In the Beginning...Our Story - Part 2

continued...

When my husband’s medication was at its worst, he thought people were there who were not.  He thought things were happening that were not.  For example, he thought he could put it all on the line to begin his own custom cabinet making business, and he really believed with his whole heart that he could become a millionaire doing it. 

Never mind he had never once in his life built a cabinet, custom or not.  Once I informed him of this little dilemma, he plummeted from his manic state into deep depression.  He slept…and slept…and slept.  He was ill, sad, crying, furious and self-centered all at once. 

Going back to his medication from yesterday’s post, the anti-depressant was making him rapid cycle badly and the drug to help him stop smoking was blocking much needed receptors in his brain (I am not a doctor; this is my feeble attempt at an understandable explanation).  It took more than two years to find a medication regimen that worked for him. 

Sometimes things would get really hopeful, then they would get really bad, really fast.  It was like riding on a freight train that has malfunctioning brakes.  You get to zooming along, thinking things are going pretty good, and suddenly you’re slapped up against the windshield (or whatever equivalent you might find in a freight train) when all those tons of metal just stop.  Then you might even hit reverse for a while…you never, ever know. 

Throughout all of that, he maintained therapy and psychiatry visits, plus primary care physician visits.  We went to marriage counseling.  And I can safely say that as long as he couldn’t think straight (which was a long time) it did him absolutely no good. 

Don’t get me wrong!  I firmly believe that therapy is integral to the person with bipolar disorder.  I also believe that the spouse and family of that bipolar individual can benefit greatly from therapy.  But if a person is so far gone that they cannot stay awake for more than a few minutes at the time or focus on a single word being said, it is doing them no good. 

The point?  Get that medication right as fast as possible!  There are folks whose primary care physicians can help just fine.  But in extreme cases, like my husband’s, a psychiatrist really should be involved.  Thank the Lord, we have a family doctor who knew when to say, “I’ve done what I can.  It’s time to get you to someone who can do more.”  And I will forever be grateful to her for it.

Unfortunately, finding a psychiatrist who wants to help bipolar people get back to normal rather than medicate them to the point they are zombies can also be tricky.  It is utterly and completely complicated at every turn.  But I have always thought, and still maintain, that anything worth doing is not done easily.

To be continued...