Posted by Lorraine on August 25, 2001, at 11:47:30
In reply to Re: Update Lorainne, Elizabeth, et. al., posted by shelliR on August 24, 2001, at 22:17:45
> > > Which moves me right into why I haven't written for 2 whole days < g >. Actually, I'm a tennis nut, especially women's tennis. So there's been some great tennis going on (deep women's field), and I am also trying to get work out in between the matches and do the treadmill 45 minutes each day. (And there weren't any questions that I hadn't answered, I don't think :-) )
I am happy you have a hobby that distracts you. My husband and son are tennis buffs--both very good players and, yes, we watch a lot of tennis. It is one of the few sports I can tolerate watching. I used to play but my lack of talant was depressing.
>
> Chapter II: About Therapy
> > >To not go would be a big change and I'm not up to making any major decisions or changes right now. But we're working with EMDR and "managing affect". Sometimes it's very helpful for your therapist to set up the agenda. Like Thursday I walked in and she said, okay, we're going to continue working on "managing affect". When my life was more active than my depression, I would then sometimes say, "but.....came up this week....", and then we'd do an agenda change. But this is fine for now.You will find a way to make it work with her; it sounds like you have the motivation. It's nice that she is so proactive.
>
> > > We totally stay away from the topic of medication, which feels totally bizarre, since that is the focus of what's going on now. But the opiate thing is so disturbing to her that it is best to not even mention it. And probably talking about what feelings are coming up and how to stop them from overwhelming me is more useful anyway.I used to walk into therapy each time and say "the meds aren't working"--it got old as a discussion topic. The more important one for me became how do I resume "life" and stop putting it on hold until the meds kick in.
> > > Chapter III: Wellbutrin, Other Assorted drugs, and Addiction
> What is a puppy upper?An activating drug. On Saturday Night Live (back when it was good), Gilda Radner (who was still alive) had a routine with a bassett hound and a cha-hau-hau. The bassett hound would come dropping in and she would say "oh, you look like you need a puppy upper" and she would give him a bisquit. The basset would turn into a cha-hau-hau and start jumping up repeatedly and nipping at her. She would then say "oh you need a doggy downer" and so forth. Pretty funny routine at the time.
> > > I know that I am not feeling any good effects yet because I wake up so depressed.
Shelli: how do stimulants work with you? Are they effective at all? It doesn't sound like they are gauging your reaction to Wellbutrin.
> > > The extra oxycontin is helping enormously. The only problem with the wellbutrin is that it's making me verbally inarticulate (which my pdoc says comes up quite often with wellbutrin and hopefully will go away). Being verbally inarticulate is not okay for me.
This didn't happen to me on Wellbutrin.
> > >during these trials the oxy gets me through and I need his absolute commitment that he is willing to raise the oxy as high as it needs to be raised until I find a med that works.
I've asked this question before. This is not in capsules you can split? Get some empty capsules at the health food store and eyeball the splitting of the capsules by holding the capsules up to the light. It will allow you to increment up more slowly on your oxy and buy you time on your habituation. I have had to do this a lot because I am so dose sensitive. It's a pain in the butt, but doesn't take that long. I'd split enough caps for a week at a time. Hey, 1/2 hour out of your life. It's worth it.
> > > I asked him again about buph and he feels that it is a "dirty" drug, that it has too many side effects and causes too many complications in combinations with other drugs. He's also not convinced there is no tolerance with buprenorphine.He likes to make his job easier, doesn't he?
> > >But I am fine with the oxy as long as the rug is not pulled from under me. I am not scared of my tolerance to it, in terms of never being able to get off or going through horrible withdrawal or anything. I can't imagine that it would be worse than effexor, for example.You are probably right. Effexor was very hard for me to come off of.
> > > To be honest, what helped was the fact that my doctor upped the oxycontin and I started a new trial with wellbutrin. And I went back on estrogen--I'm going to try it for a new months and then rethink it. I am getting what are hot flushes, (not flashes) which is a sign of lowered estrogen (in spite of my 2 glasses of soy milk daily).I met with my wholistic practitioner last week and talked about hormones. She is premenopausal (barely) and takes progesterone to help control her moods. She said too little progesterone and too much progesterone causes depression. She also said that when you first become perimenopausal, it is your progesterone level that dips first. Anyway, she will be putting me back on estrogen but adding progesterone to that. She says she can tell day to day whether she needs more progesterone and tweeks her dose accordingly. She also confirmed that for PMS, the issue is progesterone rather than estrogen. Thought I'd pass this along given that you are considering all of this stuff.
