Today is NOT my friend!

[Anonymous]

I’m so glad there is a venting thread because no one else really seems to understand!!

My meds just aren’t working for me anymore, after only 6 weeks. I abstained from them over the weekend to clear my system and see if a 2 day break would make them work better during the week while I was at work. I couldn’t believe how awful I felt! I never realized how miserable I was before going on the meds, but after living life as a “normal” person and enjoying my work, projects, friends, family, etc, for 6 weeks, I was absolutely MISERABLE over the weekend. All I did was sleep. I couldn’t focus on anything. It was just…there is no word.

The beginning of the week was a little bit better, but yesterday and today are pretty much back to the old me. This morning I want to scream at just about every doctor I work with and crawl in a hole and cry. I think I’m doing a pretty good job of disguising it, but I just HATE feeling this way. I understand that everyday isn’t going to be all butterflies and rainbows, and it’s normal to have highs and lows, but I did have highs and lows on the meds…this was not what it felt like. The way I feel today is hopeless.

I’ve made an appointment with my doctor tomorrow to discuss trying a new med; the problem is that he is a 2nd year Resident. He’s awesome and supportive and the best doctor I’ve seen in awhile. Unfortunately, he has to run everything by the attending doctor. Tomorrow, the attending is one of the doctors I used to see and stopped because he has a bad habit of not listening to patients. So, I’m borrowing trouble and I am afraid the attending won’t approve the med change because he seems to think I don’t know my body.

The GOOD news is that I have an appt with the Psych NP next Tuesday. If this happens, I am going to ask her to take over my ADHD care because I want to be seeing someone who understands and will be supportive. My family doctor is, but the attendings might not always be.

In the meantime…I’m trying REALLY HARD to abstain from my desire to run far far away from my workplace…

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[billd]

I still live what you feel now………. STILL waiting to see what they’ll do for me.

After the neuro-psych appointment and final diagnosis – it was kicked back to some super-nurse who is 25 cents short of being a doctor, and that appointment isn’t until the end of the month.

So, I got 3 to diagnose me, the final really big one was 3 weeks ago or so, and I still must wait.

but, there’s folks here who feel how you do, and have been exactly there – just hang out here, remember to breath, don’t smack anyone while waiting, and hope for the best.

There’s always sunshine after rain……

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[Robbo]

Thanks a lot billd, I like what you said, it applies to me too. And I took a good deep breath right after you said remember to breath, in high school my best friend used to always say “don’t forget to breath” you see we smoked a heck of a lot of pot. (early 80’s) In hindsight I’ll bet some days I got so high I would sit there like a stone, (that’s why they call it “stoned” cuz folks like me become as useful and motionless as a stone…) So maybe he noticed me sitting there um… stoned, so stoned I may have been forgetting to breath, and he would forget to remind me until later when I took off. That’s when he’d always say, “later dude, don’t forget to breath”

Breath in breath out, heck man that’s a new mantra I can use when I need ta mellow out or try to remember something. Has anyone else noticed that they sometimes tend to hold their breath when trying to remember something? I noticed that about me years ago, so when I’m stumped about the name of that red stuff I like to put on my fries.. ummm oh yeah ketchup! I just take a deep breath and then walah! I remember the simple common everyday word that just seems to have dissapeared (dang, I destroyed that word with my spelling so bad, spell check couldn’t figure out what I was trying to spell! that’s funny) from my vocabulary when I’m on the spot ,or worse, at a doctors appointment trying to get 25 minutes of health care squeezed into about 10… grrrr.

whoops, short post made long again. sorry gang.

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[Robbo]

Suzybear78, I totally understand the “there is no word” about how you’re feeling. I can’t possibly know exactly how you feel, that’s always true, we could be exactly the same in every way, yet still experience it differently. But Pain, this I do understand. The fear of “how much worse can this pain get” is an awful thing to let run around inside my head. Please remember

This too shall pass

By the time I finally watched that ADD and loving it documentary on PBS the third time and made the call, watched the DVD a bunch of times, like seriously , about ten. And I started to admit I needed some help; at age 46. It wasn’t that bad, but as soon as I admitted that I had a problem I needed help with. Whammo! The symptoms got worse, like a bad complex gone wild. I think maybe a lot of people go through this process with lot’s of different problems.

