Posted by smith562 on April 10, 2005, at 17:21:58
In reply to anxiety as mania? So phillipa just for you, posted by Spriggy on April 10, 2005, at 15:22:07
Hey Spriggy,
I am in a similar boat ... my father is BP II and I have never gotten euphoric hypomania (maybe on nardil thou). I mainly have panic disorder and depression. This was alluded to previously, but Dr Jamison did revolutionize the concepts of bipolar disorder and the spectrum notion. Her book "An Unquiet Mind : A Memoir of Moods and Madness" explains this very nicely.
After 10 years of research, clinic experiences and interviews with other doctors, I have synthesized my own thoughts on the "mood disorder spectrum illness". Mood disorders is probably similar to sickle cell disease. If you get one bad "sickle gene" .... you have sickle trait which keeps you from getting malaria and dying ... a good thing. If you get both "sickle genes" .... you get sickle cell disease ... very bad (most people only have sickle trait in africa/america). Same with mood disorders ... if you get a small number of abnormal genes ... you will have dysthmia or bipolar II or III ... many people have this soft spectrum disease and are very energetic, creative, passionate ... good thing (read "The Hypomanic Edge : The Link Between (A Little) Craziness and (A Lot of) Success in America"). On the other hand, if you get too many abnormal mood genes ... you will have severe depression, bipolar I, schizophrenia ... not good, hard to treat.
Sounds like you fit some where in the spectrum like me .... not normal, but not concretely bipolar I. I have found low dose of zoloft, low dose lithium, low dose klonopin and low dose wellbutrin to help with my "in the middle of the road illness".
Hope any of this makes sense ... sorry for the babbling. Any comments would be appreciated. Hope your well soon.
Regards,
Smith
poster:smith562
thread:482408
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050408/msgs/482476.html