[Guest]

How many of you have been diagnosed with bipolar? because I'm really starting to think I'm bipolar, no for reals.

 

[Guest]

kari whats goin on? I haven't spoken to you in a while, it seems as though you have went M.I.A. from AIM, so im just wondering how you been & what not........

holla

 

[Guest]

I've been diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, which to some degree i think i might have it. DPDR is the killer for me though, so a little bipolar doesn't matter much for me.

 

[Guest]

Bipolar disorder is a man made illness. Probably created by the medical community so they could make money on drugs like lithium. so you may be a little up and down and perhaps a little moody. Big deal, if thats your personality then you have to work with what you have. Changing your moods is a possibility, but that is completely up to you and it takes alot of work.

 

[kenc127]

Double post :\

 

[kenc127]

My sister was diagnosed with it a few years ago. It is just what it says. There are EXTREME mood swings, and I have seen it with my own eyes. For 2 or 3 weeks at a time she will be on the phone with friends in almost a hysterical kind of high, having fun hanging out with friends etc. Sometimes she is so amped up that she can barely connect a sentence. She will go days without sleeping. Then for a few weeks all she will do is
eat and sleep for 12 hours at a time. It goes on like this month after month. It is a very real illness. Meds have helped balance things out quite a bit and have given her her life back.

Ken

 

[Guest]

I hope that after being around me that Kari is afraid to take meds... :lol: :lol:

 

[sleepingbeauty]

i REAAAAAAALLY dont think im bipolar, but its part of my overall diagnosis. ADD, Anxiety, Depression, disociative disorder, ocd, and even skitzofrenia are hidden away in my diagnosis.. but BIPOLAR is on the top of the heap which really pisses me off but my doc wont budge. its the 'in vogue' mental illness these days. doctors just LOOOOVE rubberstamping you with it. i do have moodswings, but i dont think it qulifies me as bipolar. the only reason skitz is in there is cause the first day i took lexapro i felt really drugged up and i had mild halucinations. (saw a big white dog run across the street.. saw a man standing in the road that wasnt there) but that was the extent and im pretty convinced it was completely med induced. but i cant seem to tell my doctor that. she believes what she wants to believe about me and that totally sucks. :evil:

 

[Guest]

Neal, I'm not going to take ANY medication, come on you know that.

For 2 or 3 weeks at a time she will be on the phone with friends in almost a hysterical kind of high, having fun hanging out with friends etc. Sometimes she is so amped up that she can barely connect a sentence. She will go days without sleeping. Then for a few weeks all she will do is
eat and sleep for 12 hours at a time.

Ken, sounds exactly like me, no seriously. I get extreme mood swings and sometimes I sleep 12-17 hours, sometimes I can go days without any. Sometimes I get so crazy and hysterical I scare my friends, when the slightest thing goes wrong I turn into a complete basket case, i hate myself, i'm worthless, i cry and cry and wish I wasn't alive, the next day I will be smiling my ass off because I love life so much, so much that I want to scream and jump up and down.

 

[g-funk]

yeah I get the distinct impression we know more than a lot of the professionals out there. i definitely know more than my GP. but then he is a 'general practitioner' not a psychiatrist.

sleeping b you are so not schizophrenic from that incident - besides, dont you have to exhibit the symptoms for at least 3 months or something for that diagnosis. whats your doc on about? i took Sonata, a relatively harmless (in comparison to tranqs) sleeping pill and totally felt like i was on acid. i was basically dreaming whilst awake with auditory hallucinations and 'felt' people in the room etc. tripping out. my doc mentioned something about psychotic reaction. i really couldnt care less what he said, im not psychotic, the reaction may have brought on psychotic like symptoms but i was ok when i woke up the next day. everybody who takes acid must have a psychotic episode every time they take it in that case. if the psychotic symptoms leave your body along with the drug then you aint psychotic

 

[kenc127]

Hey Kari

Well, if it starts to interfere with your life you should definitely talk to someone. If not, then keep on keepin on!