I’ve managed to not die self medicating through extreme mountain biken, surfing, etc., but let me tell you, I’ve come much much too close, not actually suicide attempts, or plans, but living a very dangerous lifestyle. I still have the cover of an old surfer magazine from 94 that says “The Joy of Fear” with a picture of a tiny little surfer on an enormous mountain of raging unimaginably huge wave [the surfer just looks small cuz the wave is about a 70 foot face…it’s stuck on my fridge next to my favorite place, the stove. Run a search on mavericks, or monster mavericks, for pictures. 94 was an epic year, unforgettable… moments of bliss mixed with extreme terror, doom, and so much adrenaline my tongue would sometimes go freakin numb!

I’m lucky and very grateful to be alive. The lyrics of a song come to mind. “God takes care of old folks and fools”, I used to be a fool. I’m less foolish now.

It freaks me out when all the new commercials for new antidepressant medz come on the telly, they always warn about how some medications are actually causing people to become suicidal. Please remember I’m not a trained therapist of any kind, I’ve had tons of good therapy. Fortunately.

Here’s why I think some people have a horrible time when they start new medz, it’s because we sometimes stop using all the coping skills we’ve used, (the healthy ones, not chasing adrrenaline) and expect the medication to do all the work. (we don’t do this on purpose) For me the work is reading here, A LOT, and re-reading. watching the video’s. I will print out the stuff I’ve said I would print out about a week ago as soon as I’m done here. Procrastination, and apathy can kill us while were still alive. Make sense? Alive, but not alive, mentally paralyzed… the videos here, They’re not therapy, but in this day and age they are an excellent resource for us, very therapeutic. You are not alone. Many people here care about your welfare and know how you’re feeling very much. Your experience is adding to the value of this web site. Please keep sharing and let us watch you recover from this awful can of worms that most of “generation X” seems to have. Some a lot, some a little. As we get older so many of what people call “senior moments” are actually, maybe… heck I don’t know, untreated ADD, and other related problems?. We all have crosses to bear, but the real truth is that life is not fair, some of us have huge heavy ones, others, well heck their life is a dang cake walk. Not all suffering is optional, most of it is. I.M.H.O Pain is not optional, just the suffering alone. We don’t have to do that. Pick up that 10 thousand pound phone and call a good listener, you know at least a couple, do what I try if you can‘t think of anyone really good, call any friend who isn‘t a gossip, say “I need someone to listen, not try to fix me“ (if that is the case) just call someone and tell them what you need from the friendship today.

I’m not an expert, but I’m feeling like helping you is really helping me at the very least. So thanks. I couldn’t sleep last night, got an appointment today, appointments stress me out. Deadlines are a terrible experience for me, and this one isn’t even very important. At all!!! It just upsets me tons when I’m late because I forgot something and have to get back outa my car, go back inside, the neighbors see me yet again making a trip back into my apartment for something I forgot. Ugh, I care too much about what people think, it’s safe to be myself here though. Of that I’m fairly sure, I know I have to take the risk and really let you guys see as much of me as I can stand to show. Maybe in about 10 years some of you guys may actually get to know me. It’s possible. But my head says “they’ll reject you, they won’t like you, you talk too much…” on and on. On to another imaginary onandonandonanonymous meeting hehe. Just needed to make a lil joke, I got a lil too serious there didn’t I?

Ack!!! Sometimes the clock speeds up lak crayzee man! sheesh

Peace new friend.

obbo

Just a quick PS, in my experience. Sometimes a N.P. or Nurse Practitioner, can be as good or better than a regular general practice doctor. They cost our insurance less, and many times spend that extra 15 minutes that a patient sometimes needs. The general practice doctors are under extreme pressure to see a gazzilian patients a day just to keep up with the demand for treatment in this quickly overpopulating world we’re surviving in. And to pay the bills like malpractice insurance etc.

