Hi David, I went with out meds. along time so I know what it feels like to “go crazy”. I lost two marriages over it, and the rage I felt over the years is unthinkable. One thing I dont like about meds. is some cause you to gain weight. Like one Im on. I have to go in and change it do to gaining alot of weight.
I would never dream of stopping my meds, not now the I feel stabable.
Danielle Sergent

to me it is amazing the amount of truth that you have to say. my husband of 5 years is bipolar. i knew this when i married him, at first he was in therapy and taking medication. after about a year and a half he stopped. like you described, things seemed ok. but like many i was ignorant to the pitfalls of getting off of medication. unsuccessfully i tried for two years to get him to take his meds and return to therapy. in that time i saw him attack his 68 year old father, myself and a few of his friends. the violence scared the living hell out of me, and yet i knew it wasnt him. it was the illness. i tried to use that to continue to stay and get him into treatment. finally the fear got the better of me, and sadly he still isnt in treatment. he is unemployed, blames me for everything wrong in his life. and yet i still fear for his, and my own life. someday the worst will happen and yet i am powerless to help him. i realize that he has to do it, so with that end, i have had to leave. for me there is a lot of guilt, loving the man that i knew yet fighting bipolar disease has become a quandry that i cant overcome. my hope is that someday he will see the light, but i am not hopeful. i am sure we will bury him or someone close to him.

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Can you speak to the Jekyll – Hyde abilities of people with bipolar? My 31 yr. old dau. is a master of this……. and it may actually jeapordize her children while people say — I met your dau. and she seems fine to me……… they really have NO IDEA what she is capable of. She cycles this time of year – holiday season…… refuses counseling to recognize approaching cycles and how to deal with it……… and seemingly is almost two personalities. She can be congenial, appears interested in kids schooling, looks fine and then turns on a dime and privately rages and rants, makes threats and then turns publicly and shines again……… it’s most frightening with school officials who are required by law to act on overt behavior but this becomes gray area that is subjective call. Without some excessive behavior – I fear the children will continue to be subjected to this. There is no visual reason to question her…….. I’m the one who’s starting to look a little looney……. I’m feeling more and more helpless. She lived with me for the last 6 years and I was able to act as buffer for children but now she’s moved and has them and I truly fear for them. The 6 yr. old has learning disability and she’s only interested in him skating by – for her to look okay and him to just get by…….. example: says his IEP is a waste of paper and her time! RIGHT……… what advice can anyone share? As I said – she refuses counseling and meds alone does not handle everything. She’s refused to quit drinking and I think she may be smoking pot again as well……… I just feel helpless. I’m beyond worrying about her – I tried for 6 years to help her, thinking if she were helped to improve that the children’s life would of course improve…….. I literally wasted 6 years on her. I should have been trying to take the kids and now……. I really fear that she will ‘fly’ under the radar until something really bad happens. I fear for the kids and can’t find anyone who feels there is enough reason to intercede without an overt behavior on her part. Any experiences like this or advice?

Hi Connjer, I centainly can not advise, I can share your pain. I have been sick for 43 years. Just recently found out it has a name my youngest daughter also has it.I just lost my job of 11 years, I should have been locked up several times instead of just a couple times. I have to get myself better or my house will be gone. Hitting rock bottom has the advantage of only one way to go after that. Hang in there. Karen

hi davis .never done a blogg before but though it was important to say how important my medication is to me and people with bi-pola .im39 and have only just been diagnosed with bi-pola in august .why it took the health service so long to finaly diagnose this i dont know ………..i have tried to take my own life on several ocassions .have lost my business that i had for 10 years and also my family have dissowned me .i have not had contacted with my family for 4 years now …….i realy had a bad bi-pola episode 4 years ago and realy thought at the time i was going crazy .so crazy that i tempeted suiside again this time it almost work but lucky for me the partner i have at the time came home from work early and found me just in time …hes a nurse so knew just what to do ..how lucky am i to be alive if it was not for him .my son who was 14 at the time would of found me dead …….but at the time i took this overdose i was so out of my head that i could not carry on no longer ….i lost my salon .fell out with my parents and brotherts……didnt was my son to live with me anymore and hated my partner so much at the time i wanted to kill him ……….when i look back now i scares me so much ……..i was put into hospital for sevral months till i was stable again ….which means i was on all kinds of tablets ………diffrent types diffrent shapes all colours off the rainbow ………but none seamed to make me better ……..this is because id never had help for my bi-pole and never showed sighns .i had a good business run a good home and had many friends…… .people looking into my world would have seen a good stable woman .but deep down i could feel myself getting darker by the day and was staRTING TO HATE EVERY ONER AROUNG ME .INCLUDING MY SON .WHO IS MY WORLD AND MY ROCK .the piont is if i was not on my med i would not be here today .to see my son blossom into a younge law student .hes had it hard with me all his life and always wonderded why his mom had mad crazy days ………..not knowing it was bi-pola .thi9nking it was soming he hasd done ……..he is my carer now and looks after me ……he does the shopping controls the finances and checks my spending every month with out HIM AND MY MEDICATION .I WOULD NOT HAVE A LIFE TO LIVE .iv not lefted the house for 4 years but now in on the right medication i am planning a holiday and for the first time in my lifeim looking forward to GROWING OLD LOL.
SO PLEASE PEOPLE WHO ARE ON MEDS DONT STOP TAKING THEM AS THAY ARE YOUR LIFE LINE …….WHY DO I SAY THIS .BECAUSE I KNOW I LIVED MANY YEARS WITHOUT MEDICATION AND IT NEARLY MADE MY SON AN ORPHAN .

