Dear Jennie,

(Please excuse any odd characters that appear in this letter. I have to write in Microsoft Word and then copy and paste onto the forum because my computer shuts down unexpectedly when I write directly in forum or email programs. The transposition causes the odd characters.)

Here is a link to a site that describes the various, “mood stabilizers” used to treat bipolarity. The overall site is the best single resource for bipolar information that I have found on the web. As far as I can see, “anti-psychotic” and “mood stabilizer” are phrases used synonymously to describe this genre of meds. “Depakote” would, therefore, be an anti-psychotic. http://www.psycheducation.org/depres...tabilizers.htm

“Celexa” is an SSRI, (Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor). While often a godsend for Unipolar Depressives, these meds can have paradoxical effects on Bipolars and send them into mania or depression. If you are not yet stable, my bet is that the fault lies with the Celexa rather than the Depakote.

At the risk of offending Christian Scientists on the forum, it is difficult for me to see how someone of this persuasion could be helpful to people like ourselves. Christian Scientists believe that, since god is all-good, he wouldn’t create anything that is “bad”. Ergo, if we are mentally ill, it is the fault of our perception rather than of reality. In reality, we are not sick. Essentially, Christian Scientists are zealous Cognitive Behavior Therapists. Through prayer and reading the works of Mary Baker Eddy one trains one’s mind to see reality as it truly exists, rather than in the malformed state that our (sinful?) perception takes in.

If it works for you, great. However, my secular view is that the chemical soup in our brain is out-of-balance, and it requires the addition of other chemicals to regularize it.

After reading your posts, it is obvious that you are still very much in control of yourself. The fact that one thinks about flying off a balcony doesn’t indicate that one is about to do so. You are afraid of the confusing, depressing interpretations of reality that your mind is sending you, and justifiably so. But many of us have been there and are still here.

Make an enumerated list of your concerns and the perceptions that elicited them before you see your shrink on Wednesday. He will probably make a medication change of some kind. However, if he doesn’t know the specifics of your reality, he won’t know specifically what to do.

Your mental health is a work in progress, and that is progress itself. Hang in. Most of us have, eventually, found relief. There is no reason that you should be different.

I would like to include some relationship advice. However, in view of my track record, I will refrain.

Good luck.