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[munchkin]

I had a rough weekend too. Last week, I just felt like the meds weren’t doing anything… Things just weren’t materializing into actual positive results for my situation – in fact I felt like the little progress made in my excitement of diagnosis, and first couple weeks of meds was totally undone, and everything regressed back to less than zero. I had to do something, and I don’t have another Psychiatrist appt for a month, so I decided to look at the “holistic” thing again. What was I doing, now that I’m on meds, to make use of this tool? I seriously have issues with having given up on trying to do stuff, and a rationized belief that how my life has been is “who I am” and screw everyone if they are so uptight and “A-type.” Mainly I believed my problem was about who i was associating with – not anything I was doing/not doing. So having this new perspective where I supposedly can do stuff, is a huge upset in who I am and how I spend my time. There are deeply ingrained habits of doing things that just keep my mind busy and thoughts of impending problems and consequences at bay.

So – I actually have tried to let go of those comforting crutches for windows of time and actually attempt to do things that seem ridiculous to me like trying to organize my stuff, or housework or bills or organizing my desk at work… Stuff that to me is monstrous and pointless and, I don’t know what… Just trying to build a little momentum… I’m reading “More Attention, Less Deficit” by Ari Tuckman, and just spending a little time on it each day – no matter how small – is helping me beat down the hopeless feelings that have built up over so many years of failures, feeling misunderstood, trying to believe it’s my fault because that way I would have control to fix it, lowering expections, raising expectations, trying to explain why other peoples solutions don’t work for me, and yes – I really did try it – and here’s why it didn’t work – and the rolled eyes of people, and patronizing speeches about how they motivate themselves, and how simple it really is… and just keep up with stuff and then it won’t build up like that…

Anyway… I’m making the decision that none of that matters, and I will need to get out of my comfort zone and actually try to do stuff all over again, and it will be just as hard as ever, only this time, I will have a shot at succeeding because I am aware of what’s tripping me up, and I don’t have to come up with all these bizarre explanations, rationalizations, etc. that I’ve done for so long. I just have to “do it” – yeck, that’s the same crap that’s always failed, but I have to believe that this time might be different. A tough leap of faith, but I’ve been trying this week, and despair is becoming less… I’ve been trying to pause, and evaluate – is what I’m doing right now appropriate for my overall situation and priorities? Lots of times it makes no difference… I’m gaining immediate emotional relief by doing some random activity that keeps me distracted from worrying. But… a few times a day, it’s working – I can actually shift to a higher priority task and get some progress on it. Even being able to do that a few times a day makes a difference… If I can do that even once a day, it’s a foundation to build on…

I guess there’s going to be good weeks and bad weeks, but I’m really, really hoping that I can stay the course. I have to deal with choices about which meds, which doses, do I have the right doc’s in place? Is my health OK – if I’m not eating or sleeping how can I tell what’s up with the meds? How does the female hormone situation play in? How do my past experiences and deeply held rationalizations play in? What kind of emotional roller coaster is my spouse going through with what to expect from me? What is reasonable to expect? What is my true personality without the deafening noise of all the criticizing voices in my head? It’s going to take time for these things to get sorted out, but I’m going to keep trying. As I said – despair is less… that can’t be bad…

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[billd]

>>whoops, short post made long again. sorry gang. <<

Geesh, you might be ADD or something……. LOL – I used to be the king of long posts – until i came here. I’m not even qualified to shine the king’s shoes after seeing the posts here. I used to get kidded in other forums about my 200 page posts – but here, I SO fit in! HA.

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[Robbo]

Munchkin,

It was a good read to read your post, I don’t know if it’s the change in meds, the fact that I’ve been writing for about 6 hours, or the three sips of coffee I’ve had in the last two hours, actually half an hour ago I drank a little less than half what was left after the first sip. I’m trying low doses of really good coffee. It’s difficult cuz it tastes so dang good.

Anyways, it was easy and smooth to read your post, and helpful, encouraging, and just cool I guess. To read, all the time I have to go back and re read stuff, that only happened twice near the end of your post. Amazing. Thanks, I hope you’re doing well. Sometimes I think if I have too much to say about what someone else says it can make it difficult to come here and just vent. I hope I didn’t do that with my last post to Suzybear78.

