Mania: mini update

So I think I might be in the midst of a mania cycle. My mind is humming a million miles a minute, I'm stumbling over my words and I'm highly productive. Productive to the point where when I'm not doing anything I feel anxious and like I'm not doing enough. I guess it would be a good time to give the house a real good clean down or start a few projects I've been meaning to start (but they required planning and I need to buy stuff to begin). Planning is difficult because I really need to think things out, which is hard when I'm switch from here to there every other second. Money...I should just stay away from buying things. I've somehow already put my bank account in a tight spot, not sure how it happened.

It's been a while since I've felt this way to this extreme so I'm not sure what to do with myself. I don't really have the attention span to stick to one thing too long (although I did marathon 4 seasons of Legend of Korra over the weekend). Watching things is easy because I get involved in the story and the characters but it's just a waste of time. When, instead I could be learning things or getting stuff done.

I don't really have much more to talk about because it's hard to keep my train of thought before jumping to the next thing.

I did plan a my very first adult trip to Austin next month from the 10th-17th. My boyfriend are flying out to stay with some really close friends. No big plans as of yet, I'm just excited to see my best friend. Then I turn around on the 18th to fly out for a conference for work in San Francisco! I'm a bit scared about that to be honest but I'm going to try to make the best of it. It's going to be really tiresome to go from plan ride to plane ride back to back. I 'll be out there until Thursday, so I'm debating taking a vacation day that Friday or just work from home. I'm going to be really drained I'm sure but this is just how the cookies crumbled. I'd been planning the Austin trip for a while and the conference didn't seem like it was going to happen even though I spoke to my team lead about it earlier in the year. I just hope I don't be a stick in the mud and can actually mingle and network.

Work has been insane. I've been assigned to a special project that takes me away from my normal work and team. I miss the social aspect of seeing my team but at the same time I'm excited to learn all this new stuff. Eventually I'll be coming back with all the info to teach the team. But for now I'm taking it day by day trying to learn as much as possible and hope that it all sinks in and I get everything documented so I don't get stuck again. My "mentor" on this project is not a hand holder and I think I've gotten a little bad about trying to figure things out on my own so it's a good chance to reestablish those problem solving skills.

Also I signed up for a watercolor class for Monday nights but now I'm not sure if I should cancel or not. They pushed the start date back a week (so there goes one class I paid for) and then I will be missing two classes for the Austin trip and the work conference. So I'm just not sure if it's bad timing or if I should just do it anyway. I think I'll go to the first class and decide then. I still have a little time to drop and get my money back. I was just really, really looking forward to learning that medium.

It's been really hard for me on the weekends to get motivated enough to do just about anything recently so this "manic" feeling only started Monday. Now, there is a chance it could be a side effect of my new ADD medication but the symptoms seem to fit mania better. Or perhaps the ADD med is putting me in a manic state. I'm not sure. I've only been taking the new med for a little over a week now. I also missed 3 days of meds over the weekend (I know a big nono) so I'm not sure how my body is adjusting.

I see my therapist on the 23rd, I don't feel like I have much to talk about or work on. I dunno. I see my psychiatrist on the 3rd so it will be a while until I can adjust my meds, if needed. Which probably will considering I'm rapid cycling right now (the weekend I didn't want to move).

Anyway that's what's been up lately.

Up and down we go, when will it stop? I'll never know...

So recent update on the mental health journey. My work from home stent ended and I'm pretty much in the same boat as before. My social anxiety and GAD are an everyday occurrence and I'm trying to treat it without medication as best I can but I just end up taking a Xanax to calm down enough to concentrate. I'm just not sure how to cope anymore. I kind of think I'm depending on the Xanax even though whenever it happens I try to take 30 minutes to clam myself down before resorting to take the Xanax. But it's happening so often I can't keep it under control. I'm not sure if there's something more daily I could take to manage the anxiety rather then the quick fix Xanax. I've tried Abilify but it didn't work for me.

I'm on a new ADD medication, Concerta because I was concerned on getting hooked on the Ritalin. But now I'm beginning to think that was a bad idea. I don't feel like this new medication is working, now mind you I've only been taking it for a week. It's just the Ritalin kicked in right away, it just had such a short half life, I felt I was popping too many of them even though I was sticking to the directions and on a low dose. This is only one of the minor things I need to treat right now so it's kind of fallen by the wayside but it's really beginning to bother me. Whenever I take the time to just sit down and try to study something, I can't absorb the information. There's just no focus for me. Then  when it gets slow at work, I just web surf and I feel guilty and disgusted at myself that I'm not using every free minute to learn something. Because in the end, I want to move to a different role. I want more freedom and I just don't have those technical skills right now. So I NEED to learn. I'll have to address it sternly in my next appointment if I don't see any improvement by then. I'll probably ask to switch back to the old stuff even though my doctor will have push back. The Ritalin worked, I was just worried about the addiction aspects. Although I honestly don't feel I'm the type to get hooked. But if Ritalin is just a temporary fix I want something else anyway.

