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This is what it took to get better…

Posted by Janice on May 25, 2000, at 14:43:26

•1 priest• - at 10 years old, which I consider the start of my bipolar, I'd make weekly visits to my neighbourhood Priest to tell him that somehow the Devil had gotten inside my head and I could no longer control everything that was going on in my head, that some of my thoughts were evil and that God would probably not be impressed.

•1 hospitalization• - for anorexia

•2 Psychologists•

•3 years of therapy with them•

•2 years of group therapy•

•1 Chinese medical doctor•

•2 Naturopathic doctors•

•3 psychics•

•1 more hospitalization• - for mania, where I finally introduced to psychiatry

•3 pdocs•

•6 years of seeing pdocs•

•25 different medications•

•1 year at psychobabble•

These were all the times that I remember asking for help.

On top of all this, I had 1 (short-term, of course, no man could handle me long-term) boyfriend who was a medical doctor, and I've had another longterm friendship with another medical doctor (although we were kids when we met).

I've had a great aunt who spent 10 years in mental institute for manic depression. My mother was diagnosed as hyperkinetic as a child.

I used to go to parties (hypomanic) and tell people I didn't need alcohol or drugs cause I had a 'serious natural high happening'.

§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§

So after 24 years after the time of onset of my manic depression disorder, and 6 years after first trying medications, I've found my answer.

lithium (the most common treatment for bipolar)


Not to criticize any of the people that helped me, they all (except maybe 1) seemed to have my best interest at hand. Of course, as my bipolar got worse, I was minimizing my negative symptoms (anger and rage). For a longtime, I was the one who could not even image giving up anti-depressants because at least they gave me some good days, plus I couldn't really imagine life without them.

I guess I'm trying to fathom how this has happened.When I showed this to my pdoc, he seemed to think my experience took longer, but not alot longer, than many bipolar patients.

Couldn't they teach this stuff in school. Once or twice through the 12 years, have someone come in to talk about mental illness, destigmatize it, shed some light around it. I could be wrong, but isn't it something like 25-40% of people have mental illness at one point in their lives.

I don't mean to complain, just point out something that really seems ridiculous, That so much time is wasted in ignorance, in denial, in time spent receiving not the right help.

Anyone have any ideas on how to get help faster and the right help, they'd like to share? Are there alot of people who have had this type of experience?

Janice


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poster:Janice thread:34620
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20000517/msgs/34620.html