Ken

 

[Guest]

I spent a good yar or so stressing out about bi-polar becuase I had (still do) manic depression...all within the same day. You may have it Kari, but I was only exhibiting the symptoms of it due to other problems. Bipolar isn't a death sentence though and can be cured just like anxiety and depression. Too bad dpdr is a bigger stretch than that.

 

[Guest]

Neal, I'm not going to take ANY medication, come on you know that.

For 2 or 3 weeks at a time she will be on the phone with friends in almost a hysterical kind of high, having fun hanging out with friends etc. Sometimes she is so amped up that she can barely connect a sentence. She will go days without sleeping. Then for a few weeks all she will do is
eat and sleep for 12 hours at a time.

Ken, sounds exactly like me, no seriously. I get extreme mood swings and sometimes I sleep 12-17 hours, sometimes I can go days without any. Sometimes I get so crazy and hysterical I scare my friends, when the slightest thing goes wrong I turn into a complete basket case, i hate myself, i'm worthless, i cry and cry and wish I wasn't alive, the next day I will be smiling my ass off because I love life so much, so much that I want to scream and jump up and down.

Yea i feel you on this one, sometimes i feel totally happy like nothins wrong and i say to myself, y am i happy but i cant stop being happy but then on other days i sit in my room and just feel like my life is over. I think its the brain pattern, I sleep 15 hours a day sometimes and other days i wont sleep for 2 days (unhealthy pattern). I think its our thought processes sometimes we get a head full of deep sad thoughts and the other day we feel as if nothing's wrong and we look toward the future. I dont think im bilpolar because there is a legitimate reason for this. I beleive its a way to cope with our problems, we cant feel totally happy all the time because we aren't like that and we cant sad all the time because we are like that. We level off.

 

[enngirl5]

Bipolar is a confusing illness. It's often misdiagnosed and given the wrong definition. Bipolar is supposedly the same as Manic Depression. Extreme highs and lows. But that's not the same as Clinical Depression which is just periods of extreme depression without necessarily the highs and lows. Anyway, there is a Bipolar I and II. Bipolar one is the extreme one. Bipolar II is the mild one. I think if either one is bullshit it is Bipolar II. Bipolar I if diagnosed correctly is very serious and very real. People get manic and go buy thousands of dollars worth of clothes and then get down and don't leave their bedroom for days, stuff like that. I'm not a doctor but if you're ineterested go read up on the two types. But, in the psychiatric community, you almost need to be able to diagnose yourself. This doesn't apply to everyone obviously, but still you cannot believe everything doctors tell you. You have to take the responsibility to educate yourself on your own illness because you know yourself better than anyone else. When my panic disorder first started I was told it was just Depression, even though it was textbook Panic Disorder, a very obvious and specific illness, and I argued wth my doctor until he told me maybe I should see another psychiatrist. Just educate yourselves, that's my advice for the week. But the problem with us obsessive types is we tend to diagnose ourselves wuith everything we read about. That's where a doctor can help to get us back into perspective. Anyway, that's all.

 

[Living in a fog]

I was told back in 1989 that I was bi-polar and it was also the first time my DR hit me. No one said anything about my DR even though I kept on complaining that I was seeing thru a mist or a fog. I was treated by several psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers who never took my complaints seriously about my visual problems. I swear I knew i was depressed but when the DR hit me it was like I went thru a trap door and fell 1000 feet. I am one of those bi-polar types that get the really low lows, but my highs aren't that high. I mean I feel good when I am in an upswing but I can not stay up for days. I need only about 3-4 hrs sleep when my mainc phase occurs but during my depressive phase I need about 12 hrs. My current shrink says that the DR really bothers me when I am in a down cycle but when i am in a up cycle i can put up with it. He says when the lows are there my DR is magnified sort of like "the perfect storm" when everything comes together to produce the most serious cosequences. I had an prior girlfriend who got to know me really well and she one time exclaimed that "I have never seen a person go thru such highs and lows like you do". I thought it was normal for me at the time but in looking back on my life I guess she was right.

