Well, I'm on the road again, this time I'm visiting my brother in Calgary-Alberta.
I'm enjoying the break. The Island kind of gets me down sometimes.
I think my medication needs some kind of fine-tuning. I'm lethargic and I don't feel motivated at home to follow through with my plans, which is unlike me.
The combination of Zyprexa-Seraquel in high doses for the last six years is starting to wear on my brain a bit, I think. It wouldn't be so bad if that wasn't combined with high amounts of Tegritol and Topomax. I really think that it's just too much. I'm 52 and I feel that if I don't do something to change this pattern of treatment, I'll become too dependent on it as I grow older.(I may have already) I dislike intensly having to be my own doctor and decide what's right for me, and I know that the doctor that I see currently will not agree with anything I have to say and will warn me about relapses and so on, but I feel I must do this.
It's cold here in Calgary. About 34 degrees fahrenheit. Canada is a cold place to live. But the medical is free.
Don Fraser
Hi Don,
My next SharePost will be about universal health care and how to contact senators and house members in the U.S. government to lobby for mental health concerns. I'm appalled the Republicans want to roll back oour scant health insurance reform as it is.
Could you find a new psychiatrist? I also seem to remember you were in a funk maybe a year or so ago. It's good that you're able to catch what's going on before it worsens.
A minority of people when they're in their sixties can go without medication or have their dose lowered because of their age. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this now and it's not something I will consider when I'm a senior citizen.
Luckily I have a great psychiatrist. Only I have to pay out of my own pocket because he doesn't take health insurance. If he weren't so good I'd have quit him long ago.
I hope you can work with your current pdoc to find a resolution of this should not want to change doctors.
Lastly: I envy you your vacation. Round here the cold weather is about to set in. It was unusually cold in New York City last winter. I don't relish such another winter.
I was in Montreal in early April five or six years ago. Everyone work black raincoats. I stayed at a bed-and-breakfast.
Sometimes the medication does need tweaking though.
I hope it works out for you.
Regards,
Christina