TAKE CARE AND BE HAPPY TRACEY

Hi Everyone, I thinking now life trammas are a trigger. My episode, this current one is so bad triggered by my oldest daughter being attacked in her sleep a year and a half ago and molested when she stayed the night at her bible-toten friends house. I remember telling the judge if you let him out I will fight very hard every day to not take his life. That is what I do now, every day I fight very hard. Thanks, Karen

I`m still in two minds about David Oliver – on the plus side he seems to offer SOME genuine , concrete advice , he says his mum has gone thru this hell , so he is a good son researching and helping, the medical system( undoubtedtly) is patchy at best, medications works in mysterious ways: because of the above he is de facto a guiding light for lots of people fighting daily with depression monsters. (And I know myself how draining and horiffic such a fight can be.)There is a minus side however, id est :
1. the mail of that guy 4 days ago who said his partner might be bipolar, so he is not going to have children with her ( why not tag her with a BP letter as well)
2. D.O. @thought of today@ – i.e. first a BIG disclaimer , then basically , if you go off medications, it`s at your own risk ( fine so far), but then going into rant about “death threats”??
3. Lots of bloggers telling their really sad stories and mentioning how they cant afford D.O. treatment.Anyway, best wishes and god bless you all , incl. Dave Oliver. xxx

Hi, Dave-
My mom is bipolar and had her last episode 20 years ago. She had taken her meds religiously, never missed work, and was a fully functioning individual. She realized how important it was to take her meds, because she new she never wanted to be hospitalized again. Well, this past February, she had a hernia that was blocking her small bowel. She continued to take her meds, but vomited for 5? days straight before she went to the hospital for emergency surgery. They didn’t have her meds in shot form, hence more days with no meds. She seemed fine once she was released. Three weeks later, she had ANOTHER hernia on the other side, which caused more vomiting and another surgery. Long story short, she is now in a full blown psychotic state. She has been hospitalized or been in rehab (now in a nursing home) for 3 months with no major improvement. We are now looking into ECT, as suggested by her psychiatrist. I can’t emphasize how important bipolar medication is, and how long the road to recovery will be once meds are stopped. Unfortunately, in my mom’s case, it wasn’t her voluntary doing. Thanks for listening.

OK-
I’m a little frightened now.
If I have to go to the hospital and am not on any medicine during that period for bipolar, and because I’m now taking bipolar medicine where before I wasn’t, I could become totally psychotic and end up in an institution as Cathy mentioned???

Well said, Dave. However, don’t forget that some psychiatrists now think that trycyclic anti depressants may actually cause Bi Polar symptoms. My GP has such a patient; when the patient takes Prozac she becomes manic. When she stops, she also stops being manic. He’s tried this a few times and the same results have occured on each occasion.