 

[falling_free]

Well of the two biggies of mental illness Ie scitzophenia and Bi Polar i seem to match a lot of symtons for the bi-polar and few on the scitzophenia so I am not sure I have bi-polar (havent been diagnosed) but its looking like I having some kind of manic disorder of some type, like for example I match all these criteria

mania sympons ( i am going through what I beleive is a manic kind of episode now, I feel like the man, everything feels right, ive been awake for all night since christmas eve and prior to getting back home i was having serious thoughts about killing myself, now i feel on top of the world and full of energy)

Increased physical and mental activity and energy yes, oohh i want to write a book, i want to script a film bla bla bla etc etc
Heightened mood, exaggerated optimism and self-confidence yes
Excessive irritability, aggressive behavior yes (already had an argument with my mum today)
Decreased need for sleep without experiencing fatigue yes - haven't slept all night and I feel fine
Grandiose delusions, inflated sense of self-importance - yep recently been thinking about how im going to change the world and become like the best rock star ever, despite the fat i cant play music for shit)
Racing speech, racing thoughts, flight of ideas - yep sometimes speech seems to flow in a very natrual fashion, and i feel confident about what im saying self assured
Impulsiveness, poor judgment, distractibility - yes ,yes don't think about doing things consuqeunces etc etc,no
Reckless behavior - sometimes yes
In the most severe cases, delusions and hallucinations - yes for delusions mild panoia , no for hallucantions

Depression

Prolonged sadness or unexplained crying spells - yes for sadness feeling of voidness , no for crying,I can't cry
Significant changes in appetite and sleep patterns - no for appetite , yes for sleep patterns , these are always changing
Irritability, anger, worry, agitation, anxiety - big fat yes, i worry about everything, and also that things are my fault
Pessimism, indifference - yes , often feeligns of whats the point, recureent suicidal thoughts
Loss of energy, persistent lethargy - yes for sure, i felt so letharic a few days ago when my relatives came round to stay i didn't want to see them, satyed in my room and listened to kraftwerk man-machine album
Feelings of guilt, worthlessness - oh yess though ive preety much decided guilt is a stupid worthless emotion, i still feel it
Inability to concentrate, indecisiveness - yes, i cant concentrate on crap when im low
Inability to take pleasure in former interests, social withdrawal - iv'e spent the last 5 days in my room, with no desire to go out, preety much layed in bed all day
Unexplained aches and pains - back pains
Recurring thoughts of death or suicide - yep defeialty, more so than a long long time, like i have been constantly thinking about getting some knives from downstairs and slittign my wrists actually was preety close to doing it today when i was preety drunk, but when drunkenesss wore off i saw sense, still constant thoughts of suicide when low, at the moment i couldn't care less about suicide though , i feel happy!

Sorry if anyone finds this post depressing or whatever, but I seriously think that the bi-ploar may be the source of my dp/dr as well as all the other crap thats going on with me, as I am preety sure I don't have scitzophenia.

 

[Guest]

It seems that everyone is walking around claiming to be bipolar these days. How long did it take for your doctor to diagnose you? 10 minutes? People so willing to accept such diagnoses should get their heads checked. You can call me paranoid or schizo or whateva, but I know for a FACT that "illnesses" such as GAD and bipolar were created so that more drugs could be put into our brains. Why else would they create these illnesses? Companies are making billions off of people buying into such garbage. If there was no benefit from such names then they would never have been created. But there is a benefit and it's called profit. Anyone who thinks otherwise isn't living in reality. The medical community is anything but compassionate.

I would much rather be "bipolar" or whatever they diagnose you as than to take those meds that make me a creature straight out of "night of the living dead."

 

[falling_free]

but I know for a FACT that "illnesses" such as GAD and bipolar were created so that more drugs could be put into our brains.

