Posted by shelliR on September 29, 2001, at 20:18:11
In reply to Re: hanging in there » shelliR, posted by Lorraine on September 28, 2001, at 17:34:23
Hi Lorraine.
> > > > I put out my morning pills and mistakingly took them with my hs meds! I told him and he said yes, he realized that even for depression (along with other types of pain), I should be taking it three times a day.
> Very cool! This will make a big difference for you.
I think it will, only for the last two days I have lay down, setting my clock for a 30minute nap, and woken up three hours later. I have been very very tired. I'm not sure why, whether the oxy at night is affecting the quality of my sleep. All the sudden I went from very stimulated on the oxy and wellbutrin to very sleepy. But I'm not going to worry about it yet, although certainly I can't live this way. Sometimes I am like this premenstrually, but I can't figure out my cycle at all now, to see if it's related.>
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> > > >He admited that he was fairly new to the use of oxy for depression and he had been working with a pain specialist.
> I like the admitted part. Big step for him. I'm hoping you gave him lots of positive reinforcement. Also great to know that he is working with a pain specialist and that they believe your dosage is a "water seeks its own level" sort of thing. What a blast of positive news, Shelli. I know you have been worried about the role oxy would assume. It is nice to know that his intention was for it to assume a fairly large role and sit there as a hinge piece. This is much better than as a crutch to help you get through and it takes a lot of pressure off your other meds in terms of how much work they have to do. Good stuff.I am really excited. Probably I didn't reinforce him enough :-) , but I did forgive him! I feel good having two doctors working with me (even if I only see one). The best thing is that I don't feel that I am in so much pain that I must die for an hour in the morning and think if I got habituated to the oxy, this is how my whole day would be. Because it probably would not be as bad as the rebound was making me feel in the morning. Oh, and I am up to 45 mg of nardil (well, I'm alternating every other day with 30mg, instead of splitting pills).
> >It doesn't leave me totally and fully dependent on working with my current pdoc, if I decide at some point I don't want to.
> Have you met the other doctor? Would he be comfortable working with you without your pdoc or substituting in another pdoc?He told me the other doctor's name, but I already forget. And I'll have to wait a bit to work it into a conversation so I can get it there again (without hurting my pdoc's feelings). I have no idea if I ever could work with the other guy, he's not a psychiatrist, I gather. I think it's more this thing that stays in my head as a possibility if I ever have any questions, or concerns that my pdoc is not able to address or if my pdoc and I break up. So maybe I don't want to know anything negative, like no he wouldn't work with my next pdoc around narcotics. Sometimes it is better to live with illusions until it is necessary to figure out the reality. Now when my pdoc is good (as the saying goes), he is very very good, and when he is bad....... I also think it is in my best interest to take great care with his ego. He keeps asking me what number I am at in the depression scale. (1 being the most depression). I never answer. This time he said 5 to 6, and I said yes. I have to figure out this scale thing. What would it mean for *me* to be at 10. (I also want to write back to Zo, because she bought up happiness related to hypomanic, sort of when is it hypomania instead of a 10 or 10 plus. For example if it doesn't involve anything concrete, like spending money, but she is painting really well and really happily. Do you stop yourself to ask: , "Is this hypomania?". I have had absolutely no signs of hypomania ever, but I'm asking questions like could I be at a 10 and not need therapy? What does a ten feel like?
If my the physical elements of my depression really go away, then how much more therapy will I need? I talked some with my therapist about this on Thursday and we also used EMDR to start to process how much of my life I have missed. I am so so sad, under the depression. I am not ready to be my age. I want those years back. Things that I was working on two years ago when everything (with the exception of survival and work came to a halt.) But there were lots of years lost before that because of my self-image, because of my dissociation, etc. So, now, if I depression is sad, and I have mourned enough, what is next in my life. Am I up to the challenge of looking for an emotiona/sexual relationship, and do I really think I have the potential to love someone fully. I don't know, and I'm not even sure I want to go through all the effort.
But I must feel very encouraged by my now three good days in a row ( :-) , to even be thinking what comes next.
