I saw my psychiatrist again on Tuesday, she took one look at me and raised her eyebrow and after a five minute conversation she said I was becoming manic. I asked her why she thought that and she replied: "You have cut all your hair off, you are unable to stop bouncing your leg, you're sitting forward in your seat as though you are about to sprint away, you're talking a mile a minute, you're switching subjects at random... shall I continue?"
I confessed to her that as well as reducing the anti-psychotic I had secretly halved my Lamictal dose too, but going off it had made me feel so much better that I wasn't prepared to go back on again. She challenged the fact that reducing my mood stabilizer had made me feel "better" suggesting that perhaps it had just made me hypomanic.
We discussed an action plan in case the mania escalated and how to recognize the red flags of when the hypomania was becoming a problem - ie reckless/dangerous behavior, paranoia, behavior that could affect work or social interactions. I agreed that if these red flags appeared then I would increase my Lamictal dose again.
She also gave me sleeping pills which I agreed to take, but only if I had less than 3hrs sleep for two nights in a row - they do put me to sleep but they also give me such a terrible hangover the next day that I am unable to function let alone drive the kids the 20km round trip to the school bus at 7.30am!
So I have another psychiatrist appointment next month which is good, but she said I could call up and she would fit me in in if things escalated in the meantime. She is very hard to get in to and books out 6 months or more in advance, luckily I thought ahead enough to make a bunch of future appointments a while back so I am not left out in the cold in the middle of a mood episode.
I guess I know that I have hit hypomania but to admit it is admitting that I really do have bipolar, something I desperately want to be in denial about right now.
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