I had my scheduled quarterly visit to the psychiatrist today. Lucky I was early because the appointment time on my letter was half an hour later than the one she had written on her sheet.

I talked about the three months since my last visit and about how I have been down since the end of November, and, frankly, how annoying this has been.

Admittedly, being permanently down (on about a 2 or a 3 on a good day on a scale of 0-10 where 0 is suicidal, 10 is full blown mania and 5 is what most of the population would consider to be having a normal life) is far better than my weekly rapid cycling between 0 and 8 that I was experiencing in the first half of last year and what put me in ACU for a few days back at the beginning of last July.

I have been struggling, not that anyone would really notice, but there have been some periods of up to four days at a time where I haven’t left the house or spoken to anyone other than Richard. Some days I haven’t even been able to stay out of bed for more than a couple of hours at once. This might sound like lazyiness to you but when your brain shuts down and you can’t even concentrate hard enough to make a decision on wether you want a cup of tea or not, it isn’t much fun I can assure you, and when there really is no let up for a few days and you’re existing in a confussed daze of despair, then, believe me, trying to find some way of ending it all is about as good as it gets.

Luckily for me I know it is a only condition of the chemical imbalance in my brain, and not anything I have done, and that, at some point, it will pass.

My work has suffered over the last couple of months. I haven’t been able to write anywhere near as much as I have wanted and yes my blogging has been affected too. (Today is actually 21st Jan and I’m filling in my blog entries from 3rd December since I’m now back up again. I keep an almost daily record of what’s been going on in my personal hand written journal so I’m able to update this online version.)

I have at least this time been able to keep the few social engagements I’ve had, though at times this has been very difficult as during a depressive episode it can take a good couple of hours for me to get up, shower, shave, get dressed and get in the car to go out. And even then I sometimes run out of time before I’ve even started and have to just get dressed, usually in whatever I was wearing previously because it is too complicated for my brain to choose anything different from the wardrobe. I generally have a minor panic attack as I try and force my brain into gear. It basically tells me it’s not ready to function properly and it can’t cope, and not to go out, which then causes more problems as I try and work out some sort of emergency plan to cover the fact that I am basically a vegetable at times like this. And of course, when you are like that you can’t make decisions anyway. It can soon spiral.

Last year I would often end up in a complete state where the only option was to allow my brain to shut down and recharge. Once I’d given in, usually in tears because of the complete failure I had been–it so demoralising when you can’t work out how to put on a pair of socks–I’d be asleep within thirty seconds and out of it for a good couple of hours. In the last six months though, since my visit to the ACU, I have been able to deal with it a lot better and haven’t had to miss anything. I generally have to take a little time to adjust to the social situation at hand and so am not particularly conversational on arrival, and basically hope no-one has noticed.

My biggest problem in the last couple of months has been sleep – all at the wrong times, far too much of it, and not particularly good sleep either. Aside from the huge lack of motivation, anything I do get round to doing, usually late in the afternoon, be that washing up or just watching the tele, just drains my enery. (I could say Tesco Value batteries last longer, but I won’t.) I end up sleeping. I dream in a depressed way too. It’s horrible when you are being threatened by menacing forces and your only option is to run away, but your legs are too heavy and every movement is an effort. This can go on and on and on. And you can’t wake yourself up because you know you are dreaming anyway. And when you do wake up, you only wake up into another level of the dream. Eventually when you have woken up properly, which by real time is probably only a hour or so later, you are so physically and mentally worn out, that you just fall back to sleep again – if you can call it that. Subsequently I have been very inactive, and thus my metabolism has been low, which means I eat more and have therefore put on an extra stone in weight.

Anyway. I digress…

Back to my psychiatrist who, once again, tried to persuade me to consider taking medication in order to give me some quality of life. Whatever that is – I’ve lived with BiPolar (Type II) since I was in my teens, and don’t know any different from the severe mood swings I endure. I have, in the recent past, been very reluctant to take medication. I’ve tried a lot of different stuff over the years and none has been any good.

One type about six or seven years ago, made me very high and I was so manic I didn’t sleep for 10 days. I spent the time working out a grand plan about how to buy up loads of hotels and have my own airline so I could travel the world and have somewhere different to sleep every night. I’m laughing now, but I was deadly serious at the time and even set up a limited company to start it all off.

Five years ago, another type of medication reacted with my immune system. It started attacking itself, and all my organs swelled up, including my skin, which turned a horrible purple. I was ambulanced to Frimley Park Hospital and spent a week on an isolation ward in my own room with en-suite and a TV while they tried to work out what on earth had gone wrong with me. I had an endless parade of doctors all looking at me. The consultant, who saw me twice day, explained she’d only had one case like mine in her lengthy career. Apparently that poor chap never made it. Luckily I had stopped taking the tablets as soon as the odd and very itchy rash had appeared on my stomache.

There’s now a note written on the cover of my mental health case notes – Allergic to Carbamazepine. (Tegratol)

So, I’m not a fan of medication but being permanently depressed for two months is no way to live a life and so I have to say I reluctantly agreed to try something new. So new, in fact, it hasn’t yet been licensed for BiPolar, but test cases have proved positive. The drug (I forget it’s name) is generally prescribed to treat epilepsy and I’ll need to book an appointment to see my GP so she can prescribe it for me. The word ‘procrastination’ comes to mind.

I have also agreed to be referred for an an eight week intensive group therapy course, which if nothing else will get me back into some sort of a routine.

Oh, and I’m still waiting for my CBT.