Next would be sleep. So the good news, I've been getting consistently sleepy every night around the same time. Now that isn't to say I can FALL asleep easily but my body knows when it's time for bed. So after many different meds (failed Trazodone which was a combo fall asleep and bipolar med to replace Xanax and Latuda; it made me sick if i didn't eat with it and I don't want to be eating at 9/10 pm at night) to FALL asleep we defaulted back to Xanax this week at a higher dose, 2mg. I know it works so I'm happy with that decision. Although now that I think about it, I filled a script for Valium but never started it so I'm not sure if I should have inquired as that as the fall asleep option.

The problem now is STAYING asleep. I'm a pretty light sleeper. I didn't have so much trouble when I was combo-ing Ambien and Xanax (and Latuda as the companion bipolar med), I slept like the dead and it felt great in the morning. But Ambien just magically stopped working. So I had to switch to something else. I started Restorial as my stay asleep med with Trazodone for my go to sleep med but I kept waking up periodically through the night so I never felt rested. I gave it over a month and no changes so I asked to switch to something else. Now with that being said we had eliminated Latuda from my regimen because a higher does made me sick. So we had to replace the companion bipolar medication with something else. Now I'm taking Seroquel. Apparently part of the side effects is sleepiness so it's supposed to be dual purpose for Bipolar and staying asleep. But the problem is that I'm still waking up at 4 or 5 in the morning everyday and not being able to fall back asleep despite staying the bed and trying my hardest to remind myself I still have tons of time I need to sleep. Again it's only been a week so I still have to give it time. I just want a combination that works like Ambien and Xanax did. Sleep is so crucial to my mood stabilization. I know I'm sleeping my life away when I'm taking 9-10 hours a night but it's the only way I feel rested and strong enough to take on a new day with all the challenges of the agonizing anxiety.

We wanted to nip the depression in the bud, so to speak so I started an antidepressant. Now I know from research SSIRs can create a lot of side effects and can even make bipolar worse. I started on a low dose of Prozac and recently uped to 40mg. I'm not sure if it's attributing to anything yet because there are so many other things going on right now. So many medication switches, dose changes and the like. I've tried Cymbalta and Wellbutrin when I was being wrongly diagnosed with depression and neither seemed to have effect at the time, but they might be viable options now if this doesn't work. 

Also on the depression note, I started counselling again with a new therapist. She's nice and I'm interested in her approach to treatment (cognitive behavioral) but I'm not sure it's working for me. I feel like I go into my session anxious because I have nothing particular to talk about because there haven't been any clear triggers for me lately. Her feedback cycle is generally the same thing, think positive thoughts, notice when you're spiraling out of control etc. I'm not saying that wouldn't work, but it's very difficult to put into practice.

Other than that my Lamictal was uped from 200mg to 300mg. I've read that anything over 200mg probably doesn't do anything but I'm willing to try it if it means I stay reasonable stable. At the moment that is not the case but it can be attributed to my sleep problems rather than the bipolar. I HAVE cycled though so I'm very worried. It all started out as a major depressive state and then I started to feel a little better, mellowed out because I didn't have to worry about going to the office; then I started to feel a lot better (mania starts) and my spending shot up and I started a lot of projects among other symptoms. It was more subtle that usual so it was hard to detect but it lasted for a few weeks, much longer than usual. Now I'm going back down. I wish Lithium was an option for me to try for my staple bipolar medication because I've heard it really works for a lot of people. But due to my age (baby making years) they won't consider it an option.

The last two weekends I've cancelled plans, isolated myself from my boyfriend and pretty only slept or stared at the wall and intensely other think everything. I hope these switches in meds kick in soon. I'm getting anxious trying to balance adult responsibilities, work and my relationship as best I can.

So the current regimen:

Morning

• Lamictal 300mg
• Prozac 40mg
• Concerta 36mg
• (many many vitamins)

Daytime

• Xanax 1mg (as needed, up to 2x day)

Night

• Xanax 2mg
• Seroquel 50mg
• Melatonin 6mg

Currently feelings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J61u3wFzl68