Have you got anything to back that comment up, now I can be quite the cynic sometimes and I can concieve the possibilty that drug companies don't give a fuck about anything apart from sales of drugs, but there isn't really any evidence to support your claims so how can you know for a FACT?

I would much rather be "bipolar" or whatever they diagnose you as than to take those meds that make me a creature straight out of "night of the living dead."

Meds are probaly going to help some people though IMO, I know when I had my intial breakdown meds helped me a lot, calmed me the fuck down, now im not so sure i need the meds but at some points if an individual is having a mental problem what is wrong with chemicals going into your brain to bring some relief, or sedate the person, they don't even have to take the meds forever as it is an indiivudal choice (in most cases anyway) to take the meds.

for me perosnelly I am going to take a break from meds probably after iv'e had a chat with my doctor as they are making me very very sleepy and I think I am at a more or less more functional level than I was previously, and my meds have helped, regardless of the not so great side effects, but have to take the bad to get th good ie recorvery so I rhink that in the end taking meds for a while is a good option (depending on the individual) and is probably not going to make me a braindead zombie for the rest of my life.

 

[Guest]

Its not as if doctors recieve commission from pharmaceuticals everytime they sell some drug. I don't think many of you would be satisfied unless we have an MD and a psych following us around at all times. We have to realize that there aren't many out there, and psych drugs are fairly unevolved.

Docs deal with schizo, and life-threatening illnesses everyday, and it would ask a lot out of them to give you their unyeilding attention.

 

[Guest]

In recent years there has been a proliferation of psychiatric disorders. The pharmaceutical industry in cahoots with the psychiatric industry has for a long time been on the trail of inventing new diseases to throw their drugs at and, if a pill stays on the shelf for too long, they find new illnesses to throw it at. Normal human responses and conditions are, according to this money-hungry machine, very serious illnesses and disorders which can only be treated with mountainloads of drugs.

Shy people have Social Anxiety Disorder, nervous people have GAD, kids who are just being kids have ADHD and women with PMT are all of a sudden plagued with the incurable (but according to Eli Lilly eminently treatable with repackaged Prozac as Sarafem) PMDD or Pre-Menstrual Dysphoric Disorder (See: Old drug for a 'new' female disorder).

And what about Panic Disorder? Is it really a true psychiatric condition? I'm very uneasy about this label since it was a term concocted by Upjohn/Pharmacia (now owned by Pfizer) to promote their drug Xanax. Like many other disease-mongering drugs companies they "bought" psychiatrists to write it up and persuade the FDA to approve it, but the majority of people I have spoken to these last few years suffer from panic as an iatrogenic condition. Anxiety isn't a disease but drugs companies aided and abetted by their legal pushers have turned it in to one. Benzodiazepines (all of them) cause, exacerbate and prolong the symptoms of anxiety and beguile the user into believing that these drugs are of benefit. It's an awful trap to be caught in but millions unwittingly buy into the lie.

"Panic Disorder is an 'illness' specifically invented to market Xanax/alprazolam. This is described by Dr David Healy in his book "The Psychopharmacologists". Also I agree that panic attacks are often iatrogenic or drug-induced. The ones I hear of are often people coming off benzos, starting antidepressants (especially SSRIs) or as a result of cannabis," according to Professor Heather Ashton.

"Healy points out that drug companies "are now not simply confined to finding drugs for diseases. They have the power to all but find diseases to suit the drugs they have". ... One of many examples of this process was the development in the 1970s of alprazolam (Xanax) for panic disorder. According to David Sheehan (Institute for Research and Psychiatry, Tampa, Florida), the marketing of this drug involved a "clear strategy" to take advantage of the medical profession's confusion in the classification of anxiety disorders; "to create a perception that the drug had special and unique properties that would help it capture market share and displace diazepam from the top position... There was in fact nothing unique in this regard about Xanax... benzodiazepines were all good for panic disorder." Xanax was marketed by Upjohn with F.D.A. approval of doses up to 6mg daily (equivalent to 60-120mg diazepam). It is perhaps no coincidence, as Healy observes, that the effective incidence of panic disorders has grown 1000-fold since 1980." - Professor Heather Ashton, DM, FRCP, A View from the Shoulders of Giants, A Review of David Healy's "The Psychopharmacologists III", September, 2001.

