Posted by Cece on June 6, 2006, at 1:15:00
In reply to Re: Reverse SAD?, Weather, Meds - me too!, posted by pulse on June 5, 2006, at 1:28:42
I've been really interested to read everybody's posts- neither could I live in the southwest or someplace really seriously hot and glaring- the very thought makes me feel like a deer caught in headlights.
When I lived in southern California as a teenager, LA area, near the ocean, it was temperate year round, usually mid 60's to low 70's, with a nice breeze off the ocean. I was comfortable there. When I lived in Washington DC as a kid, there were summer thunderstorms that cooled and cleared the air. The humid hot summers were oppressive, but I was okay.
It wasn't until I moved to Davis, CA (inland CA) in my late teens, where it's unrelentingly hot and dry in the summer, that my RSAD really kicked into gear- and stayed even when I moved around to other places. Well, that's a time of life when bi-polar disorders often begin to manifest, and I think that was the case for me. I had my first (of two) breakdown at 24, and it was diagnosed as acute depressive anxiety, this was before BPII was identified.
Another subject that I think has some relevance here is light and dark. I started a thread on that one 6/13/02 called "Day is day, and night is night". In this modern world we live removed from the seasons and the times of the clock, we're expected to perform and be the same year round, we're supposed to stay up and be active after sunset and before sunrise, and that's just not the way the natural world works. Other living beings live by nature's rhythms, each species in its own relationship to it. I work with plants and I know that summer is a time of slow fruition, not a time of rapid movement and growth. I'm much much happier when I can slow down in summer.
So, Chris asked me to tell my med story.
Morning:
500mg Lamictal
300mg Neurontin (I find it to be a calming adjunct to the energizing Lamictal)
15mg Adderall (I don't officially have AHAD but do have focus and distraction problems, plus it's an AD)
Synthroid (I have an auto-immune thyroid disorder called Hashimoto's thyroiditis, and BTW, any thyroid condition can mimic any psych disorder)
Hormone replacement meds (I'm post-menopausal and made the decision to take HR despite the risks because it can help stabilize BP in women)Night:
900mg Neurontin
25mg Surmontil (a low dose of an old and not widely used TCA that some pdocs consider "atypical")
125mg Depakote (a sub-clinical dose, but it was the first mood stabilizer I tried, I'll never forget how it made me feel like an electrical charge had been lifted from the surface of my skin, and when I've gone off it entirely I've felt wierdly off-base).I take Xanax .25-.5mg PRN for anxiety, usually at night when I do, and every once in a rare while I'll take 12.5-2.5mg/2Xday Zyprexa for 1-2 days when I feel myself headed into a hypomanic swing- that little bit heads it off.
I also take 2-4000mg of Cod Liver oil in caps, various vitamins/minerals, and at bedtime I take Melatonin.
poster:Cece
thread:55983
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20060604/msgs/653490.html