Where I am now...

I just celebrated my 3 year anniversary of being on meds nonstop.  A proud accomplishment I suppose.

It still bums me out to know that I'll have to rely on meds to function in society for the rest of my life.  I can't lose weight and then magically be able to stop taking the pills because the weightloss cured my ailment.  I can't get a shot and get better.  It is what it is.

I've been through so many since my last post.  It got to the point that things were changing so rapidly as far as my meds go that it became pointless to even share with my friends and family, much less on a blog.

Today, I'm on 450 mg of Wellbutrin SR (tried to take that down to 300 to see if it would help with my anger/irritation levels but it just made it worse) 100 mg of Lamictal, still the Xanax as needed, and the most new is Trileptal as a mood stabilizer.

It turns out that my body responds better to the mood stabilizers than it does to the majority of antidepressants.  I'm a difficult case to treat.  I feel like my doctor thinks I"m making shit up because of all the side effects I get from different things.  I stopped researching a new medicine before starting it... I just take it as I'm told and then make not of any side effects or interactions, or whatever so that I don't have any preconceived notion about any particular medicine...

This week I"m mentally exhausted, stressed out, tired, run down and want to climb in bed, hide from the world and sleep for like 72 hours straight.

I'm actually thinking about bumping up the newest med to see if it helps...

I'm not feeling completely hopeless at this point but just eh, blah, here.

Will see if it gets better this weekend...

The Happiness Cocktail

So I'm still on a roll and haven't quit my meds... Gold star for me.  But damn if I don't have days where I think about it.  The whole being a guinea pig thing and trying 973 different combinations of drugs gets old after a while. 

As of Tuesday, I'm on a new combination.  The Happiness Cocktail that is being prescribed to me still includes wellbutrin, a dose at which I'm maxed out on; xanax as needed; lithium, and now another antidepressent called Vybriid. 

I feel like I should be mixing all of those in a smoothie or something... it's just weird.  I hate taking all these pills, but the thought of not taking them scares me to death... I can't risk a manic or a super depressed phase...In a perfect world if the scale was 1 to 10, 1 being suicidal and 10 being whoa manic, I would want to be a 6.  I'd like to be balanced with a hint of mania...does that make sense?

Oh well we'll see how this one turns out and go from there...one pill at a time.

it's all sinking in

So Jen has now gone from wanting to write the manufacturers of Lithium and tell them they rock to asking me repetitively why the doctor decided to increase my dose...  She feels like I'm moving backwards rather than forward and is genuinely concerned.

I can see changes but only in the sense of side effects.  My hand tremor is more predominant, my guts (insides in general) are all out of wack, and I'm pretty tired.  Granted I need to find a way to force myself to go to bed earlier I haven't made it to that point yet. I usually go to sleep around 11 only to get up at about 4:40 in the am... several nights of that and it's no wonder I'm dragging...so I can't blame it all on the medicine.

For now, I'm not giving up on it by any means.  What it boils down to is that Jen may feel I'm moving in the wrong direction, but what she isn't taking into account is that if I was truly bad off that she'd be battling with my manic side and since that hasn't been an issue, I'm completely content.

My pal Lithium

Still taking lithium and haven't died yet so I'm thinking it's going pretty well, lol.  A few days ago my dr increased my dose, so I've gone from the 300 mg starter dose to 600 mg.  No huge side effects going on so that''s pretty awesome.  My hands tend to get a little shaky, but not to the point that I can't function and/or just ignore it. 

I can tell when I don't drink enough water because my kidney region starts to hurt if that makes any sense...it also becomes more difficut to do simple things like open and close my hands or twist open a bottle... weird little things that aren't too terribly awful but annoying enough to make them noticeable.

My doctor had told me to avoid caffeine because it can dehydrate you and that leads to lithium levels in your blood becoming toxic... so I kept drinking soda (regular of course and since I'm more thirsty that helped me pack on some points rather quickly) but when I went to the dr the other day and told her that I thought I was drinking too many because they made me feel weird sometimes she said that it's not just because of dehydration that I should avoid caffeine, but because it can alter lithium levels, pushing them up into the toxic zones...

