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Easier said than done when personality and mental illness are so easily comparable. The travel, etc was the catalyst that helped me clear my head to think abou

by bpchaps 11y ago

Easier said than done when personality and mental illness are so easily comparable. The travel, etc was the catalyst that helped me clear my head to think about what was going on and finally ask my psychiatrist "What if I had X". I saw him maybe 10 times prior to that and the subject never even came up. Shit's hard, yo.

DenisM 11y ago
That sucks, 10 times is far too long. If a doctor can't figure out what's up in that much time, then it's time to move on to another doctor. The hardest part is working up the energy to make a change.
- bpchaps 11y ago
  It's not that simple, even for the doctor. I've had about five doctors tell me that I have ADHD which always led to amphetamine based prescriptions. That generally helped with the attention issues, which was my biggest concern. The problem is that the mood issues were always just... "me". It just seemed like an aspect of mild depression that was always manageable. The daily internal dialogue would go: "My mood is absolutely awful right now. I have zero energy and feel depressed. But, this is just a fleeting feeling that should go away in an hour. I'll just deal with it. Coffee should help a bit for now, at least." In other words, I would swing between moods similar to bipolar II. Turns out that's the wrong way to look at it. Some major life events caused me to re-evaluate many things, so I took a major vacation by myself without contact to the world to gain a lot more self insight. Eventually that led to me asking my psychiatrist about bipolar/schizophrenia as a possible cause of my problems. (Some article on hacker news on mental health actually led to bringing up the specific questions.) When I brought it up, he even looked at me like I was trying to completely self-diagnose and initially shrugged it off. Technically, yes it's self-diagnosis, but it led to a more-correct diagnosis, but only after sending me to a research program that gave me a full psych evaluation. One of the doctors even mentioned multiple times "you're the perfect candidate for this study..." Go figure.. Mild aside - Similar doubt happens when I ask about lead poisoning as a possible attention/mood root. I used to shoot rifles competitively for years without taking care of washing my hands and such, so it's not a completely awful theory. Every doctor I brought it up to looked at me like an idiot and would just send me to get a blood test as if that's even a valid test. Still no answer there. (edit - editing)
  - DenisM 11y ago
    Oh dear oh dear oh dear, the medicine has let you down. The second hardest thing, after getting yourself to the office, is conveying your problem in all its gruesomeness. I have a hunch they aren't allowed to lead you with questions, and if you think its "normal" you won't describe it in enough detail. It's too easy to start thinking that you are of bad character, or "it's just life". You aren't and it ain't - a healthy person, especially with a good skill set, can easily focus on his work, or put effort to find better work. Timid acceptance of suffering, absent an actual terminal disease, is the hallmark of a mood disorder. The key trigger with doctors is to describe both how you feel and how that affects your life - e.g. you can't do your work in the afternoon, you can't sleep at night and feel tired during the day, your relationship unravels because you can't put any effort into it, the trash is piling over your house, the bills go unpaid more than they have to be, you get riled up about inconsequential things and can't calm down, that sort of thing. I'm glad you found proper help. Tenacity pays.
    - bpchaps 11y ago
      Thanks for the kind words! Truly. I get the slight impression that you know me in-person, or at least someone very, very similar. Or you experience similar. Things are definitely better these days. I'm currently in the process of switching careers (starting today, actually) to remove as many stress points as possible, which definitely has a major effect on my mental health. No more on-call ;) Absolutely on the tenacity, btw.

by bpchaps 11y ago

DenisM 11y ago

That sucks, 10 times is far too long. If a doctor can't figure out what's up in that much time, then it's time to move on to another doctor. The hardest part is working up the energy to make a change.

bpchaps 11y ago
It's not that simple, even for the doctor. I've had about five doctors tell me that I have ADHD which always led to amphetamine based prescriptions. That generally helped with the attention issues, which was my biggest concern. The problem is that the mood issues were always just... "me". It just seemed like an aspect of mild depression that was always manageable. The daily internal dialogue would go: "My mood is absolutely awful right now. I have zero energy and feel depressed. But, this is just a fleeting feeling that should go away in an hour. I'll just deal with it. Coffee should help a bit for now, at least." In other words, I would swing between moods similar to bipolar II. Turns out that's the wrong way to look at it. Some major life events caused me to re-evaluate many things, so I took a major vacation by myself without contact to the world to gain a lot more self insight. Eventually that led to me asking my psychiatrist about bipolar/schizophrenia as a possible cause of my problems. (Some article on hacker news on mental health actually led to bringing up the specific questions.) When I brought it up, he even looked at me like I was trying to completely self-diagnose and initially shrugged it off. Technically, yes it's self-diagnosis, but it led to a more-correct diagnosis, but only after sending me to a research program that gave me a full psych evaluation. One of the doctors even mentioned multiple times "you're the perfect candidate for this study..." Go figure.. Mild aside - Similar doubt happens when I ask about lead poisoning as a possible attention/mood root. I used to shoot rifles competitively for years without taking care of washing my hands and such, so it's not a completely awful theory. Every doctor I brought it up to looked at me like an idiot and would just send me to get a blood test as if that's even a valid test. Still no answer there. (edit - editing)
- DenisM 11y ago
  Oh dear oh dear oh dear, the medicine has let you down. The second hardest thing, after getting yourself to the office, is conveying your problem in all its gruesomeness. I have a hunch they aren't allowed to lead you with questions, and if you think its "normal" you won't describe it in enough detail. It's too easy to start thinking that you are of bad character, or "it's just life". You aren't and it ain't - a healthy person, especially with a good skill set, can easily focus on his work, or put effort to find better work. Timid acceptance of suffering, absent an actual terminal disease, is the hallmark of a mood disorder. The key trigger with doctors is to describe both how you feel and how that affects your life - e.g. you can't do your work in the afternoon, you can't sleep at night and feel tired during the day, your relationship unravels because you can't put any effort into it, the trash is piling over your house, the bills go unpaid more than they have to be, you get riled up about inconsequential things and can't calm down, that sort of thing. I'm glad you found proper help. Tenacity pays.
  - bpchaps 11y ago
    Thanks for the kind words! Truly. I get the slight impression that you know me in-person, or at least someone very, very similar. Or you experience similar. Things are definitely better these days. I'm currently in the process of switching careers (starting today, actually) to remove as many stress points as possible, which definitely has a major effect on my mental health. No more on-call ;) Absolutely on the tenacity, btw.