Basic description of my rapid cycling bipolar disorder:
I go through an up-to-down cycle every 15 days. So each week is either up or down. I can feel the change coming over the period of one day.
More details about my rapid cycling:
My psychiatrist said the best treatment for bipolar disorder is to "live a boring life". This minimizes the stresses that make the amplitude of the cycles worse.
When I was working, the managers said I could "get more done with my little finger than others could do full time." That was due to the hypomanic energy that I could draw upon.
During my down times at work I was probably able to realistically see what was wrong with my job, and I was able to see how to improve my own work, which I would then do during my next round of manic energy.
Lessons Learned
- I wait for the up time to get things done. During the down time I think about what I want to do next.
- Keep frozen dinners in the house to eat during the down time.
More I want to share about rapid cycling:
I worked as a research scientist before diagnosis. I thought the extreme happiness when my theories and models worked was due to my success as a scientist, and that the down time was just part of reviewing my work and seeing how I could improve my theories and models. Now I see it was my illness.
My cycles' severity is:
enough to affect my ability to function during my down times and to work at a paid job.
Over time, my rapid cycling is getting:
The amplitude of my cycle is less now that I do not have the stress of working, but I have not found a medication to stop the cycling. I find that antidepressants (Effexor and Wellbutrin) help reduce the severity of the down time.
Rapid cycling has kept me from:
My rapid cycling has kept me from continuing to work as a scientist. I changed jobs thinking the severe moods were due to the job. The new job showed me that the strong emotions followed me -- that they were the illness made worse by the stress of my jobs.
