Tired of the Bullsh*tt

By bipolar_susie Monday, February 09, 2009

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I was diagonosed with"manic-depressive" syndrome when I was 14. I was on medication until I was 18. From the ages of 18 to 34, I did quite well managing my disease even though I had quite a few "episodes" such as promiscuity, shopping sprees, alcoholism etc. etc. Anyway something snapped one day and I could'nt stop crying. My husband made me seek help and the psychiatrist put me on Risperdal. Well let me tell you that shit had me not being able to function until 2pm! How can I work and be productive if I am in a damn fog? So guess what the happy doctor does? That's right, she adds another pill, Wellbutrin well that didn't go over so well they figured out after a suicide attempt. Now the doc gives me Abilify which has me anxious all the time! So I haven't been on any meds for about 8 months now and i was doing fine until my husband says that I am "tripping" I feel like telling him that he knows about this disease and if he doesn't like it or can't deal then he needs to leave. I am so sick and tired of him making me feel like I am crazy. I hold a job and have worked consistenly since I was 14 which is more than I can say for him.

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cassie

2/ 9/09 10:26am

i have new rules for whether or not to take a psychiatric drug: 1. if it is being advertised on TV, i don't take it. 2. if it is less than 7 years old, i don't take it. 3. I google the drug being recommended by the psychiatrist (who never bothers to do what is legally required: to inform the patient of side effects and risks).

I am not a guinea pig. I am not an avenue to fraud of the medicare and medical assistance programs. I am a human being. I expect to be treated honestly, fairly and humanely.

I am very tired of people in positions of power and responsibility deciding i'm the one who needs 'fixing' and 'controlling' .. when clearly those in positions of power and responsibility are living lives far more in need of 'fixing' and being put under 'controls.'

My illness may cause me to do harm to a limited few within my sphere of influence. People in power and responsibility, when they do harm, have a much larger sphere of influence and are capable of doing far broader and greater harm.

bipolar_susie

2/ 9/09 1:37pm

Your comments are right on time! Those are wonderful rules to live by! Thanks a bunch!

stupid

2/12/09 9:36am

I can see from these posts that I have been very lucky and well cared for. My personal family practice doctor was the one to figure it out. I went in for depression. She started me on meds to help, then I was too high and gave me seroquel. (Oh I hate that one). My sister is also bipolar and goes to her, and my dad has depression and goes to her, so she could see the big picture. she did monitor us and at a point she told us (my sister and me) that we were bipolar and reffered us to a nurse practitioner that deals with this. she changed our meds (she said we shouldn't have been on Seroquel for that long - talk about fuzzy knocking you out...). We did have to go thru several meds and make adjustments. She also kept my sister and me on that same meds for a while. She said family responds closely to the same. I am on 5 meds at this time and have been for about 6 months now and am doing well. Except for a couple of episodes where she added an adjustment to help me thru and then go back.

She researches extensively, has recommended reading to find out more, and knows that we are on the internet consistently finding out more. I trust her completely and if I didn't I would move on. I don't feel so much like a test subject as others have suggested. With any medication she tells me why she feels this would help me, over another.

Now I am not sure about adding ones that came out so quickly. There are way too many commercials out for all kinds of drugs that we are to "ask our dr if this is right for you". That gets me. And any dr needs to listen to us, as no one knows us better than ourselves.

tabby

2/ 9/09 12:06pm

1) You have the right to have medications that will not force you to be unable to function as you see the need to.

2) If the medication or medications render some type of dysfunction or disability in your day to day living of life.... like mental illness.... then you have the right to demand to the doctor that you won't have it.

3) You have the right to say to him or her to prescribe something that will allow you to live your life, as functional as you possibly can while giving you some bloody sense of a peaceful relief from the nightmarish symptoms this twisted ugly disorder can throw at you.

If he/she refuses or fails to hear you.... find another.