Wow, could have used that information a month ago, lol.  My stomach occassionally gets upset and I go to the bathroom like 17 times a day (but that's probably only like 2 or 3 days of the week) and not so uncontrollable that I have to stay at home for fear of shitting my pants... (not yet anyway)

I'm super paranoid about my hair falling out if I put chemicals on it, so I've stopped coloring my hair and for the first time since my sophomore year in highschool am seeing my natural haircolor.  Crazy.

My face is breaking out more than usual which can also be blamed on Lithium I'm discovering, but if it gets bad enough, I'll go to a dermatologist...for now, it is what it is.

I ordered a medical ID bracelet the other day.  I want to have something as back up to where if my levels get all fucked up and I pass out or somethign crazy, then someone will have an idea of maybe what caused it, be able to reverse it and just go from there.

I've been a little on edge the last couple of days but I have my first mortgage payment coming up, and lil man seems to be really good at working my nerves since he's in his "smart ass" phase... I could just knock his teeth out somedays, but I don't...I never even lay a hand on him... I've gotten pretty good at giving him looks that say, look here boy, I'm not playing--DO WHAT THE FUCK I'M TELLING YOU TO DO, FOCUS, LISTEN, SIT STILL, BLOW YOUR NOSE, etc etc etc

Life goes on... headed in the right direction and just embracing it.

one week later

So I've been on lithium for a week now and I'm not dead...SCORE. Lol.  I just went this morning before work to get my bloodwork done.  For anyone not familiar with the process--the doctor sends you for bloodwork to ensure that your body can handle lithium being added to your system.  If everything is fine, the doctor will call and tell you to go ahead and start taking it.  Then, the day after your fifth dose, you go get blood drawn (9-10 hours after your evening dose) so the doctor can see what the lithium level is in your system and adjust the dose accordingly.

I'd have to say that I don't feel bad overall.  Yeah, I'm thirstier and my mouth always seems dry, but I haven't had any stomach discomfort or any weird eating habits.  I feel good for the most part.  The only drawback for now is that I'm not sleeping as well at night... but on a plus side I don't wake up groggy or foggy and I'm not struggling to stay awake once I do wake up... My head hurts off and on and I'm scared to take anything for a headache because I haven't found out what can interact with the lithium... the RX sheet from my pharmacy said to be careful with things like Naproxen and Ibuprophen... so I need to look into that... and my skin is dry as fuck... but hey it is what it is.

Maybe this won't be as bad as I thought...time will tell.

A scene from a movie...

You know in the movies when the main character is making a purchase that they don't want to be caught making (i.e. condoms, the stuff to get rid of crabs, kotex products even, whatever) they almost ALWAYS get caught. 

Sometimes its in the form of a person they know bumping into them in the aisle and dealing with the awkwardness... but the really good ones are the ones that have issues with price or items that can't ge found...the clerk shouts through the loud speaker, "Hey Merv, I need a price check on ______ for this gentleman/lady here" Merv then hollers back through the store with the location or even better comes running up to the counter to "save the day" extending the product to the customer--at this point everyone in town knows their dirty little secret... awkward right?

Well yesterday I got the call from my doctor that my blood work was all good so I could start taking the Lithium that she prescribed as the next step in my "treatment."  I go to Walgreen's and hand my RX to the girl and she with a puzzled look walks over to the girl at the pick up window and asks her a question.  She had already spent a few minutes on the computer trying to figure this whole thing out.  Well little miss helpful at the pick up window in her loudest voice imaginable (no really, on a scale of 1 to 10, 3 being normal indoor voice this chick was easily a 9.5) says, OH! THATS THE GENERIC FOR LITHIUM, GO OVER TO YOUR RIGHT DOWN THAT AISLE AND LOOK FOR LITHIUM CARBONATE!

That's about when I wanted to turn around climb up on a chair from the waiting area and proclaim "HI EVERYONE, MY NAME IS TOMMY AND I'M BIPOLAR!!!