Hello Dave. My name is Diana. I signed up to your site a few weeks ago while doing some research on bipolar. I really don’t know what is wrong with me. My doctor says i suffer from depression, along with OCD a fear of contamination aniety and panic attacks. He never addresses my moments of intense activity and creativity. My periods of not be able to stay at home, always in the street. Partying all night, hardly sleeping, very sociable, very outgoing with lots of friends and just fun to be around. I started seeing him in April of 2006. I had fell into a deep depression in November of 2005 after coming back from a ten day trip to San Francisco. When I’m feeling great I would get the urge to get up and go. During one of these phases, I went to San Francisco by myself. A place I had never been to before, having no friends there. After coming back from that trip I fell into deep depression. The following May I woke up one night screaming. I saw myself looking into the face of insanity. I don’t know what would have happened if my husband had not been there. That’s when I knew I needed help. I went to see my doctor who recommended a psychiatrist. He immediately put me on medication. We started off with Sertraline. It made me crazy. We then went to Citalopram. It was somewhat successful but not in the way it should have been. It did take away my thoughts of suicide, that was as far as it went. It kept me in limbo. I was neither one way or the other. It took away my sex drive. It took away my creativity. Where as before no matter how deep my depression or how long it lasted I knew there would come a day when I would be my fun loving productive self no matter how short the time i was able to do it. The medication took all that away. I have friends I haven’t seen since I went on it. My anxieties remained although i must say my panic attacks lessen somewhat. In spite of this I was not happy. I am no longer on medication. Here is why. All my life i’ve been thin. In fact I had to eat to maintain my weight. Skipping meals did not work for me doing so would result in rapid weight loss. I learnt the benefits of eating. On the pills I gained thirty pounds. How it came about was a mystery to me. For the first eight months I was fine and then within the space of four monthes I gained all this weight. I started noticing that my clothes were not fitting properly. I developed rolls on my back around my waist area. I couldn’t understand it. How could I have gone from being a certain way all my life to this. People used to refer to me as model type (i am also five feet ten inches tall) I did not change my eating habits so why all this weight gain. It was later during a chance conversation that I found out that it was my medication. I immediately stopped taking them. All this took place in Britain. I am now here in America. I notice that your bipolar commercials mention this side effect. In britain it is not so. The Food and Drug Industries do not have the same control there as they do here. You hardly see commercials about what sicknesses you may have or make you think you have and drugs to cure them. You get your side effects facts from the prescription itself or your doctor. In defense of the pills it did take away my constant thoughts of suicide that was as far as it went. I’m no longer on them and my thoughts of suicide has not returned. thank god. (I stopped in May of this year) I do know now that I suffer from hypermania, the lower end of the sickness. This I discovered through my own research. A part of me feels angry that my doctor didn’t tell. I had to do it all on my own. My diagnosis that is. I don’t know how i’m going to tell him about my findings. Another part of the sickness that people hardly talk about is the sexual pervertions of the person. We hear alot about the spending of money but not alot about the sexual changes that occur when in a mania. I know that during my high phases men featured very heavliy. As i mentioned, I would always be out and about always partying very attractive in my personality. I was like a lodestone to them, so drawn were they to me. I would not tell them I was not free. I would meet them for dates make them think I was available. I even watched a few of them fall for me. In a nutshell I was a cock tease. Although I didn’t sleep with every Tom, Dick and Harry, I did play with their affections. The crazy thing is that it was all a game to me. Which is quite sad really. I don’t know if I’ll ever go back on medication. I’ve told myself that I’ll rather be crazy and thin than be fat and sane whatever sane is. I am fortunate to have my husband. He’s been there through it all. Through the nightmares, the men, the unpredictalbe spending, the withdrawals. Not being there emotionally. Locking myself in my room, not speaking to him for days. I’ve known him for eight years. We’ve been recently married. I feel humbled by him. I don’t know if faced with the same set of circumstances if I would be able to handle it the way he did. I know that it takes a special type of person to love outside of family members someone with a mental illness. It has to be an unconditional love. Thanks for reading this. This is the first time I’ve done something like this. It feels good to talk to someone outside of a doctor who knows. Thank you. (please overlook incorrect spellings)
Diana

My son, 23 years old, was unofficially diagnosed as being bipolar, severely depressed, and severe anxiety. He went for a free screening at a hospital in our town. I had thought he was bipolar for years. He doesn’t live with me, doesn’t have a job, no money or insurance. (partly due to alcoholism now)How does he get help? We’ve tried everything, but we’ve been running in circles trying to get him the medication he needs. Can anyone help??? Please!!

Getting off meds and replacing them with natural or hollistic alternatives is absolutely deadly. I’ll never forget the summer I went off meds, went full manic and couldn’t sleep at night. Then I’d be tired and not too alert the next day. To makes sure I was alert enough–I was doing electrical work from a bucket truck 30′ in the air–I took ridalin. If you know anything about this disease, you can imagine what happened. My boss was horrified at how I was bouncing off the walls. Three days later I was fired.
Then came the long period of unemployment, bankruptcy and homelessness. All because I went off of meds.
Today I have a comfortable place to live. I’ve been working for three years w/o an incident. I have a stable relationship. and I take my prescribed meds religiously. YOU CAN’T GO OFF MEDS. and survive. I’m not crazy about taking medication for the rest of my life but I won’t consider life without them. Listen to Dave, ehknows what he’s taling about.
Jim G.

