Plugging along..

Right after Christmas, for whatever reason, I stopped taking the mood stabilizers I have been on for a couple of years now. I continue to swallow the mirtazapine, because depression scares the devil out of me. I don't think I could take another one...especially of the sort that lasts for months and months. LOL...perhaps I should be concerned with not taking the mood stabilizer as that is what stopped the crazy making behaviour.

I stopped them, because morning and evening when I took them...I felt ill. I have also been losing weight. Weight that I cannot afford to lose, and that I had only started to gain when I first was prescribed the mirtazapine (anti depressant).

For the last year or so, I have not been really living my life. I get up in the morning...go to work..go home at the end of the day, make dinner, have a bath and am in my bed by 6:30. I just couldnt change it up somehow. I lost interest in everything. I wasnt depressed. I wasnt manic. I just....was existing.

So, I started to wonder. I recognized that I had some serious issues and things that happened due to mania for years. I didnt like it...and I knew it was dangerous for me, and for the people I love. I just am not sure that medicine has it exactly right for everyone.

You see, I have been doing a little research and I came across something very interesting. It had to do with bipolar in children. Specifically children with a diagnosis of RAD. (Reactive Attachment Disorder) No...I do not have RAD.

Anyhow...I read something a doc wrote that stated he thought that perhaps trauma can bring on bipolar. Without going into detail...I did experience severe trauma in 1998. Since that time, is when the mania and sometimes bizarre behaviour became noticeable. Lets not forget, I have worked my entire adult life as a Social Worker specializing in counselling. The odds of someone with Bipolar 1 doing that for any real length of time, and with any continuity is slim. Most of the folk I have met with BP1 have struggled with education and employment for most of their lives. Its not a matter of intelligence or will...it just isnt possible most of the time.

The long and the short of it is. I am not stupid...and if I notice that I am heading up the bipolar highway...I will immediately go back on my medication. I also mentioned it to my husband, and although he is understandably nervous, he has promised to address it if he sees anyting untoward in my behaviour.

Some will think I am just one of those people who refuses to take their meds. Some will think I am being stubborn...or that I am foolish. Whatever.

I just know that a life lived in bed and at work is no life at all. I need to try this and see what happens. I wont let it get out of control...but perhaps that doc I read is right. If I have worked through my trauma and grief issues, and I do believe I have, then perhaps the anti depressant is all that I need. Depression is something that has dogged me my entire life...whereas Bipolar and its excesses are only a few years old.

Wish me luck.