What do you make of Explosive Brain Disorder? Note that this relies so heavily on the "chemical imbalance in the brain" hocus-pocus. Do they really expect us to fall for these scams? This merry-go-round seems unstoppable. The drugs companies have whole truckloads of drugs to sell and they're always coming up with new "diseases" to throw them at aided and abetted by the legions of willing doctors. Are these people really concerned about your health and well-being or do they just wish to drug you from the cradle to the grave and carry your cash to the bank? Do governments perhaps have a vested interest in keeping you sick, drugged, dependent and docile?

First, you market the disease... then you push the pills to treat it

First, you market the disease... then you push the pills to treat it

Brendan I Koerner on the ugly truth about doctors, PR firms and drug companies

Tuesday July 30, 2002
The Guardian

Word of the hidden epidemic began spreading in spring last year. Local news reports around the United States reported that as many as 10 million Americans suffered from an unrecognised disease. Viewers were urged to watch for the symptoms: restlessness, fatigue, irritability, muscle tension, nausea, diarrhoea, and sweating, among others. Many of the segments featured soundbites from Sonja Burkett, a patient who had finally received treatment after two years trapped at home by the illness, and from Dr Jack Gorman, an esteemed psychiatrist at Columbia University.
The disease was generalised anxiety disorder (GAD), a condition that, according to the reports, left sufferers paralysed with irrational fears. Mental-health advocates called it "the forgotten illness". Print periodicals were awash with stories of young women plagued by worries over money and men. "Everything took 10 times more effort for me than it did for anyone else," one woman told the Chicago Tribune. "The thing about Gad is that worry can be a full-time job. So if you add that up with what I was doing, which was being a full-time achiever, I was exhausted, constantly exhausted."

The timing of the media frenzy was no accident. On April 16 2001, the US food and drug administration (FDA) had approved the antidepressant Paxil, made by British pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, for the treatment of Gad. But it was a little-known ailment; according to a 1989 study, as few as 1.2% of the US population merited the diagnosis in any given year. If GlaxoSmithKline hoped to capitalise on Paxil's newapproval, it would have to raise Gad's profile.

That meant revving up the company's public-relations machinery. The widely featured quotes from Burkett were part of a "video news release" the drug maker had distributed to TV stations around the country; the footage also included the comments of Gorman, who has frequently served as a paid consultant to GlaxoSmithKline. On April 16 - the date of Paxil's approval - a patient group called freedom from fear released a telephone survey which revealed that "people with Gad spend nearly 40 hours per week, or a 'full-time job,' worrying". The survey mentioned neither GlaxoSmithKline nor Paxil, but the press contact listed was an account executive at Cohn & Wolfe, the drugmaker's PR firm.

The modus operandi of GlaxoSmithKline - marketing a disease rather than selling a drug - is typical of the post-Prozac era. "The strategy [companies] use - it's almost mechanised by now," says Dr Loren Mosher, a San Diego psychiatrist and former official at the national institute of mental health. Typically, a corporate-sponsored "disease awareness" campaign focuses on a mild psychiatric condition with a large pool of potential sufferers. Companies fund studies that prove the drug's efficacy in treating the afiction, a necessary step in obtaining FDA approval for a new use, or "indication". Prominent doctors are enlisted to publicly affirm the malady's ubiquity, then public-relations firms launch campaigns to promote the new disease, using dramatic statistics from corporate-sponsored studies. Finally, patient groups are recruited to serve as the "public face" for the condition, supplying quotes and compelling stories for the media; many of the groups are heavily subsidised by drugmakers, and some operate directly out of the offices of drug companies' PR firms.

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