I’m sorry if I did that Suzybear78, I’ve got fairly thick skin, so please let me know if you felt any kind of a negative reaction to so much commentary about what you had to say.

Take it easy, n I hope people keep coming back here. It all helps and I try to spend more time reading than writing. That just became one of my top goals or guidelines for this site.

b-bo I have to let a little creativity out every time I write, so I’ll write all the different nicknames and online “handles” that I’ve used throughout the years. Turbo is a funny one. I wonder why people could call someone like me turbo? why not turmoil? hehe. turible. ***chuckle chuckle*** Turble, that’s how Shakile Oneil (forgive my spelling plz) says terrible, hehe – turble

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[Robbo]

I have a post I’m working on about writing, I think I have a solution less frustrating than unplugging my computer.

I finished this one first, I call it (in the folder of first drafts) ADD is a can of worms, ugly, nasty, important, and good worms.

Dang, I’ve been writing for a few hours I think, I need to eat. Don’t want to, I ain’t freaking hungry! Why does the medication I take steal my dang appetite?, I’ve been taking add medication for about 8 years and didn’t even freaking know it! Crap! What the heck do I do with that new information? Sh&t! I started taking Wellbutrin about 8 years ago, and prozac. Instead of paxil. I switched to paxil only a couple months after I tried prozac. Prozac wacked me out way to much. It was like rocket fuel to me. Paxil worked for a long time, but the real reason I had grief, never left. I’m not really depressed any more. I’ve learned to deal with the rejection that happens to people with adhd. It still bumms me out, but I get over it. There’s a difference between legitimate grief, sadness. and depression in my opinion. We get stuck feeling sad and that’s depression, I know a little bit about how SSRI’s work, but I don’t think any psychiatrist truly knows how or why they work. I hope to find out more. I can’t figure out why prozac works good now, but was too much more me 18 years ago.

I know it’s weird that I trusted the lady in some hospital that changed my medication for depression from paxil to prozac and Wellbutrin. I was in the process of trying to keep my entire freakin right leg because the first SIX OR SEVEN doctors wanted to amputate the whole thing. I had an abscess deep inside my right hip. It was depressing being in that particular hospital, surrounded by old folks dieing from pressure sores. Extreme problems with understaffed nursing, I mean 10 and 12 to 1 patient to nurse ratios. I later found out about how awful the reputation of Kindred hospitals were. I don’t care if they sue me, I don’t have much to sue me for anyway. I know medical/Medicare stopped funding them many years ago, it was in the paper in Modesto Ca. That was the Modesto hospital. I was in the one in the Bay area of Ca. 3 times for 2 months each. I got to keep my leg, it would hurt even if they removed it! That’s called “phantom pain” and I’m afraid that might make me more crazy than I already am. It scares people enough to see a person in a wheelchair all of a sudden. I don’t notice any more. But once in a while I do. No problem. And for the record, it’s always okay to get the door for a person in a wheelchair, it’s polite to ask first. Sometimes when a person, especially if they’re 31. prideful and newly disabled. Sometimes people Will get angry, but give em a break, and just ask next time. I’m always grateful and say so when people get a door for me. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. BTW surviving my stays at KinDREAD hospital made me stronger. I got some good support from a few good friends and one excellent girlfriend after. So it was a growing experience.

I keep trying to write to post on this web site without talking about the fact that I’m already disabled to begin with. That’s just ridiculous. I wanted to name this post, “the beauty of ADD” only because the fact that some of us are very memory impaired keeps us from lying, we talk faster than we think, or vice versa, I don’t know. You guys probably know what I mean. Of course this is the Internet, and I never expect people to be totally honest. I don’t know if that’s possible because we don’t often even know what the truth is, all there is, is what’s true today. Then we grow and we change.

There is no box, that was the original idea when I decided to get my first tatoo. It changed of course. I draw on my shoes, and on my jeans a lot, that washes off. I only have one tatoo, and I’ll always like it. Love it!

