I think I’ve reached the point where mental illness is shortly going to take away the life and career I’ve worked so hard to build up. I know there are many others on this site who have shared this experience and I’d like to hear from you or start a discussion in the comments of how you managed to cope, not cope, work through it, how long it took, and so on.
I’ve been away from MN recently due to life stuff. Succintly put, I’ve been trying a few more medication options for dealing with my persistent hypomania. The latest incarnation, risperidone, seemed to be the promised land. It removed all my symptoms and I went back in to work. Unfortunately, it also caused severe, crippling anxiety that made any kind of normal functioning impossible, and made me very tired so spodding online was a no-no (hence my absence from MN).
So, there’s a new med coming up in about 10 days – I’m on chlorpromazine in the meantime for various logistical reasons I don’t want to go into here. This new med, amisulpride, would appear to be the last chance saloon anti-psychotic wise. It will almost certainly be effective on the symptoms, but the question is, what the side effects will be, and will I have a major reaction to it like the other two. Absolutely no guarantees, as you can see. I have to face the fact that it may not make me well enough to go back to my job although it may give me more of an independent existence than the cpz.
I’m now staring in the face the likelihood that I am about to become a full time disabled person. Income is not an issue as DH has a good job, but all the others losses, like the loss of a social environment, of a sense of purpose, and just something to structure and occupy my time, are weighing heavily on me. My sense of personal identity is bound up with being able to do my job, in a way, and this shatters a large part of the self-esteem I’ve worked so hard to build up.
Most of all, I’m finding it really difficult to cope minute to minute at the moment, knowing what may be in store and also because I have to walk a tightrope of going easy on the cpz in order to not spend all day asleep in bed. Having had a reprieve from the hypomanic symptoms I loathe and detest them coming back.
Anyway, over to you. When did you have your “mental illness stealing your life” moment? What did you do to cope? Did you find a way of managing that helped you?
It’s not as serious, but when I had to quit my postgrad degree. I don’t have much self-esteem to begin with, and what I’ve got’s based pretty heavily on academic success – I might’ve been a miserable freak at school, but dammit, I was the cleverest miserable freak. I might’ve skipped classes and stomped out crying, but I got the grades. It was the one thing I knew for sure I could do right. I was researching something I really cared about, but 2007 was The Year Of The Relapse, and that was the end of that. It was, and still is, pretty difficult not to see that as a giant failure.
I’m really sorry this is happening to you. I don’t have any answers. A friend of mine is writing a dissertation on how sudden disability affects the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves. If she has any answers, I’ll pass them on.
thanks.
When I had to move 200 miles and move back in with my parents. No job, no independence, no nothing.
I did get my life back though, slowly and surely. It was awful, and it did feel like mental illness had stolen my life, but it wasn’t a forever thing. It’s taken me a few years, and I’ve had a few set backs, but I’ve got back on my feet – I’m now working full time again (after being told by a few that I would be on benefits for the rest of my life) and am looking to move into my own place.
There’s always hope.
Thanks. This is an inspiration to me.
I’ve still not put everything back together since the, ahem…’incident’ which lead to me having to leave my first university less than two months after I started. I was 19, losing it in a major way and very, very angry and bitter. Three years on I still have some waves of bitterness at what I saw as my future and my life crumbling into pieces, particularly over the last year with the thoughts of, “If that hadn’t happened I’d be in Japan/Spain right now on my year abroad”. The most important thing I’ve found is to let yourself be angry, let yourself be upset about what’s happened, because if you let yourself feel that anger and hurt you can deal with it and move on.
What has helped me is trying to give myself some semblance of a goal, no matter how small it needs to be broken into chunks. I’ve had to dramatically revise my expectations of myself and I’m still in the process of working out exactly what I can and can’t do. I’ve gotten much better at picking myself up and dusting myself off if it does go pear-shaped, and trying something else or trying again to break the big thing into smaller chunks. When you achieve something, give yourself a pat on the back, even if it’s something as small as “I got out of bed before midday” (that incidentally was my achievement for today). Part-time study is what’s kept me from going out of my mind with boredom and frustration, especially if I’m stuck in the house for days at a time. The most important thing is: don’t give up, don’t write yourself off and don’t feel guilty about what you can’t do – be proud of what you can do.
thank you.
It has happened to me a few times, but first of all the accumulation of LSD, weed and booze combined with stress from uni/personal life led to the first episode of psychosis in 1991.
My GP gave me a beta-blocker (can’t remember which one now) and all it did was make me feel a bit ‘numb’ and flat so I stopped taking it. I feel very glad that he didn’t give me anti-psychotics as I masked the extent of my paranoia from him, but I was v.paranoid and I also had a lot of acid flashbacks which were scary and I also thought I was going to die every day, especially in bed at night. I had a massive pain in my head the it felt as if my head was going to spit in two and I was convinced it was a tumour in there so this worry about the physical health combined with the paranoia made me highly anxious and restless and the physical worries and being scared of dying fuelled the mental distress. I was determined not to become a psych patient as many of my friends had I wanted to get through it myself at any cost.
