Scared Medicationless?
I went to the doctor and he confirmed what I already suspected - yes, I have a mild concussion. I had a CT scan which turned out to be normal except for an unrelated sinus cyst. I was told to get one week of physical and mental rest. That just seemed a bit crazy to me - a whole week of doing absolutely nothing? And I didn't have most of the concussion symptoms, mainly just horrible, horrible headaches. So he finally said if I was symptom free by Monday, I could go back to school, but absolutely nothing physical or mental until then. I had to ask what was "mental rest"? He gave...
Source: bipolar.and.me - March 7, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Horrible Day, But All Days Can't Be Roses
I hit my head really, really hard sitting down on the train on Monday. I don't remember ever hitting my head that hard, it almost knocked me down. It made a loud sound, at least to me, and I looked behind me to see if people were looking at me, but no one seemed to notice or perhaps they were being polite to save me the embarrassment. Anyway, that night I started getting a headache, and it has been slowly progressing into being more and more painful until last night it was almost a migraine. Almost - but not quite, but it was bad enough that I knew from when I used to get migraines to get ...
Source: bipolar.and.me - March 6, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Moved In!
We're all moved in to our new house, but not unpacked and it's a mess. The house is so beautiful, I love it! But it really shows how awful our furniture is. The decorator came over yesterday and we went through the house and talked about what we wanted done and what she thought needed to be done which was actually less than what we thought we needed, went through colors, styles, just a lot of things. We probably gave her too many things we wanted to do all at once. I think we meet with her again in about a week, not sure. She is so super nice, I love her.The town,...
Source: bipolar.and.me - March 3, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
I Want To Get Better - at Everything!
I ran on Saturday and since I was dreading the treadmill so much, I decided to run outside and just hoped it wasn't too icy or snowy. I knew there was no way I could add on 5 minutes to my run on the treadmill - it was too awful.It was SO much easier running outside! I think it just gets very boring on the treadmill and I just stare at the numbers, like how much time I have left, how far I've gone, how many calories I've burned, how fast I'm going (slow). Sure, I have my music and there's a television in the gym with closed captioning, but it's miserable for me.It was pretty cold, but I've run in that col...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 25, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
The Diet Is Working!
I weighed myself for the first time, after the first week I started my diet and was floored. I lost six pounds! I have never, ever lost that much weight in a week! I realize a lot of that is probably water weight and do not expect to lose that much again and know it would not be healthy to lose that much again, but wow, six pounds? Wish I FELT the loss of six pounds! So, I'm 143.5 now, 18 pounds to go! I must admit, this last week has not been the easiest. Getting back into a regular running schedule has absolutely sucked. I've hated the time I've been spending running e...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 23, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Not As Happy
On the way home from school, I started feeling depressed. I couldn't pinpoint exactly why except that I felt lonely and was tired of reaching out to people with nothing to show for it. I was tired of being extroverted 24/7. In retrospect, I was extremely hungry. I had run first thing that morning and didn't have enough to eat by that time. But the issue remains.I think it's time for me to let go of people in Texas. There's no reason to hold on to them. I wasn't friends (meaning, go out and do things with someone) with anyone when I was there any more, why try to maintain old friendships long distance...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 20, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Pushing is Hard!
I've been here for a month and I finally made an appointment with a new psychiatrist today. They can't get me in until late April, which I was totally expecting. I don't know why psychiatrists push off new patients like that, but it just seems like they always do.I'm really pushing myself, training for the 8k race in April. I can run 5k now, so that's 2 more miles I've got to be able to run in less than two months. It's totally do-able, it's just that I forgot how hard pushing yourself to your limit can be. Yesterday I went to the gym (oh my gosh, I HATE running on the treadmill, but it was too cold to ru...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 18, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Overall? Positive!
I went to a weight loss center, and in my jeans, sweater and boots I weighed 154. Yikes! But I've never weighed myself fully clothed in bulky clothes AND heavy boots. Anyways, something interesting happened.On the questionnaire, I decided not to disclose I am bipolar, and put that I am not taking any medication. I struggled with that decision for days, and even on the car ride there about what to do, but that's what I eventually decided, and it's a darned good thing!Instead of it being a "private" consultation, four of us were counseled together. Our weight wasn't disclosed or how much we wante...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 17, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Still So New!
