My doctor is recommending ECT. I already have memory loss from unknown factors, and I'm afraid that, after ECT, I would forget that I have a cat to take care of. And there's no one here to remind me. Has anyone had the experience? I would be grateful to talk to you! I don't need clinical information - I need thoughts from someone who's been there. Thanks! And thanks ever so much to all those offering to be my friend. I needed that. The one or two friends I have here in Big Spring just aren't able to understand that "getting out of the house," "going dancing", etc. doesn't help. And I don't know how to tell them.Thanks again. billie

Billie,

I'm sorry that I can not help you as I have no experience in ECT. I just wanted to reach out and let you know I hope you get your answer.

barbara

Thanks for you support. I hope you find answers that you are looking for too.

I know of one person here who posts regularly who has had ect treatments and they saved her life. she was very suicidal and that was the only thing that helped along with a great therapist.
I would ask her to post to you but she is out having surgery for cancer.
I can tell you this that she was able to take the first part of her cpa exam and passed really well even though she has had all of those treatments.
so that is good. She has tried the vns implaint for her depression but that did not help her as far as I can tell and she had that turned off.
anytime you are faced with a big decision it is good to get feelback. you may want to do a google search there are probably forums, also you may want to check out psych central forum our parent forum and see if they can answer you, give you feed back.
beth

http://forums.psychcentral.com/forumdisplay.php?f=11
You will have to register to post a thread but that is easy.

Dear Billie,
I don't have any experience with this.
I did go to an hour long consult with my work friend and learned a lot about the procedure. The pdoc had lots of stats and studies.

I wonder if the ECT community keeps better stats than the workers in the depression community can.


Of course keep doing your research.
I was concerned about headaches. The pdoc said that a VERY small number of people continue getting headaches that do not respond to treatment. That was a very tiny group of people but having untreatable headaches would stink.. . . unless the depression was lifted through ect.. . . .
. . . . there are some trade offs to think about.



The pdoc was encouraging with his stats . . . . Even so, the pdoc was a bit discouraging because he said that my friend had a life time of depression and was looking at not a fabulous prognosis even with ECT.


Has your pdoc done the procedure?

M.

This is not something I’m proud of Billie but I’ve had several rounds of electroconvulsive shock treatments. I’m bipolar and I can’t take antidepressants because they make me manic. I was in such a deep state of depression. Further, I was suicidal and had a record of several attempts. I elected ECT as the treatment of last resort. Memory loss, particularly short-term, was significant. I am a professional whose mind is my primary tool. The treatments rendered me useless at work and diminished my ability to remember my own phone number for quite some time. I still have gaps in my memory for certain events, dates, etc., not only from that period during my treatments, but also for things that occurred prior to ECT, which might not be such a bad thing. The bilateral ones where the ones that were tough to handle and caused most of my memory loss. And I do get constant migraines which they told me might happen.

I believe it was necessary for me at the time and would not have second thoughts about more ECT. Short term memory loss is tolerable compared to constant MANIC DEPRESSION!!

I wish you all the best Billie whatever you and your pdoc decides

Debbie... as you can see you are not the first to ask about ECT. The member i'd been thinking of, who hasn't been able to be around for a time is BJ and she answered this thread so i'm bumping it for you... if you look at the dates of the posts above this one, you'll see the most recent post goes back to July of last year.

you could try PMing BJ and/or Billie. i don't know if Billie decided to go ahead with the treatments or not. BJ may not be able answer you - she was very, very very ill and i'm not sure how she is now.

~ waves ~