I cut out all drugs (and alcohol ad nicotene and even caffiene are just as much ‘drugs’ as canabis, cocaine etc. to me) and went vegan (for a while), cut out sugar, went on a complete physical health regime and I started doing a bit of relaxation and I studied buddhist writings a little bit.
I was saved by finding some great books on diet, relaxation/yoga etc. which I stubbled upon by chance in charity shops, I found an idispensible book from the 1950′s about man’s natural diet which was a real eye opener and which I haven’t seen any modern books replicate, it explains all the processed foods we eat and their effects on the body and subsequently the mind.
At the time I didn’t become a buddhist, but a lot of the philosophy really helped me sort my head out. After a year or so I started re-introducing some ‘bad’ foods ie. chocolate, cakes etc. and was able to drink a pint without thinking I was going to die as had been happening at first. (a few sips used to make me feel like my head had been inflated like a baloon and that I was going to die of a brain heammorhage).
As with J.Wibble above I invented purposes for myself, gave myself goals (I still feel that this is prob, alongside physcial health, the biggest ‘cure’ for some mental health problems, having goals, directions to focus on). I put my energy first into becoming a new, changed person, healthwise and in terms of my goals in life, my priorities, to help others and work in a something that could facilitate this ie. not work for a business of any kind, not making money for a company or individual, but working to do something positive for society.
That’s when, in a round about way, I enrolled to be a student nurse and have never looked back and although I’ve had the odd relapse (more depressive rather then the psychosis, although this have emerged occassionally in a mild form when I’ve been particulary stressed), but have managed to pull myself through it without any outside support or medication, but I can see how thins would be hard for other people to do. I have been lucky to have taught myself how to cope and recognise when I am becoming low or having some strange thoughts and give myself space, I found that one good thing I learned was to say ‘no’ to people, not take on too many commitments, I think it’s important to have space and time to unwind and be quiet and also surround yourself with positive people who don’t put any pressure on you to do anything above and beyond the important every day stuff, it’s getting the balance right, people who will push you to do day to day stuff and not mope in bed and motivate you, but not people who want you to do anything too demanding or that you don’t really want to do (ie. peer pressure, which can continue on from school to sdult life if your not careful). I found I had to lose some ‘friends’, but gained more positive, easy going ones in my life and that has really helped too.
That must be horrible, DeeDee. I’m seeing a similar thing with my mum and her physical health (ironically, since it was her mental health that meant she dropped out of college originally…she had wanted to be a nurse but depression took over). Since then she’s always worked, but it’s looking like she might be getting to the point where she physically can’t.
I can completely understand the self esteem/work thing. I know it’s not ideal, but have you thought about voluntary work? I think you’d make an excellent befriender/patient advocate type thing, and it would give you some structure still. Or even something completely removed from MH.
Anyway, am crossing my fingers for you on the amisulpiride.
thank you for your kind words.
Mine isn’t as serious as yours, but I’ve always been very ambitious. 6 months ago or so I had my first serious manic episode landing me in hospital- I suspect one of the major things leading up to this was high stress at work. I’d always wanted to do medicine, or failing that a specialist position in nursing. I also always wanted kids.
Becoming that unwell with the (comparatively lower) stress in nursing (because the hours are shorter) gave me a sudden realisation when I started to get better- I’m not capable of working full time let alone juggling a high-stress high-hours career with kids.
I’m still bitter and angry and sad about it, but I’m trying to do what my doctor tells me- learn to fill my life with something else. I’m booking travel (which is still complicated by my illness, but oh well) and I’m trying to learnt to form functional romantic relationships.
That ‘something else’ is hard to find though isn’t it? Especially when you’re still hypomanic….
Or particularly when you’re depressed.
When i was 17 i began nurse training and after 8 weeks ended up in psychi ward with psychoses. Felt like the end of the world when i was told i was prob too screwy to return to nursing and after months of depression iand anxiety i finally felt better.
I had always drank from about the age of 14 and did not link mental illness and alcohol together.
I have lived with the shadow of mental illness, always fearing a return (which never happened apart from anxiety/ low moods)and married a man who was very controlling and made me think at times i was “mad”
I filled up the years having children and then came the day i needed to address my drinking problem.
I have found a spirtiual answer to my problem and now at the age of 41 am in the process of considering a career in mental health nursing. No idea what the future holds but I like to believe that everything happens for a reason, want to wish all of us luck with whatever life throws at us x
thank you
The day I was first forcibly medicated. I found myself thinking that these people could do anything to me and I wouldn’t be able to fight back. I was a non person.
I was nothing more than a label.