Posted by djr55409 on September 21, 2000, at 20:09:29
In reply to Re: Cyclothymia - Anybody else out there with this???, posted by Ella Iverson on September 21, 2000, at 19:28:14
> i was recently diagnosed with cyclothymia (possibly tetering towards bipolar II because my depressions are a little intense) my psychiatrist REALLY wants to put me on lithium and i am scared to death to take them.
Ella - thanks for the response. Why are you reluctant to take lithium? I took it in small doses and the only side effect I could notice was that I felt a little slower mentally at times...
I will also say that my highs are not all that high, while my lows can be pretty intense, and I did not really find that lithium helped - but that was my experience and yours may be different.>i am new like you, so i can't really be much help, i guess. but i have read just about everything on the subject. what has hepled me a little is keeping a mood chart with a diary of al my quirky feelings for the day. it has helped me deal with what to expect and since i cycle pretty frequently i can se how long i have left. you also might realize (as i did) that you actually HAVE periods of "normality" which i didn't notice before. i would say more than anything though: read, read, read! let me know if you need some titles :)
> ellaWhat have you read? Most of what I have found deals with Bipolar Disorder and I don't really relate to it - my experiences and symptoms are rather different. There really does not seem to be much on the net either. And I am mostly interested in corresponding with others to find out how cyclothymia manifests itself in their lives and how they experience it and cope with it.
As for the charting and diary - I have about a year's worth of charts that I kept on myself - 4 times per day when I was able to. I looked for factors like the weather, amount of sleep I had, when I went to bed and when I got up, how well I slept, etc. and then charted how much energy I had and what my mood was. It convinced me that my mood was cycling, but did not tie it to anything that I could identify, nor did it allow me to predict my moods and energy levels in advance - my cycles appear to have a rather random appearance and length... although they rarely last more than a few days and sometimes less than a day.
poster:djr55409
thread:601
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20000813/msgs/609.html