Eek ack wowza! It has been a year and half since I have written a blog post, way too long! This past July I was laid off, it was actually a good thing. I was hating my job and hating my manager, it was hard not to walk out with a smile. I started a new job in September, I am a Team Supervisor in a call centre. I have a lot of a call centre experience and managing/mentoring people is something I have wanted to do and have indirectly done in my past roles. In the four months I have been at the new job, it has been intense. A lot of things are broken, including staff from past poor management. There is a lot to fix and some days it has been overwhelming, but change is happening, slowly, but it is happening. We have a new Manager starting and I know her from one of my previous jobs and from what I remember she was amazing, so hopefully she still is!
Another big change is, I finally got in to see a Psychiatrist this past September. My doctor had referred me back in March 2014 and he finally followed up and they didn't get the original referral, so that is why it took so long to get in; better late than never. The Psychiatrist is the cutest little old man I have ever seen. He is shorter than me, I am 5 Feet 6 Inches, he wears these old style suits with a bow tie, I swear he must be in his 80's. I want to put him in my pocket. He had me fill out a bi-polar screening test, I selected yes to everything. He looked at it and said, you should not have been on Zoloft at all. I said that makes sense, a week before my episode back in February, my Zoloft dose was increased. He said that would do it.
He prescribed me 600 mg of lithium. I started taking it right away and had my blood taken a week later. I had my follow up appointment with him and he asked me how I was feeling. I told him I had never felt better. For over two years I had been going to my family doctor repeatedly complaining of severe fatigue. All I did was sleep, sleep and more sleep. I went from seeing my friends multiple times in a week, to once a week on the weekend. As soon as I started taking Lithium my energy levels were fixed, I told him I didn't nap once this past week. He was happy for me and also surprised that I was noticing a change so quickly.
He upped my dose to 900 mg a day to get the blood levels up to the therapeutic range. The next follow up appointment he said that my blood levels were in the therapeutic range and that we would stick with the 900 mg dose. He asked me if I was still feeling good and I said that I was. I let him know that my roommate, who is also one of my best friends, said she had noticed changes in me. My friend noticed that I was coming out of my room a lot more, I was more social with her and her husband. She also said that I was posting on Facebook much more and that it was quite funny, he gave me a weird look when I told him this. He was probably thinking what's a Facebook.
I went to my pharmacy to fill the prescription and the Pharmacist asked how the medication was going. I said really well, that I hadn't felt this energetic in such a long time. She looked at me concerned, and then I realized and said oh I mean normal amounts of energy, not too much energy haha. She laughed and said oh good, and she was really happy that the medication was working so well for me. I love my pharmacy, everyone who works there knows my name, they are always so friendly and genuinely care.
It has been a frustrating few years of trying different anti-depressants and having various doctors not take me seriously because I don't fit the DSM Manual criteria perfectly or because I am so self aware. Fingers crossed the Lithium continues to work for me, and a big hallelujah for finally getting to see a doctor who got me onto the correct medication.
No comments:
Post a Comment