Posted by BarbaraCat on May 22, 2002, at 12:56:08
In reply to Re: Cyclothymia mood stabilizers, posted by Listohep on May 21, 2002, at 18:12:22
Hi,
I second Jon's suggestions. I was recently rediagnosed from unipolar severe depression with mixed states to Bipolar II in January. Actually, it was me who presented my Bipolar theory to my pdoc after following up through research what I learned from the folks on this board. He agreed completely. The main thing that alerted me was the fact that the depression/anxiety would always break through any SSRI's, and an increase always initiated anxiety and/or panic attacks. Or else the AD would just make me feel more depressed from the get-go. Since starting Lithium, the world has been a much better place and the AD I'm taking also works better.You ask about creativity and concerns that a mood stabiliser will inhibit it. I'm a musician and dancer (by avocation rather than as a career). My own experience is that I feel about 10 times more creative now that I have the clarity and motivation to follow through. I used to have swirling frenzied ideas and a desperate longing to create but be too mentally disorganized to follow through, and then I'd beat myself up for it. Since feeling so much better, I'm now in the process of getting a dance class together and have started studying music again and am in a chorale ensemble -- impossible tasks when I was cycling up and down all the time. I can now hold one thought at a time and this helps immensely with the discipline required to pefect an art. Hypomania just wore me out and left too many loose ends.
poster:BarbaraCat
thread:9730
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020517/msgs/107291.html