And there's a photo meeting that I actually want to go to next week about imaging off the computer. This is where I am headed so I think there will be lots of people there that I can learn from, specifically about paper and inks that are available. I already have my system up and running, finally. I met one guy in the photo supply store last month who has converted all his stuff from darkroom to computer and he did give me his number. I never got around to calling, but I think he will be at the meeting. Plus it's in the studio of a commercial photographer, a women who I've never met but have respected her work for years. She's highly published in Washington magazines. (When you're a photographer, you get in the habit of always looking for credits). She changed her last name to Z very early; her father is a well-known political figure and she didn't want to be identified with him in her work. So I 'm sort of excited to meet her.>
> > > > Are you sure it's the nardil that is making you hyperventilate. That would mean it was activating and sedating.
> Nardil is wierd. I'm not sure what it is in terms of activating/sedating. The only med that I used that I think made my hyperventilating go away was Adderal. When I was on Adderal and Neurontin alone during a washout. I also didn't hyperventilate when I was between meds (med free) this time (the 5 days between the parnate termination and the nardil beginning).
>Well if you take the neurotin and adderal, will you be able to tell when the nardil kicks in? Because that is probably an easier option for you, to take that route, rather than the purity route. Actually it is the way my doctor wanted to handle things in the hospital and I resisted, then gave in after one day. I wanted to try selegiline for a while before I added the oxy, because I really did feel that the oxy made me feel so good, that I wouldn't be able to see if the selegiline was working. But my pain was too great, and we decided that I could always take away the oxy, in other words I guess it would be called the subtraction method, rather than the addition method.
> OK, that is a really useful piece of info for me and I suspect that this is where I may end up. Given my last experience with Adderal the day after terminating Parnate (hypertensive crises), I'm leary of adding it again but may end up there.
I've heard that there are a lot less interactions with nardil and other meds vs. parnate and other meds. Is adderal time release? If so, is it a capsule that can be split? Is it a capsule and a pill? JUST KIDDING. See we already have a history :-)
> > Lorraine, I really don't know what to say. I can only say for me that it took a full five weeks of 45mg, and it changed my life. You haven't even done one week at 45mg. I also have to say that nardil alone wasn't enough. I also used a benzo throughout my whole adult life, sometimes more, sometimes none. It allowed me more or less to lead a normal life. And if I could have tolerated a stimulent, I would have been on that also.
> I think your attitude toward all of this is more mature than mine actually. I'm fighting myself in addition to my depression. I've also been reluctant to add things to the mix until I have a better lay of the land. What with the Nardil, the Neurontin, my new HRT and so forth, it is hard to figure out what is causing what.That’s why I mentioned subtraction above. That really may be easier. easier = better.
>
You are much more evolved on this. Maybe you have been dealing with the depression longer and have already come to terms with some of the things that I am struggling with.Well, yes, I have been depressed since my early twenties and if I had not put it in some perspective, my life would have been unbearable. I have had the image of myself as fucked up, much more than depressed until two years ago. Lots of stuff to work on outside the depression which was managed by nardil.
Although I do feel like I am having some success with my struggles. It's just that I never really accepted the fact that it was a long term chronic condition and then the fact that I might not be able to predict my next day. The problem has been that for the past 18 mos or so I have been holding my breath waiting for a drug to work--putting my life on hold. I need to live a bit more than that.
When you find the right drug, then you will naturally put it into perspective. I really never thought about my depression, only premenstrually. It’s sort of like you’re actually not depressed when meds take away the depression. Especially ADs. I took nardil once a day like a vitamin for depression and that was it.
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> > How long did it take for the Moclobemide to kick in?
> Day 1 i felt positive effects and day 5 I was pretty much thereWhat is your next plan, if nardil doesn’t kick in. I know that one plan would be to go back to moclobernide with adjuncts, but is that next? I know you always have a next plan.
> > > >Also what was your experience with effexor?
> Three weeks.
ÿ Is that an AD you would consider going back to?
ÿ I tried. It didn't work.You mean you took effexor successfully once and when you retried it, it didn’t work?
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> I have finally had two good days in a row...
Woohoo! Let the good times roll!
Three now. (Today though I’m very spacey, but not depressed)Well, you have your little niche when your depression goes away. It’s not like you have to start from scratch.
I remember that you said that you had quit work to be home with your kids, because that was something you had missed. Had you thought you’d stay home until the kids were a certain age, or just left it open-ended?Shelli
poster:shelliR
thread:67742
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010927/msgs/79919.html