I decided not to edit out the reference to the wheelchair under me from my posts here. That would just be dumb, and I would feel like I’m not being honest. I just don’t want to be judged based on that simple tiny little detail about who the heck I really am. Who I am changes every freaking minute of every day. The permanent changes happen slower, n we call that growth usually. Sometimes it’s the growth of some kind of sickness unfortunately. That’s why it’s such a crazy world, we’re all growing, some in the good way, some not. I like the saying. “If you’re ripe you’re rotten, if you’re green you’re growing” In other words, humility pays. I’m only 46 years old in time. Not maturity. I’m done figuring out how old I am in any other way, that’s either minimizing my problems, denying them, or boasting. It’s all bull to me. I’m just 46. I use a wheelchair cuz I was stopped at a red light on my Yamaha XT 250 enduro motorcycle, ready to pop a wheelie as usual (probably) I don’t remember anything. Lost about 10 days of memory. I found out 15 years and 2 days later, (last month) that if you get knocked out and don’t remember any part of what happened after, that is a concussion. I thought a concussion was some kind of crack, or even a hairline fracture in the skull. I was 31 at the time, and I remember I had no broken bones, the swelling from the pickup truck that hit me from behind at T-8 of my spinal cord, that’s about where the bottom of our sternum is. Cut off the circulation long enough to kill off most of my spinal cord. If I lived about 7 or 8 hundred years my spinal cord will grow back is what the doctor told me. Why? Like that’s information I can really use. My first memories were awful. In the hospital in this crazy bed that kept tilting left and right. And arguing with some lady who insisted that I was in the hospital and was never gonna walk again. Wham! Another day or two asleep and I’d wake up freaked out from the extremely vivid morphine dreams. I won’t talk about them, too dang weird, and really pretty dang sad. I don’t want to write about that. I haven’t cried for many many years about this, and I’m not going to manufacture my own misery just because people might be curious. Trust me, it’s not very interesting anyway. Finding out none of that stuff never happened really sucked Tons and tons and tons.

So there I spilled my beans, they scatter… I have bad pain, tried pot, too addictive. It’s not an option. It does indeed work the best, but the side affects are the worst. I can’t get anything done, I’ve taken marinol, that line “spilled the beans’ reminds me of the generic marinol spell check automatically fixes some of my spelling, it thinks I’m saying donation grrr, I outsmarted it my adding a semicolon and a comma with the word then clicking on “Add” when spell check tried to guess what I’m trying to spell, then delete the semicolon and comma…, actually I discovered it hehe, so dronabininol is the drug, the’re perfectly round and escape very quickly when you drop them. Grrrrr. I don’t have kids, or a pet that might eat these little brown balls, so I’ll leave then “escaped” hehe. they don’t make you stoned. But if you take a high enough dose to help with pain, you get the same darn miserable side affects. So I take half what I was taking about a year n a half ago, and I don’t get “high”, or stoned, but It might be mellowing me out a little bit. I will cut back a little bit more on the dosage. The psychiatrist approved my idea of slowly cutting back on the Wellbutrin, it was making me too dang hyper. She also said “I don’t like the Marinol” but didn’t ask me to stop taking it fortunately. It does help with my awful stomach problems, a little with the appetite. But I’m not sure it’s worth the cost. I’ve been taking that about a month now, and I’m not sure it’s worth taking. Too much controversy, and if I can’t be sure it’s helping why take it? This web site is helping the most. I’m still not to the depression stage of accepting my add symptoms. That really looks dumb on paper. Crap!

I wish I could get better guidance from all the different kinds of doctors I see. There are too many specializations in medicine today. It’s necessary because health care is so very difficult and complicated. I think it’s greed that drives on the desperate need for general practice doctors, and not specialists. It’s likely that I don’t have all the facts, just my many years experience across the spectrum of healthcare depending on who your HMO is, and basically how much money you have. That’s why I come across so very grateful on this web site, I am grateful!!! Period. I’m grateful my general practice doctor never chose to specialize, He helps tons and tons of low income folks. Works his dang butt off. And takes good care of himself too. I’m extremely lucky when I stand back and look at all my experience with the many different kind of doctors I’ve had to deal with. Some of them would have been sued if I didn’t have a brain. In the end, it’s not likely they would learn a lesson anyway. unless they had true evil/malice in the way they practiced medicine, I think it’s just dumb to sue a doctor. We pay for the malpractice insurance in the end.

