Dark Days Still Linger

Some days still just suck…Days where you get yanked into the embrace of the demons in your mind. Days that drain your energy and spirit out of you. I have been trying to keep a mood diary to find a pattern in my mood changes. A lot of people find that it helps with bipolar disorder, but I just don’t seem to follow a certain pattern. (*insert extremely sarcastic voice here*) I am lucky enough to have a rare form of bipolar that is rapid cycling between depression and angry/violent hypo mania. It is very complex and unpredictable. I have stabilized on medications, finally, but I still find that I have more bad days than good. There isn’t any more anger or violence, but now I am just overly sensitive and depressed more often than not. It is as though I am stabilized on depression. When I have the rare good day where I am able to defeat the monsters in my mind, I get this empowering feeling of hope. However, the good days seem to be so few and far between. I spoke with my psychologist on Monday and he agreed that this still wasn’t where I needed to be. He increased my antidepressant dose and (of course) gave me the whole “it will take time” spiel. It got me to thinking, like I had many times before, about having to wait weeks before being able to determine if a medication was going to be beneficial or not. Why have they not discovered an antidepressant that is more fast acting??! Seriously, how nice would it be if you could just take your medicine and it made you feel better within a few hours, like Advil for a headache?! Being the inquisitive person that I am, of course I began researching it. Now I have a new found respect for Dr. Carols Zarate. The man has dedicated decades of his life trying to develop fast-acting drugs in hopes to revolutionize depression treatment. Supposedly it could be developed by 2017 or 2018. How amazing would that be?! Just sitting here considering that… Mood disorders such as clinical depression and bipolar disorder are among the leading causes of disability worldwide. This would change the game! In the meantime… We just have to keep pushing ourselves to establish our own means to help us endure. I find that keeping myself busy with things that are meaningful to me, not just busy work, aids in keeping me from getting sucked into my own mind of madness. Everyone is unique though, what helps you?