THANK YOU, DAVE! You have brought up the major NUMBER ONE aid for this damnable illness – DON’T GO OFF YOUR MEDS!!!

However, after my first hospitalization in 1968, my father died in early 1969, we moved from IL to VA, I got a job as a medical records transcriptionist, and was acting in a play 30 miles away from my home. I seem to remember that I was on some type of medication, but I was also self-medicating with alcohol. Because of the above-mentioned life stressors, I fell into a full-blown manic episode. I was hospitalized for 7 months to regulate my medication and gain weight (I had gone down to 78 lbs.)

I was fine on meds for six years. Then, some more life stressors occurred, and I went “off” again. YES – you CAN have hypomania while on medications – that’s one of the awful truths of this illness.

I was diagnosed in 1977 with manic depression and put on Lithium. Unfortunately, I was too stupid to continue on it, stopped it, and had the most major clinical depression I have ever had. I continued to work (God only knows how I performed) and ran my apartment house for a full year before going to the local Community Mental Health Center for evaluation. The shrink put me on an antidepressant and started me back on Lithium, and within six weeks, I was feeling like there was a “light at the end of the tunnel” – bringing me out of the dark hole that I had dug for myself.

In 2000, I developed neuropathy in both legs, and was taken off Lithium and put on Depakote. The doctor added Zyprexa, Valium, and PaxilCR. I had surgery in 2001, and when I was released, I started vomiting so badly, I didn’t realize until too late that I was throwing up my medications! I was so scared, I went to the ER to be evaluated. It turned out that I had developed acute pancreatitis from the surgery, and was on life support for three weeks. Even though I was not allowed anything by mouth (no liquids OR solids), the hospital gave me my antipsychotic meds with a little bit of water to help me stabilize during this period. I sincerely believe that if I hadn’t continued to take my psychotropic meds, I would have been a “basket case.” I almost died during this time, but was in my “right mind” at the time!

I have not had a psychiatric hospitalization for 30 years. That’s not to say that I haven’t been treated out-patient for hypomanic attacks. When I moved to my condo in 2005, that summer they took PaxilCR off the market, and while they were giving me alternate meds (like Prozac and Zoloft), I didn’t react very well to the new meds. I was literally “out of my mind.” Fortunately, they brought PaxilCR back on the market, and I was stabilized.

In December of 2005, I flew to Wyoming. When I got back to VA, I developed a fever of 103 degrees, and went hypomanic again. I didn’t know day from night and WAS acting “crazy.” I refused to leave the house. My case manager came to the house. I was maintained on my usual meds, and finally, as the fever abated, I returned to my “normal” state.

Even though it’s true you can go “off” while still being on your meds, it’s highly likely you WILL go “off” if you STOP taking them. I consider any alternative treatments, like acupuncture, herbal remedies, hypnotism, even religiosity, to be “snake oil” and not be trusted in the treatment of bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder IS a chemical imbalance in the BRAIN, and the meds that work for you act on the synapses that short-circuit our brains, keeping us stable and able to lead a more normal life. You CAN be a highly functional bipolar IF you continue to TAKE YOUR MEDICATIONS. Yes – it feels GOOD to go off of them because it throws you into hypomania, but the end result is it CAN KILL YOU…

BIG HUGS to all bipolars and the ones who love them. My prayers are with you.

Your friend, SuzanneWA

I am very glad to have found your column. So far, you and I are in agreement on everything. Obviously you as have I, have spent much time on this issue. I just want to say that I hope people will take your comments seriously and not doubt you too much. Thanks to a decent brain and a desire to help I have educated myself well about this illness. I am sharing your emails with one of my daughters. She is not bipolar, but her father and my other daughter are. It really helps a lot if one is supporting a family member who is bipolar does make a point to inform themselves about the particulars of the illness. God bless you. Keep up the good work.

I struggled with this dilemma as well. One thing that really bothered me was how tired one of the meds was making me and I was not feeling better, but instead worse. After six different anti-depressants I told the doctor no more. Getting off of them was the best decision I made for myself. The doctors didn’t realize that the antidepressants were actually making me have severe depression episodes. Some meds are not right for us, but you must be open and talk with your doctor about it so that you can have help right away if you take a turn for the worse. I take Lamictal and it works the best for me. If you are feeling worse on meds than you were off of them then you and your doctor just haven’t gotten the meds right yet. Only once did I stop all meds and I was manic, yelling and screaming at my mother for things that really never bothered me before. I will never make the same mistake again.