> > > What happened with your pdoc on Thursday?
> didn't raise wellbutrin because of my experience of inarticulation.You might try adding Serzone at night. I was on this combo for a while. The Serzone helped me sleep and the Wellbutrin woke me up.
> > > Well the mental/verbal aspect is more troublesome, but I did take 5mg of valium today.I used to take two extra strength Buffrin before tests when I got my MBA--it really helped with thought clarity.
> > > I'm also not at all worried about valium addiction. (Am I sounding more and more like an addictive personality with all my denial in this posts? < g >)
You sound like someone who has come to grips with the fact that you will need to take meds for life and that the meds you need to take may be meds with the potential for addiction. You are not trying to get high, which is what addiciton is about. You are trying to medicate a serious condition and you know what withdrawal is about. So, I suspect that you are pretty grounded about all of this but a bit desperate right now in your quest.
> > > Thanks for the lecture. Really.Your welcome:-)
> > > Chapter IV: Work, Vacations and Family Issues
> I am always struggling with work issues because even when my depression is under control, I distract easily. Having a DD is part of it. It obviously does take a lot of discipline to work at home by yourself and that is always a struggle for me. Plus I am really slow at doing things; that is by temperment and it's the way I like to work. But I need to work on using work time more efficiently, so I don't feel guilty when I'm not working. Today was good because I had deadlines (post office closes, frame store closes) so I pushed myself to finish what needed to get framed and mailed before I got on the computer, for example. :-)You are right on track here, I think. You need to find out what you can do when you are feeling bad. Doing the mindless errands (frame shop; post office) works. For me, at least, the trick is to get my foot out the door, then the rest follows. What about doing the artistic stuff (not the shoots) when you are down? If you actually start working on your painting the photos when you are down, are you capable of pulling in the creative energy?
> >
[re me and vacations > > > >I think I understand that. Is it like his energy level is higher or different, so you feel like you are keeping the pace at his level so *he* can feel, "I had a great vacation." I can see if you do have different energy levels that it would be easier working out living together than planning time on a vacation. Is this what you mean? I guess also different types of vacations would be more suited to one energy level over another. How are your energy levels different?Bingo! Yes, he is very very very high energy and I am not, especially when I am depressed. His idea of a great vacation would be to go someplace educational, get up crack of dawn and conquer the place step by step; roll into bed at 10pm. I can't do this. We have found ways to accommodate our different energy levels--like when we were in DC the last time, I didn't go on every excurtion with them (neither did my son). Last vacation, I planned so I could have some chill time. But even being fully aware of this--there is a constant pressure with him to "do" something. It is his own internal anxiety that drives this and, thankfully, he is aware of this. I still feel the pressure though.
[re my daughter]
> Since she has the personality that you have described, I would think that she'll be fine. I can imagine that your depression makes you watch her closely, but you were also a neglected child and she is not.My daughter tells me that she doesn't want to grow up and leave her childhood because it has been so great. Can you imagine? That is so foreign from my childhood and yours.... Plus she has no traumas--no burns; no sexual abuse, no physical abuse; no deaths; no constant moving with the stress and loss of community that goes with that.
> > >I mean that even if genetically she has a predisposition to depression, the circumstances usually have to be there for depression to be manifested.
I think this is true for her. I worry much more about my son, who is emotionally intense and more predisposed I think to mood problems.
> > > Schizophrenia is a strange thing, because it is often manifested in the late teen years and if I remember correctly, more often for boysThis doesn't run in the family so I don't worry about it.
> > >I'm of course, wondering, about you and parnate.
Well, I have response but not remission. I can't increase right now because of the side effects--which include more hyperventilation as I increase the dosage. I still have the rash and it looks worse, but my husband says "it always gets redder when it's healing" and my daughter says "mommy, this is worse". So I'm giving it a few more days. I didn't get the headache this morning either. My pessimism has to do with the tears behind my eyes I think. Break-through depression.
> > >Or is the talk about nardil a just in case scenario so you'll be ready if...?
Yeah, I want the visa for my next trip so to speak in my pocket. It makes me feel better to know the next step is at hand.
> > > BTW, I'm getting nightmares, not awful ones, more like bad long dreams since I started wellbutrin that I really do not like.
I think I had that with Wellbutrin for a while.
> > >Wishing that you wake up rested without a headache tomorrow and a rash has nothing to do with parnate.Thanx. I dreamed of kittens last night. Wouldn't have known it if I hadn't woke up. Soft kitten curled around each other in a box.
Keep in touch, shelli
poster:Lorraine
thread:67742
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010822/msgs/76359.html