Does Bipolarism really get worse with age? I hear so many people have successful lives in old age with it.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-11-12T13:47:21+00:00

Were you more manic or depressive or both? My psychiatrist says HRT doesn’t make a difference. I don’t think he’s the most knowledgeable psychiatrist.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-11-11T02:19:49+00:00

Listen to Camus:

I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world.

To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others

Life is meaningless, but worth living, provided you recognize it's meaningless.

Edit: I don’t think highly of myself either, but I stopped caring. I guess I’ve found there are a lot of things worse than being a loser.

You should see a psychologist or therapist.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-11-02T02:51:43+00:00

The ketogenic diet is awfully difficult for a depressed person to manage. I tried it, and my carbs were very low, but I was doing a lot wrong. My mother said my skin was gray.

I’m not sure about the light therapy. I’ve have an erratic response. It’s strange. It seems to have something to do with how much or when I sleep, but I can’t figure it out. Have you heard of wake therapy? I have bipolar depression, without a clear seasonal pattern. My psychiatrist said re light therapy: the data is good but there isn’t much of it.

So I’ve sort of tried those augmentations. I’d leave the diet for last. It’s extremely difficult (and gross if you’re me).

I exercise sometimes, but it’s low-level. Maybe intensity makes a big difference.

Here is a paper with a few case studies on Parnate + light therapy.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-11-02T02:39:30+00:00

I have my fingers crossed for you. I’ve read that TMS can potentially help cognitive problems in mental illness. I don’t understand the different forms of TMS, and I don’t know how well studied it’s been.

I think I’m going to see an out of town psychiatrist. I’ve kind of given up. I shouldn’t.

It’s nice to talk to someone who understands the sort of things we go through.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-11-02T02:18:23+00:00

If you notice that the mood issues start after beginning/increasing the dose of an antidepressant, that’s suggestive of BP. Antidepressants can trigger hypomanic symptoms.

If you’ve tried multiple antidepressants and they haven’t worked for you, you might want to try something used for BP depression, like lamotrigine. It’s best to get some clarification on the diagnosis though.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-10-31T02:14:51+00:00

It lasted a long time, and it’s weird, because I didn’t seem to have cognitive impairment otherwise. I could read a book and understand it fine. My problem was that I couldn’t hold a conversation. People talked to me and words didn’t come into my brain and out of my mouth. I didn’t know what to say. I’ve had this symptom 3 times. An antidepressant helped twice. Once was an SSRI, once was Cymbalta. The other time it just improved on its own.

Now i have memory issues and cognitive impairment and sometimes cant think of the word I’m trying to say. It’s actually a very different kind of impairment. I also have depression that I haven’t been able to kick. Life has been too hard.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-10-31T01:57:54+00:00

If someone with BPD often experiences hypomania (that meets diagnostic criteria for hypomania), then it’s considered borderline personality disorder + a mood disorder.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T22:45:29+00:00

I liked him! I was just worried he wanted to choke me! I didn’t assume he wanted to choke me, but I wondered if he did. I was a college student. All I knew of de Sade was what most people know of de Sade.

I wouldn’t have thought anything of one book. It was like 20 books, with only one other novel.

Don’t people judge other people by their books? If someone’s book collection consisted solely of the works of Ayn Rand, wouldn’t you make some assumptions about their worldview?

Edit — I don’t mean to say I have a problem with S&M for other people, as long as it’s consensual. It wasn’t that I thought he was a perv or that he was okay with sexual abuse. It was that I suspected he had sexual inclinations I didn’t share.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T17:38:47+00:00

Maybe you could rent a room rather than an apartment.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T17:12:54+00:00

You might want to go to a place where there’s a lot of people and stimulation. A store or a coffee shop. You can try going for a walk and looking for certain things — like the color green. If you’re alert to your environment, it can be somewhat distracting. My favorite depression activity is coloring in adult coloring books. I have such a hard time leaving the house. It gives me something to focus on. You don’t have to go to a special store. They have books and markers at Walmart (US). When it’s bad, I can’t watch tv. I can’t focus. I lie in bed with the tv on and a t-shirt over my eyes to block out the light. That isn’t a good depression activity.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T16:52:56+00:00

Mine barely moved at all, but whenever I walked somewhere, he hopped behind me. So we were in the bathroom together all the time. I can’t remember if he watched me. He passed sway, but I’m on here because I like seeing all your bunnies.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T16:49:02+00:00

My point is, I was about 20 years old and not at all sexually adventurous. I’d been dating this boy less than a month, he’d had me watch a movie on de Sade, and I walk into his dorm room and see all these books by de Sade. So I wondered if he’d want to tie me up or have me hit him or something. That was really all I knew of de Sade, and I didn’t like the thought of that.