Maybe that will be my next tattoo... bipolar in huge letters on my forehead....oh well it is what it is... I started it last night and I didn't die, so I guess we are off to a good start, lol.  But that folks is my awkward movie for you...

We now return you to your scheduled program...

I would like to start off by saying that I'm drinking the most dreadful cup of coffee I've encountered in a long time.  What's worse is that I will continue to drink it until it is gone, simply out of principle.

I joined weight watchers this week because the course of different meds I've been over the last couple of years has finally caught up with me and has pushed me beyond my heaviest EVER!.

No bueno, you know?  So long story short, I've reduced the amount of cream that I put in my coffee since with WW you have to count points... I'd rather use points toward something awesome, not just coffee creamer--but I digress.

The real topic of this blog is the latest and greatest in all that is Tommy's Bipolar Life.  I'm happy to report that I've been functioning pretty well for a long time now and on days where I'm not at the top of my game, I've gotten pretty good at faking it and making myself go to work and do things I don't always feel like doing.  The exception being housework which has gone from OCD in nature to just enough to get by and not be gross.

I went to see the dr yesterday.  She had a cancellation so after months of trying to get in I was able to.  I told her how impossible she is to get in and see and how because of that I weened myself off of my Latuda on my own without talking to her first.  I explained further that it made me feel emotionally numb, but angry and irritable at the same time.  Not to mention the lack of a sex drive was really killing my relationship and leading to fights that wouldn't normally happen if I handled biznazz for my wife, lol... but when you arent' thinking about shit like that it's easy to just neglect the concept in general.  (this problem has since been remedied, lol)

The dr let me in a little secret and said to call up to the office, say I'm having probs with my meds and that I need the dr to call me--she can get me in that way... the nazi receptionists are obviously oblivious to how important it is to talk to a dr soemtimes when you are taking mind altering medications...

Well we looked at the lonnnnnng list of meds I've tried since being diagnosed back in 2000, omg that was a long time ago... and she gave me three choices that hadn't been tried yet: Lamictal, Seroquel, and Lithium.

Seroquel is in the same family of drugs that I've had the least success with so it would be a shot in the dark.  Lamictal can't necessarily be equated to, but kind of falls in line with Topamax which worked for a while (but still left me irritable and snappy) so it would be hit or miss.

Lithium remains the tried and true treatment for bipolar (for those people who can handle all the side effects that come along with it.) I told her that agreeing to take Lithium freaked me out because then my disorder becomes real.  It's no secret that I'm bipolar, but I don't introduce myself to new people as "Tommy the bipolar girl" I mean come on, (I wait until like the second encounter, sike)... but now pharmacy techs will "know" just from the name on the bottle.  Friends/acquaintenances that come to visit my house and decide to read RX bottles on the counter or in the medicine cabinet will "know"... my son will soon be at the age where he will see Lithium in the house and "know" that one of his mom's is effing crazy (like he couldnt tell without that, lol) and well since my name will be on the bottle--the gig will be up... it will be official at that point.

I suppose the good thing is that at the end of the day I don't give a shit what people think.  Granted I'm not going to leave a bottle of Lithium chilling on my desk in my office so that my employees know I'm bipolar... that's just not good business...

At the end of the day I agreed to the lithium.  I'm at the point where its getting extremely difficult to play guinea pig to all of these "new" drugs that may or may not work... (for me) Since lithium does something with the kidneys in your body, I've got to get bloodwork done before I begin taking it to make sure my levels are legit.  I've also got to get my thyroid checked because it can jack that up too... Once I get the go ahead I'll start with a standard 300 mg dose.  Then five days later, about 8-10 hours after taking my nightly dose, I will go back to the lab and have another set of tests done so that they can determine what dose I should be on without being put into Lithium Toxicity...

Click here to see what I've learned about Lithium so far.  Unfortunately... until I start taking it I have no idea what effects it will have on me personally, but I'm putting on my brave face and trying it anyway... wish me luck.