Hi Dave. I just had to comment. My son was on bipolar medications until one day I took him to the doctor because he was ill and needed antibiotics. For some reason they made him see a different doctor who had never seen him before, his regular doctor had always made sure to see him and get him in and out quickly. I don’t know what happened this time but it was the end of his getting help for his bipolar. This doctor told him that he was old enough to make his own decisions and if he didn’t want to go to the doctor or take his medicine he didn’t have to. Well when he went back to the Psychiatrist who was treating his Bipolar Disorder he told the doctor that he didn’t need to be there and didn’t need to take the medication. So the doctor droped him as a patient and weened him off the medicine. Now I have to live with this problem. Thank you for listening.

Janet

My son was recently dignosed as Bipolar. He takes his meds. He does not believe anything is wrong with him. It puzzled me until I came upon new research being done about a condition called “anosognosia”. It is an actual condition of the brain where there is an unawareness or denial of disabilities. I was relieved to find this out somewhat. The person may eventually come out of this or stay that way. Research is being done on it. It was suggested that constant encouragement was what worked the best till it could be studied more. Oh the complicated brain.

Hi Dave, The worst thing could have happened to us. My Fiance was taking his meds whenever and drinking at the same time. He would tell me don’t worry about it I know what I am doing. The first time it was just with his meds. I am a nurse and know what can happen when someone takes to many meds. This day in May John took too many meds. I told him don’t do that you could die. He said Kim don’t worry about it I know what I am doing. Well, John went into a coma plus had a heartattack from the lack of O2 to his heart and brain. He was in a coma for 10 days and then finally came too. He was in the hospital for 14 days altogether. Now on Oct. 2, 2007 John was drinking and not taking his meds like he should. Well, I could see that something was just not right for 2 weeks, but John didn’t believe a thing I was telling him. His paranoia, anxeity, violance, ect. was getting really mad. Well, I desided to video tape him on this day to show him and his doctor what was going on with him. On that day John threatened to kill me and then punched me many times in the face. I didn’t know what to do so I called 911 hoping that they would put him on the 5th floor of the hospital, but because of the threat and the hitting they arrested John and now he is in jail. Believe it or not I love this man with all my heart, but I can have him hitting me. He has 5 counts against him right now and 2 of them are felonies. I have tried to get ahold of his therapist, but she wont even talk to me even though John signed the waver saying I could get or give his medical treatment. She doesn’t even care. I am appauled by the medical field and how they have handle John, the one field I love the most is letting us down. We can’t afford a lawyer so he has a public deffender, which is a joke, they work for the county not you. I can’t even talk to him because I am the vicitum in this matter. I talked to the DA and told him that I could see something was going to happen for two weeks, plus both of our oldest sons came to live with us and I told John maybe it isn’t a good idea to have them here I see your anxeity going through the roof, but he didn’t listen to me. I told the DA that John is bipolar, social anxeity disorder, PTSD, paranod, and he is talking to things that are not there. The DA said those are all just excuses for what he did and they are using the video tape against him. I don’t know what to do for I am at my wits end. The people that are there to help you don’t care about anything, but the almighty dollar. The system that was put in place by are founding fathers is letting us down, the one system that was put in place to help. If I didn’t see what was going on with John I would believe he was just a violant person, and I am not the only person that saw these changes in John, but our children did too. I am begging someone anyone out there in internet land if they can help us. This is my last resort. Thank You, Kim

Dear Dave,

YOU ARE SO RIGHT!!!!!! There was a guy in Israel – a very successful, intellegent guy, who started a very important “self help” group in a major city and then went around the country helping other groups get set up – a winner of a guy. Then he was interviewed in the NATIONAL PAPER, talking about how “with the help of my naturopath doctor”, he was now treating his bipolar with “proper nutrition”, etc….. of course, the paper didn’t bother to print any update when, a couple months later, he landed in the hospital – by court order – raging manic and having destroyed everything he had built up. Stats folks should know: 80% of people who have a manic episode will, without medication, have additional episodes. And folks who have had TWO OR MORE affective episodes have a 99.something % chance of additional attacks, without medication! Do the math, people.

I really appreciate all of the advice given to me and hundreds of others. But at this point in time the person I was trying to stand by and help wants nothing to do with me. If we reconnect again I would gladly like to again receive more newsletters. Thanks for everything.