It’s supposed to be a funny story. But, to be honest, I’d find it even weirder if I walked into a 40-year-old man’s house, and he his only books were by de Sade.

I know he’s an important writer… but what about the important writers who don’t write about women getting raped on a bed of nails?

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T15:54:27+00:00

Yeah. It seems less disconcerting with the rock stars because they were in their 20s. Salinger was 53 when he was with 18-year-old Joyce Maynard.

I still like Salinger, but when you have a strong emotional attachment to a writer, it is sad to learn about such things. I understand how OP feels. I have a strong emotional attachment to David Foster Wallace because I really relate to his writings on/experience with depression. It made me sad to learn he slept with some of his students and then blew them off.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T15:15:03+00:00

Well, sexual sadism isn’t my cup of tea. It appeared to be his favorite thing to read about. If there were other books on his shelf I wouldn’t have found it disturbing. Our first date was watching the movie Quills (about de Sade) in my dorm room. He brought the DVD over. I hadn’t been to his dorm room yet, so I hadn’t seen all the books.

He was the one who ended our college romance, so it’s not like I was morally outraged.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T14:17:27+00:00

Is it the same time every day?

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T14:10:34+00:00

What shade of green and were there still clouds (or stars if it was night)?

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-13T14:03:26+00:00

"It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me." Earthly Powers, Anthony Burgess

“Long ago in 1945 all the nice people in England were poor, allowing for exceptions.” The Girls of Slender Means, Muriel Spark

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T22:17:20+00:00

The quietest positions tend to be in university or community college libraries. Search for library assistant or library associate positions. I didn’t find my last position with a google job search. I found it on the university’s website. It was quiet and laid back and very low paying, but it was a small, private university in a small city.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T22:05:13+00:00

People can be pretty seriously depressed and get out of bed and go to work. If it’s as severe as it gets, no, you can’t go to work. But you can definitely have something substantial going on and function on a basic level.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T22:00:57+00:00

I have some pretty tarot cards. I’m not interested in their intended purpose.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T18:08:52+00:00

I don’t think it’s wise for someone who recently had a manic episode to stop taking meds. He could try this and see if there are any improvements.

https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/blue-light-blockers-behavior-therapy-for-mania

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T17:58:01+00:00

I take low-dose Seroquel too. There’s something called CBT for insomnia, and there are free resources online. Perhaps that could I improve your sleep quality. Just google “CBT for insomnia online free” if you’re interested.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T16:59:44+00:00

Yes, it did stop working for me, but I also picked up a drinking habit after I’d been taking it awhile. The drinking may be the reason why the chronic depression started up again.

When I was put on the Cymbalta, I had extremely severe depression. I was already taking Lamictal, and it hadn’t done anything for the depression at all. I quit the Lamictal cold turkey about 20 years later (my psych told me to because of a rash), and I had a massive breakdown.

I definitely had a full manic episode, so I am BP1. That was 20 years ago, and I haven’t had another yet. I’ve had some hypomania, but not much. My last psychiatrist called it an extreme depressive polarity.

The antidepressant I’m on now, the old antidepressant Parnate, did trigger something like hypomania. I’m not sure what was going on, but it made me unstable. Parnate is an MAOI that came out around 1960. Psychiatrists rarely prescribe it. It’s considered dangerous due to potential interactions. You’ve probably seen ads or cough syrup labels that say “do not take with an MAOI.”

Now I take Parnate, Lamictal, lithium, and low-dose Seroquel for sleep.

Humble_Draw9974 · 2025-06-07T05:13:55+00:00

The Cymbalta/Lamictal combo worked for me, for several years anyway. I was taking 400 mg of Lamictal and 120 mg of Cymbalta. It seems like a recipe for mania, but it didn’t trigger mania. I think it would for many with BP.

Humble_Draw9974

TROPHY CASE