Qwerty

Hello all-

I would like to first apologize for not posting this sooner. I have been working 2 jobs over the summer, which my bank account has thanked me. Finally I have a little time before moving back for school.

I wanted to share with the Mental Forum community my experience with bipolar disorder type II. So here goes. I know it is long, but I wanted to tell the whole thing.

I was 17 when I received my first bouts with depression. It seemed odd I would randomly cry for no reason. Over time this would progress into a deeper depression. It never lasted for long periods of time, a few hours at the most. I attended a Christian high school, which had dorms, so I stayed in the dorms. I had been at this high school and its dorms since freshman year, away from my parents (Maybe this had something to do with it??).

Over the summer, I worked alot, and working hard has always brought me happiness. My senior year of high school, things seemed really good. As a senior, you kind of are overseers of the whole school, plus nobody to boss you around, just some of the R.A.'s, which were always cool with the Seniors. Sometimes though, things seemed too good. I would be extremely elated and hyper, for no apparent reason. These were always very good days! This would last anywhere from 1 to 3 days. But then at random, I would feel depressed again. This was nothing compared to what I had experienced in the previous year. This would last longer, days at a time.

The depression got beyond what I myself could bear, so I turned to alcohol. Yes, not a wise choice, but it was readily available (thanks Mom and Dad). I would sneak it into the dorms. One night I decided to do it and drank the grape flavored brandy in about 15 minutes. Within an hour I felt incredibly good. The deep depression had now lifted, completely! I was very excited by this, and decided to continue sneaking in alcohol. This went on all school year.

For the first few days after a binge, I felt great. I didn't even get hangovers. But then the crash, back into the depression. I drank on a weekly basis, and found my tolerance increasing too. I never got caught, had some close and stupid calls, and it turns out many others in the dorms were sneaking it in too, when they saw I was and getting away with it. Fun times......

Prom weekend, I don't remember much, but I know it was fun! But this produced my biggest crash to date. A day or 2 after prom night, I hit rock bottom. I even thought suicide was a good idea. This scared the shit out of me, so I got plastered, and ended up not going to school the next day (Tequila).

I graduated just fine, with a 3.42, which at a public school would have been a 4.0, that doesn't really matter, it bugged me at the time my grades weren't higher.

Over the summer, despite working, I continued to have these cycles, almost cyclic in nature. A few days "manic", then a few days DEPRESSED. One day I got extremely hyper, and decided to replace my car stereo, and replace the speakers too, as they were in a 93 Jimmy and it was the original. I withdrew $500, drove down to Circuit City, and spent everything I had. When I got home, only 1 of my speakers was working. I tinkered with it a little bit, but couldn't get it. (Turns out, one of the connectors was smashed in a bit and needed some pliers to correct it.) But this was a trigger, and I crashed. I drank, and wrote a suicide note. Even looked down the barrel of the gun. Very scary, and very real. The next day I went completely manic, but had a good day.

This cycle continued for the next month. I noticed when I got depressed, it was like my brain completely slowed down. I could barely decide what to eat, so I usually didn't. When I was on the other side of the spectrum, I was crazy. Thoughts were racing at a mile a second. I engaged in risk-taking behavior, didn't care about a lot of things, and I usually couldn't sleep much, yet still felt fine. Finally after 2 days of deep depression, I told my parents. Being Christians, it was difficult for them to understand the suicide notion. But we decided to get into the doctor's, and he put me on Paxil.

Nothing improved, if anything, it got worse. My sex drive virtually disappeared, which didn't help anything. He added Wellbutrin to the mix as well. I started college that fall, and my cycles now had a regular pattern. 3-4 days manic, then 3-4 days depressed. Sometimes I had 1 or 2 decent days in between the split, but an entire cycle would go 7 days.

2 months into school, I got so depressed I was convinced it was my time. So I got drunk again, but too drunk to drive anywhere to crash into that concrete bridge support. The next morning I went to see the school therapist, as I had been seeing him for about a month, and told him about it. We decided to do an inpatient program for a few days, after checking with my insurance company which covered it. Then we phoned my parents, and they along with my pastor came down to take me there. I was scared out of my mind.

They did numerous blood tests, and that 1st day I got to visit my Doctor, a blessing from God. (The blood tests revealed I had mono at some time in the past.) That's when I learned there was a Bipolar Disorder Type II, which has hypo mania, but usually really low lows. He put me on Trileptal, upped the Wellbutrin, plus added Ambien to help me sleep and Ativan to help with my atrocious anxiety. The meds messed me up for a good week as they all kicked in, but I began to feel relief. The cycles would go longer, now 8 days, even 10 and 14. The really bad days and really good days started to level out. It took me over a year to finally feel what I considered "normal".

Things finally were great when I moved off campus, and my roomates introduced me to marijuana. I would still randomly feel very down, but when I smoked my entire depression was lifted. I didn't get the hypomania, nor did I crash a few days later. My drinking days were over, the marijuana days had begun.

On a side note, I don't see why a plant that grows naturally, cannot kill you, and has obvious medicinal benefits, makes me a criminal. Oh well, God will sort it out.

That is the majority of my suffering with this disorder. It lasted for 3 or so years, and when I was rewarded with a girlfriend, the depression was pretty much gone, if not entirely. I thank you if you took the time to read this, I wanted to be thorough, and I told God I would post this, maybe it will help other people out there with Bipolar Disorder Type II. I still take the meds, and probably will for the rest of my life. But if it works, I'll stick with it. Marijuana was very key to my healing at the time. I'm not saying it's for everyone, but that plant worked miracles for me. I use some Ativan's as well, it all depends on the day.

Just take it day by day.

-"Qwerty"