It will take time to figure out if the marinol is helping or not, I seriously doubt medical marijuana can be medicine for add. More likely it’s the cause! I’m all questions still. At first I thought they might be helping me by mellowing me out, I know one gal who uses pot for her adhd, but I don’t know if she has actually been diagnosed. She never returns my dang phone calls! She uses a vaporizer, I tried it one time, and I will never ever understand how that could help a person with adhd. It’s sounds like plain insanity. I’m not even sure the (darn, I don’t know what mistake I made there, missed it while proofreading the first time)

Wow, I deleted a lot, the very long and entertaining part of “the making of” Star Wars is an excellent education for pretty much any kind of art in my opinion. I’ll just post this and watch some more of that. I have to watch educational stuff over and over, and again some more. A lot.

“Do or do not, there is no try” -Yoda-

P.S. this post is one third the original size. That’s a decent amount of progress… (this next part added after I copy n pasted this) actually the first draft was 35.9 oops 39.5 kb’s this one is 32, so it’s more like just a little bit smaller. Yoda’s advice is very difficult to follow. dyslexia is a pain in the butt. I just left it cuz I’m fed up with fixing my mistakes. just like that sentence near the end that just stopped… I could check the un-edited folder, but time, it’s not my friend usually.

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[Robbo]

hehe, thanks billd, I think… ya made me laugh at myself, That’s good. I usually don’t wear shoes, but I should shine your shoes for having the patience to read my ramblin. After I hit send I freaked out a little, cuz even though I tried to make it shorter, it’s still SO DANG LONG, I don’t know how I feel. Whatever I’m feeling, it ain’t fun. It’s embarrassing. And I too have had to accept a lot of not always nice critical comments about my long long posts. I’ll do a bunch more reading tonight, n watch more of the videos. My next brain doctor apt. isn’t until December! That’s a freaking long dang time.

Nasty can of worms. Ugly. not fun. I have an image of a Peanuts (Snoopy, Charlie Brown, you know…) comic strip in my head. It’s one of Snoopy on a rainy day, walking down the sidewalk trying not to step on all the worms! in 6th grade I remember literally falling down curled up and laughing about that. The fright on his face as he jumped in the air looking down was a gut cruncher. Without my sense of humor I would be a miserable dude indeed.

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[Anonymous]

“Do or do not, there is no try” -Yoda-

Robbo, that might be the single best piece of advice. Sometimes it’s easy to beat around the bush, but most of the time it is best to look at it in black and white terms like that.

Also, I’m seeing a Nurse Practitioner at the Psych group and she is great. I actually talked to my doctor and he made the comment that if the medicine continues to “fade out”, then it’s likely that I’m not ADHD. I’m not sure I agree with that, but he did suggest that I have the Psych group take over my care on this issue because they are so much more familiar with it. Which is precisely what I did. The Nurse Practitioner didn’t seem see any red flags about the meds not working suddenly, she just suggested trying something different and also reminded me that it can take awhile to find the right med and dose for me.

The bad week last week continued on to this week, and I’m having a really difficult time “breathing” *lol* And most of the things I get so worked up about are really pretty trivial. Lucky for me, tomorrow is my last day, then I get a 4 vacation.

Munchkin – I have put the Ari Tuckman book on my wish list. I’ll be purchasing it at first opportunity. Thanks for mentioning it.

I’m sorry this post is so…well…ADHD-ish. I’m just jumping from thought to thought. The NP is having me try Vyvanse, she said she has several patients on it and it works very good for them. Perhaps it’ll be better for me than the Concerta was. If not, she’ll put me back on the concerta with a higher dose. She is also changing my anti-depressant from Lexapro to Effexor, which stimulates the Norepinephrine and can give an extra little bump on the ADHD front.

I also plan to invest in a hour-by-hour day planner. That seems to help keep me on task when I have a visual like that. In the meantime, I’m going to try to take several deep breaths before I slap the 3rd year Residents in the face. *haha*

Thanks for the support guys! It helps knowing that people can understand what I’m going through.

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