Peace.

bipolar_susie

2/ 9/09 1:36pm

Thank you for your understanding and your comments. They are very much appreciated and needed!

cassie

2/ 9/09 2:27pm

i had a psychiatrist who looked over my record, saw that none of the drugs had helped, and in many cases they had left me with other serious medical problems, and he suggested i discontinue my meds; i did so and by all reports from friends and family i am doing much better than before functionally.

now, however, i have spent 1 1/2 yrs dealing with physical doctors who are having fits that i am not taking medication, who refuse to believe this was in consultation with a psychiatrist, and who refuse to focus on my physical symptoms .. instead immediately launching into why are you not taking meds? and then, they try the twofer .. they try to prescribe a drug that they can legitimately prescribe for the physical ailment, which is also claimed to affect mood positively. (of course they never admit to that and get very angry when i call them on it.)

The latest said she is insisting that i see my psychiatrist at least once a year if she is to be my primary doctor. nice try. i told her my mental health was not her job. and she cannot force me to see someone who has already agreed that this course of action is best for me.

this is doctor no. 5. i think i'm gonna give up on western medicine completely. they are useless to me.

Physicians are exempt from the ADA. They are free to discriminate all they want. and don't think they don't. to imagine that the general stigma about mental illness vanishes when you walk into a clinic door is nonsense.

I still have problems. i'm not saying i am not running a risk. but i am also trying to protect a liver. i am also trying not to take a drug that turns out later to have been a scam.

maybe when the medical profession cleans up its act i'll get involved with them again. in the meantime, it seems i am heathier staying away from them. (except for emergency situations.)

tabby

2/ 9/09 6:24pm

oh... plz don't get me a going on MDs or others in the general medical community who also fall into the sterotyping of those with Bipolar cause I could write an entire sharepost and probably a half on that tirade.

I've experienced just this year several instances where my diagnosis of Bipolar has come into play with other illnesses and/or issues that have nothing remotely related to it and yet the medical professionals treating me disregarded my concerns as such.

Last summer, for one - I underwent Hernia Repair Surgery of my Abdominal wall. I had 5 hernias that needed meshing. This was a direct result of a car wreck and subsequent life threatening abdominal injury the previous year that had me undergoing 3 surgeries then.

My pdoc had told me to & advised me on how to wean myself off my "Bipolar" meds so as to not interact or affect any pain medications, anesthesia, steriodal, or antibiotic meds I would receive while hospitalized with the Hernias. I am extremely medication sensitive and so any thing is liable to mess the bunch up.

The surgeon and his associates, as well as the nurses, did not believe me when I told them. They absolutely did not believe me and kept insisting that they give me my "Bipolar" meds. I kept refusing them, they kept insisting and asking me "don't you need them?" I kept saying "no. I'll re-start after I am off all these meds per my psychiatrist." They even wanted me to see a psychiatrist while I was inpatient on general surgery, even though I wasn't "psychiatrically symptomatic".

So... that's just one recent example. I have 2 more that has happened just this past year alone. They, med professionals, may be required to go to medical school and study this stuff but underneath.... they have the same mental illness cootie fears as everyone else does and they lump us all into one image.

cassie

2/ 9/09 9:52pm

I also had the same surgery this year. And throughout the process i felt i was treated with dignity and respect by the surgeon. Finally, on the last appointment post-surgery, i found out why. She confided in me that her sister is bipolar.

sadly, the only time i have ever been treated appropriately by the medical profession is when i have stumbled on a doctor who has personal experience with a mentally ill personn so that he/she is able to relate effectively, and keep his/her mind on her job and acknowledging me as a partner in the process, with a knowledge base that is useful to him/her.

I asked one doctor who was problematic from the get go, 'how many bipolars do you know?" he responded huffily, "I have many patients who are bipolar.' I then said, that is not what i asked. I asked how many do you know. With his jaw set, he paused and finally said 'one.' and then he agreed that he probably was not the doctor for me. (sometimes some of the 'best' doctors can be the 'worst' for bipolars; reputation alone, competence is not enough.) When i related this to a nurse on staff, she was thrilled that i had confronted him and thanked me for doing so.

Nothing will ever change until and unless we advocate for it and make it a part of our medical experience. And, if you can invest enough time and attention, and remain respectful and reasonable, you can eventually find a doctor who will be helpful to you. unfortunately, 'assignments' to 'home clinics' and 'primary' doctors and 'gatekeeper nurses' will make that process more difficult in the future. we must make these problems known to policy makers to protect us down the road.

Tired of the Bullsh*tt

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