Category: Depression
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Pregnancy, Breastfeeding, & Medication
This post is inspired by #medsandmotherhood week at STIGMAMA.COM, most specifically, this article: Pump and Dump, by Walker Karraa, PhD #medsandmotherhood. Before becoming pregnant with my son, I thoroughly surveyed the medical research about antidepressant use in pregnancy and during lactation. Since I had a history of severe depression and suicidal ideation dating back to…
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Success Over Stigma: Living a Successful Life with Bipolar – black dog pie: a magazine on depression and bipolar
Love this quote: “the reason you don’t actually cross the road when you see your BPD neighbour is that….. you have no idea she has it” BY GENE FOR BLACK DOG PIE · JULY 8, 2014
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Motherhood While Depressed and Bipolar
Since I was eighteen-years-old, I suffered from symptoms of moderate to severe chronic depression. Until I was thirty, I coped with chronic depression using psychotherapy. When I suffered a severe breakdown at thirty, I sought medical help for my symptoms and was prescribed antidepressants. Before becoming pregnant in my mid-thirties, I researched antidepressants to determine which was the…
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Overcast
This morning I struggled to keep my eyes open as I drove my son to school. No more searing heat, Santa Ana winds, and fire. May gloom is here. We need the coolness. We need rain. Unfortunately, when the sun hides, I find it difficult to stay awake. When we moved to Eugene, I had…
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I’m Back
My California Marriage and Family Therapist license is now current and renewed until May 31, 2016. Inactive license no more. Yes, that’s right, inactive no more. Coming out of a long, very long, two decade long, sabbatical. Wahoo! Here are my California Marriage and Family Therapist license stats: License Number: 29796 Current Date: 05/11/2014 10:01…
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Not Just Dysthymia
Not until I was 39, was I diagnosed as having bipolar disorder. I am now 50. At 39, I recognized the symptoms of mania in myself, euphoria, the feeling of being called by God to a particular church, to a particular path. The diagnostic criteria have changed over the years. For two decades, I had been…
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Mother and Wife
When my son was young, I juggled working outside the home with mothering and homemaking. By the time he was four, I found it unsustainable and ended up in a psychiatric hospital for two weeks and then months in partial hospitalization spending my days in structured group therapy sessions. Since then I have been a…
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Aftermath of Suicide
When in the throes of suicidal ideation, you don’t and often can’t understand suicide’s negative effects on those left behind. When I was eighteen, I thought my loved ones would be better off without me. My suicidal ideation was so intrenched that it was ego-syntonic — it was in agreement with my sense of self,…
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Back to the Mundane
As my mind has slowed, I’ve gone from prolific blog writing to playing solitaire on my iPad. Back to the inane, the mundane. Not as creative, but better able to take care of daily routines, pay bills, follow up on paperwork, go grocery shopping. Exhausted, though, and not up to cooking complete meals. Heated up…
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Grief, Anxiety, and Hypomania
So what brought on this flurry of activity, this bout of defensive hypomania, the birth of this blog at this point in time? Two things: one, I forgot to take valproic acid Thursday night, and, two, my grief in facing my father-in-law’s health crisis. Writing is one way I can deal with my grief, the…