Posted by judy1 on October 14, 2002, at 10:54:50
In reply to Anxiety Disorder -- Please Advise, posted by MJC on October 5, 2002, at 21:39:45
Hi Mike,
As someone with both disorders- bipolar 1 and panic, I get the general impression that you are suffering from an anxiety disorder. As another poster pointed out- your mother reacted to a situation (anxiety), when my son fell off his bike requiring 11 stitches, I fell apart too- any mother would. Bipolar is all about mood swings not tied to anything, although stress can set them off, I had a psychotic manic episode after a close relative died (not a depressive one as you would expect). A way to play both sides is to take klonopin- a benzo used for panic but also fairly effective as a secondary mood stabilizer. If you do indeed have a mild form of bipolar with hypomanic symptoms or are perhaps cyclothymic (where symptoms aren't severe enough to qualify for bipolar) then you should see an improvement with klonopin w/o moving to the heavy mood stabilizers. As far as therapy- I would be dead w/o it- it is the backbone that treats my bipolar disorder- the only exception being if I am psychotic, then I will not respond. Hope some of this helped- judy
poster:judy1
thread:1226
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20020829/msgs/1295.html