.

And in my son’s case, he did not even have bipolar, it turns out, and after going through hell for 7 or so years. I mean he did, but it was the Luvox that caused this. Seven years of hell, and it took a complaint, and a visit from DHS to finally
deal with this. the case worker told the psychiatrist to take my son off the Luvox and from that moment on the ‘bipolar’ was history and has not returned for even a moment since and that was 2.5 years ago.

As I said, he almost died from lamictal and some of the others, like internal bleeding, etc.

I am not against medications, and I am not against doctors, but I do not worship them either.

I am glad the lithium is working for you.