In my profile I was pretty up-beat about my life with bipolar.....and I still feel that way. However, there was something essential I omitted.
In 1979, I was diagnosed after two manic breaks. My doctor said that I might experience serious health consequences long term as a result of taking the only really effective drug available, the new miracle drug, Lithium. I told my husband that I would risk taking lithium maintenance therapy, as a way of assuring our two boys a stable mother. He consented.
Divorced in '81, I worked for twelve years with emotional stability, until my meds caught up with me. It began with severe back pain and the inability to stand straight. The law firm, for which I was executive receptionist, let me go and generously put me o state disability and keeping me on my health insurance plan for eighteen months.
I was unable to function for months, not only because of pain, but also because I absolutely had to take strong pain killers, leaving me without the mental capacity to do any kind of work. I finally had twenty hours of neurosurgery in 1996, which helped some of the pain, but it wasn't until late 1997 when I could work part time, still on vicodin.
I went bankrupt in '98, and was forced to quit even part-time work in 2000. I cannot tell you the effects of pain and total poverty......and then in 2001 my psychiatrist took me off lithium. In its place I took Neurontin, the drug for epilepsy, now off-label for bipolar. After tremendous improvement in the level of pain, I discovered that I had peripheral neuropathy as a result of the surgery. Neurontin is such a great drug for that problem!
What I really avoided discussing in my profile, was the revelation of the cause of all the pain and disability........lithium had taken its toll upon my bones, leaving me in a wheelchair for the rest of my life.
Do I regret opting to go on maintenance lithium therapy? I most certainly do not! I have always believed that the mind is to be saved before the body, should a choice need to be made. There have been spiritual compensations which could not have been mine otherwise.
For me, it was the right choice.
