Very positive experience with psychiatrist and building myself up so much as a person.
Good evening everyone, I've decided to write today to discuss bipolar disorder and medications, more as an open letter to the bipolar community. I know I struggle immensely to speak with the community because they don't like what I have to say a lot of the time but I'm open to try and be more understood.
I met my psychiatrist in my crisis resolution team today and talked about things. I explained my bipolar disorder, I got diagnosed with bipolar disorder subtype otherwise unspecified with ultradian or very rapid-cycling. There is a lot of evidence I have a neurochemical disorder, I have doubted the neurochemical imbalance theory a lot but given how much I feel I'm on an eternal drug trip, the signs are clearly there. I have accepted today that I have a profoundly hypersensitive neurochemistry, especially since my neurochemistry potentially has gone absolutely haywire after trying a second cup of valerian to see if it would stabilize my moods and reduce anxiety but it ended up having a mildly pro-manic, pro-anxiety effect. I am recovering a lot from anxiety, stress, and burdens I've held onto for too long. What is a massive relief for me is there's signs I won't progress any further neurochemically, I'm at the end stage of feedback loops inside my own brain accelerating into this point, it feels as if my moods have become as frequent, hypersensitive, and intense as they can ever be, I currently feel it isn't getting any worse. Listening to my unconscious speak for a moment (yes my unconscious started speaking to me after the most extreme manic episode I can have which scores a 10 on a 1 to 10 mania scale where 5 or 6 ordinarily lands you in absolutely peak delusional mania) from that perspective things aren't getting any worse but actually improving a lot because it's starting to become the fact that this is the only direction that things can ever go in now.
My current bipolar diagnosis is to say that I display very severe symptoms but demonstrate a functioning at a somewhat high level, however there are definite issues that have cropped up and this end stage state was reached due to a few weeks of stress but it's a huge relief on me to be at an end stage where I can learn to adapt as soon as I can in an environment that is very healing and peaceful, instead of putting anything off. I was remarked by the psychiatrist and nurse that I came across as an extremely gentle, mellow young man and I am working on myself to become a better person each day by always fully admitting to my mistakes and when I'm doing things wrong and embracing taking as much responsibility for everything I can, I take responsibility up until the point I have a complete physiological crisis where any semblance of control is thrown out the window. I don't push myself hard in a violent or harsh way at all anymore, I push myself hard because I must. The good news is as the days progress my mood could be stabilizing so much due to stress relief, overcoming anxieties, recognizing my past mistakes, and just talking lots and lots to different people and establishing very firmly that there's always someone to turn to. I got here because I spent four years with a deep understanding I must work on myself and radically change myself as a person as four years ago in peak delusional mania it was having the intuition that I absolutely couldn't afford to keep going the way I was going.
The good news is for whatever reason my cognitive faculties keep improving rapidly. For instance, I have had intense improvements in self-monitoring as I'm able to monitor for very subtle signs of things such as nervous energy or tension or mania developing so that I can resolve how I feel and regulate. I've had to be patient for my brain itself to catch up to the reality of my situation and it finally has fully accepted it so there is zero denial at this stage, it's just working through things.
So I took a second cup of valerian in the hope it would stabilize my moods. It acted very mildly pro-manic and pro-anxiety today which is a setback but nothing major or the end of the world. I took 5mg olanzapine and found it made a big difference just by moving the needle somewhat and helping to drown things out. At least I'm having the time of my life but I'm just so tired and exhausted and have an immense desire to sleep better since the few weeks I struggled to sleep beginning with physical health problems knocked the sails out of me. I will speak with a psychiatrist or a pharmacist when I can to describe my drug effects and how things are going. Part of my treatment plan is keeping a medical journal. I will now unwind by a strong self-regulation technique I found which was lowering my activity levels and engaging in very repetitive tasks with something fun to do. I know that where I'm at now is I'll have extremely strong psychiatric treatment compliance since I see the olanzapine as a profoundly positive experience and would be willing to keep taking 5mg and monitor how it evolves from here.
I'm in the best hands now so things are getting better for me in a lot of ways. At least that intense increase in my capacity to self-monitor where I'm catching onto crazily subtle shit makes me feel like a far more competent, capable person in one of the areas of competency to have. I have a diverse set of symptoms too to consider but at the moment I'm focused on my bipolar symptoms and symptoms of anxiety. There's heavy psychological factors with the anxiety and its not just over the top moods.
Thanks for hearing me out and I'll keep forming a strong therapeutic alliance with my psychiatrist, as that's very important, and I've struggled too long with controversy about psychiatry.