Bipolar Disorder Support Group
Bipolar disorder is not just a single disorder, but a category of mood disorders marked by periods of abnormally high energy and euphoria, often accompanied by bouts of clinical depression. This is the place to talk about your experience with bipolar disorder, learn from others' experiences, and find support.
I have a really unbalanced schedule, its completely random when I go to bed and get up, or when I take my meds. I'm supposed to split my dose in half before bed and in the morning to help with the groggy side effect I get from Lamotrigen, and faint withdrawl symptoms, but I always take the full dose in the morning because I often drink and don't like to take my pills on a stomach full of alchohol.
So I end up taking my pills anywhere between 10am and 6pm. I also have a really hard time sleeping because I also have PTSD and because I can't get good rest I will barely sleep for a few nights then crash and sleep for 10-12 hours. All of this combined with the drinking and general stress I have been getting sick all the time lately, since September I have had 3 sinus infections and just now spent a week in bed with strep throat and a 101 degree fever.
I'm realizing that I really need to quit drinking and get a set schedule for sleep and medication. Ive tried to do this before, but I never seem to be able to follow through with it. I think its just scary the idea of that kind of rigid schedule I don't want to be stuck to it :( I'm so used to living in chaos, to the way I lived before I was on medication, It seems scary to have a stable sleep pattern, if that makes sense?
With not drinking I am trying to quit for 6 months and see how I feel about it, but I am having a hard time committing to that mentally too. I don't consider myself an alcoholic, I take breaks from drinking, and recently went a month without drinking, but there is a definite cycle, where I will stop drinking for a while, have the occasional beer, then start drinking every day and getting wasted a few times a week. Sometimes this turns into emotional binge drinking where I blackout or vomit all the next day to the point where I am hungover for days. I feel like it coincides with me getting more manic. Meds help of course but I feel like I still cycle on a smaller scale...
Does anyone have any help or ideas about how to come up with a schedule and stick to it for sleep and meds? Or about drinking? I have just realized that I keep getting sick all the time and something needs to change :(
So I end up taking my pills anywhere between 10am and 6pm. I also have a really hard time sleeping because I also have PTSD and because I can't get good rest I will barely sleep for a few nights then crash and sleep for 10-12 hours. All of this combined with the drinking and general stress I have been getting sick all the time lately, since September I have had 3 sinus infections and just now spent a week in bed with strep throat and a 101 degree fever.
I'm realizing that I really need to quit drinking and get a set schedule for sleep and medication. Ive tried to do this before, but I never seem to be able to follow through with it. I think its just scary the idea of that kind of rigid schedule I don't want to be stuck to it :( I'm so used to living in chaos, to the way I lived before I was on medication, It seems scary to have a stable sleep pattern, if that makes sense?
With not drinking I am trying to quit for 6 months and see how I feel about it, but I am having a hard time committing to that mentally too. I don't consider myself an alcoholic, I take breaks from drinking, and recently went a month without drinking, but there is a definite cycle, where I will stop drinking for a while, have the occasional beer, then start drinking every day and getting wasted a few times a week. Sometimes this turns into emotional binge drinking where I blackout or vomit all the next day to the point where I am hungover for days. I feel like it coincides with me getting more manic. Meds help of course but I feel like I still cycle on a smaller scale...
Does anyone have any help or ideas about how to come up with a schedule and stick to it for sleep and meds? Or about drinking? I have just realized that I keep getting sick all the time and something needs to change :(
As for getting on schedule do what I do, put an alarm on your cell phone to go off at certain times when its time to take your meds. I used to do that and now I Don't need it anymore because I take my pills on time without thinking about it.
The first step in stopping drinking is admitting you have a problem, and based on what you wrote you do have a serious drinking problem.
Alcohol and drugs do not mix, period.
I pick up my meds at the beginning of each month and then spend a while distributing them in dispensers that hold enough pills to last a full month. I have 30 dispensers for AM pills and 30 for PM pills. The pills I must take at noon are kept right where I can see them in the kitchen so I take them when I fix my lunch. This is the routine I have established for years and it works perfectly.
I take my night time meds about 30 minutes before bedtime to give the sleeping med time to work and go to bed at 11 PM and set my alarm for 8 AM. It kills me that I no longer have a job and if I do not follow a routine, like I did when I worked I feel bad, guilty as a matter of fact.
I usually take a short nap around 2 PM till about 3 PM and then I feel refreshed until it is time to go to bed later in the evening.
I have my ups and downs and my disorder is pretty severe but I do take my meds very seriously. In the past I had a few awful experiences as a result of skipping meds for a couple of days, each time ending in the hospital. The memories are terrible and I do not want to go through that again.
Trust me, if I could do it so can you.
Meds and drugs DO NOT under any circumstances drink while on meds. PLUS, taking them at random times makes your drug levels not therapeutic. So, stop drinking.
treat Physical illness
balance Eating
avoid mood-Altering drugs
balance Sleep
get Exercise
build M A S T E R y
This is from DBT
I put this handout up on my refridgerator to help me remember what to do to help me from being so vulnerable to bipolar/borderline disorders.
I had to stop drinking entirely. I was an alcholic. But even if your not bipolar and alcohol don't mix (or other mind altering drugs). They upset your mood. I used to be considered rapid cycling bipolar 1 before I stopped drinking. Once I stopped drinking I went to just bipolar 1 without the rapid cycling. So see alcohol induced these extra severe mood swings.
Something to add about the above paragraph is that I could not get disability until I cleaned up my problem with alcohol. And I couldn't lie about it because when I was hospitalized I was usually under the influence. It worked as a vicious cycle. I would drink to help me control my out of control mood and then would not want to come down due to the debilitating depression and I would have these attacks monthly. I had to stop drinking and get on a routine along with regular med times and sleep times and do what the PLEASE MASTER DBT handout suggested.
We all have our different ways to cope. But for someone who was out of control and felt like I had no hope...this was one of the really great skills that helped me.
I know. I've played that game.
I've even stopped drinking for YEARS and then went back to drinking on a regular basis, to the point of blacking out and/or passing out.
Stop drinking. It's not good for your BP treatment, it's not good for you physically, and it disturbs the sleep pattern. (I suffer from anxiety and when I drank it got rid of the anxiety for a few hours but made it all the worse the next day, too.)
As the late, great Robin Harris said, 'I'm not an alcoholic. I'm a drunk. Alcoholics got to go to them damn meetings!'
In other words, I don't do AA. I quit cold turkey.
So try it. Stop drinking. If you do it no problem, great!!! But if and when you find that you can't, get help.
Go to AA. Or go to a doctor and get put on Antabuse. Or find another program to try.
But Stop. Do whatever it takes.
Do you best to force yourself to take your meds at the same time every day and/or night. If you are not drinking, that should make it easier, since it was the drinking keeping you from doing so in the first place.
And if Lamotrigine makes you groggy, taking your evening dose IN the evening makes a lot more sense if you're having sleeping problems.
Try no drinking and taking your pills on time for a couple of months and see if things are better.
Talk to your Pdoc about all this, if you haven't already. Be honest.
Yeah, you seem 'sickly', all right!!! Do you eat a halfway decent diet? If not, try to do so!!! It sounds like your poor immune system isn't doing its job too well!!! I hope that this strep is the last of your illnesses!!!!
Good luck!!! Things might get a lot better from here on in!!! (((((Hugs)))))
You sound like you don't really want to have a better schedule or to quit drinking. The first step is you making the decision. The second step is sticking to it.
I like the alarm for meds idea.
Keeping going like you are means you will get more of the same. Do you really want that?