A lot is going on in my life right now, but I don't know if it's really blog-worthy. I'm not FEELING a lot of anything, just doing a lot of activities and constantly on the go. I don't have much time to stop and think, "how am I feeling?", when before I moved, I had way too much time to think about it. That may have been part of my problem.The house situation is kind of in limbo at the moment. We're waiting to see if the home owners will make the necessary repairs that the inspector found - nothing major, but now that we know they're there, of course we want them fixed. So strange, in Illi...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 11, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Train Situation
I was exhausted today, but not because of school. There was a mixup of what time I had to be at the train station, and I ended up being there an hour early, so I had to wait for my train. I don't know how long I'm on the train to get to Chicago but it's over an hour. Then I walk over a mile to get to school. I barely made it to class, was there an hour and a half, then it was time to go back home. I got to the train station and was thirty minutes early. Rode the train back home, then the drive back home. So how long was I gone for a 90 minute class? SEVEN HOURS. Mark just doesn't get it yet.&n...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 5, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
New Life?
My life has certainly become more social since moving to Chicago. Mark has been coming here for years to work and his good friends are all here, so there was an automatic social group I moved into with party invitations and social events waiting. His friends and their wives are all nice, it's just weird. They know HIM, not me, and...at the events, he's always one of the top leveled executives from his workplace at parties, so I don't know if people are just nice to me because he's their boss or what he can do for them at work or if they really like me. Yes, they seem to like me very well, they ...
Source: bipolar.and.me - February 3, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Found A House/More To This Life
We looked at so many houses today it was dizzying, I think 9 or 10. It came down to two that we had a hard time deciding which one we wanted more. One had a better location, one was a much nicer house. Yes, I know people say "location, location, location", but we weren't "in love" with that house as much as we were the other house. I think we saw it more as an investment. Who wants to live in what you consider an investment, not a home? It was a very nice house, but we each had our own major issue with it, so we decided on the other house which is only 10 minutes away from that house and still in a ...
Source: bipolar.and.me - January 21, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Back to Feeling Normal?
I received my Latuda in the mail today, all is right in the world again. Of course it doesn't work that fast, but my mood did pick up after I had the break down a couple of days ago and I stupefied myself with all that klonipin. My husband commented today when I picked up my medication that I seemed happy without it, I was laughing, etc. Hello, welcome to the world of being bipolar with extreme mood swings! Just as fast as I'm happy and laughing, I can come crashing down and the world is awful, terrible, and nothing in it is good. Today I *love love love* Chicago, don't want to be anywhere els...
Source: bipolar.and.me - January 20, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
Getting My Latuda, Thank God
I'm better. I took 3 klonipin when I broke down yesterday and it calmed me down and left me numb for the rest of the day. My awesome realtor in Texas went to our house, found my Latuda and sent it overnight to me, so I should have it soon. After being relatively stable for so long, I had forgotten just how fragile my mental state really is. Depression is ever so near and close that I just can't take my mental stability for granted. There is never a good time to "break down" or fall into that impossibly deep hole, but it's letting yourself get so far into it that you can't climb out that scares...
Source: bipolar.and.me - January 18, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
No Help From Anyone
Somehow I left Texas with an almost empty bottle of Latuda, leaving my new 3-month supply. I've been out for three days, and today I'm feeling it. It seems too soon, but I'm incredibly weepy, I guess depressed, I don't know, but I can't stop crying at anything or to anyone. Moving to Chicago seems like the worst possible thing I could have done and nothing seems to have gone right for me since I've moved here.For all the hoopla being made in the news right now about "OH MY GOD THE MENTALLY ILL", you'd think if I'd left my medicine in Texas and moved to Illinois the insurance company would bend over backwards to...
Source: bipolar.and.me - January 17, 2013 Category: Mental Illness Source Type: blogs
