Dear Nathan,
Yes welcome to the world of mood swings...unfortunately you have seen it on extreme ends of the poles. I am sorry..its hard isn't it.
I am taking lamictal as my only bipolar med...it has antidepressant properties as well as mood stabilizing ones.
I also take ambien to sleep at night.
Thankfully this new med for me is working out alright.
My moods have been staying in check....
Glad that you found us and keep posting.
bizi

Hi Zombie Slayer... It is such a great thing for a mod to be getting acquainted with our forum, to want to understand where we (as individuals, even) are coming from.

I am a mild bipolar. I have been on antidepressants most of my adult life - originally for a straight 11 years. It was only 4 years ago that I was recognized as bipolar. It was rough getting going with docs who wanted to tank me up on antipsychotics that turned me into a zombie who gained weight like a steer in a feedlot. But then I changed doctors and found someone who recognizes that patient's feedback is unmatched in learning what works for a particular patient.

I often tweak my meds and have even changed antidepressants. I am doing fantastically for the past two years on Lamictal, an epilepsy drug that makes me less Tigger-bouncy. For one example - where I used to drive more like a teenager, I now am much more careful, less likely to make u-turns in unusual places or pass other cars so closely that we swap bugs caught on the wipers. Stuff like that.

With Wellbutrin (an antidressant), I am not as likely to disappear for days at a time into the escape of sleep and I am starting to move forward in dealing with things. Not things you might imagine - just the things of daily life that regular peole never think twice about. I am still not able to deal with all that I was able to before I was bad enough to go on disability, but I actually believe that I might be able to regain a lot of functionality. It takes a patient therapist able to tolerate slow progress and frequent regressions, able to spend a lot of time just being there for us. Especially for those of use who simply have never had ANYONE who was there for us.

About being on disability. It wasn't the bipolar alone that put me here -- but it may have been an aggravating condition with isolation, severe repeated PTSD over 10years, complicated by CFS/CFIDS, and severe birth-family dysfunction that victimized me. Lots of us have been THERE.

It was common (where many of us come from) to feel that members of this forum were considered "crazy" and "different" - "not one of us". There is a stigma attached to the diagnosis and it is not at all unknown to experience the leper resonse.

Also common is that because we are given to emotional excess and great passion, we can seen (by outsiders) as unreasonable, out of line, disruptive and are, as a consequence, we attract negative reactions from non's.

Some of us are more given to occasional emotional outbursts or even disagreeable behavior and lashing out (usually indiscriminately). This often comes from a perception that they are not liked or rejected. It is like a ultra-sensitivity... But what is not recognized (by outsiders) is that the same person is loved and valued within our community. While we may express displeasure with some of the more exteme behavior, we are always happy to welcome them back, forgiving them totally. Bipolar is a tolerant, accepting and warm loving community.

I do not recall a single time in the past when there were any significant disruptions within the community that lasted more than a few days .. and all died away on their own. The only major disruptons were not within our community, but were in protection of our community from outsiders who did not understand our needs at all, yet gave off-the-mark interpretations, offering half-baked treatments and cures, or who sought to impose their views on us.

We hang together here - for in our real world lives, we often dangle alone.

Bipolars greatly appreciate the type of moderation offered here. No matter how angry or out of line some few of us may sometimes be, we always get over it, creeping back with apologies and, like the prodigal son, are greeted with acceptance and understanding. Bipolar exemplifies the word community.

Complicating the varying presentations of bipolar include the fact that bipolars are not one thing, but an entire spectrum of degrees of impairment, an entire spectrum of giftedness in a myriad of styles, an entire spectrum of mood and responsiveness, an entire specturm from extreme confidence to hiding under the bed. We are all individuals - dramatically so. We can, in no instances, be conveniently pigeonholed.

Also, there are other co-existing conditions that occur more frequently in bipolars than the population as a whole - things like learning difficulties of various kinds, personality disorders of various kinds, and a variety of complicating behaviors that can develop as a consequence of (in SOME, not all, people) living for long periods with bipolar.

Again, thank you for introducing yourself to this community and

http://www.moodswing.org