STEPHEN FRY

I've tried all of the above except ECT which has never been offered. I find meds are the most important, and CBT (I've also have DBT) very helpful indeed, but it would have been useless without the meds.

When I was an inpatient I took part in a fish oil study. I had to swallow 9 capsules morning and night. It did nothing.

Hospital made me worse. You go in there wanting to be helped but they do little more than feed and water you and mostly stop you doing damage to yourself, although I have to say they did a terrible job with me and I self-harmed brutally or attempted suicide pretty much daily or twice daily. I deteriorated terribly and attempted suicide about 300 times. (Obviously at a time I was so ill I couldn't put together much of a plan, though I did die twice). OK I was devious and far smarter that any of the nurses charged with my care, but how difficult is it to lock a door or search a room?

Mixed-KSx

Hehe, I have a dumb psych NOW.

Yes I've seen the Electroboy website, and I've read Andy's book. It was quite a read. It would make a good film.

KSx

3) Flow-charting your cycles (not sure how that helped)


It doesn't help you deal with your problems directly. It just helps you to establish a pattern and see things you may never have noticed otherwise.

i did that with a counselor for quite a while.
the clinic i went to wasn't able to diagnose me with anything, but she thought this would be helpful regardless.

it seemed tedious at first. to stop all the time and think, am i feeling a 2 or a 7??

but it made everything seem so practical... and revealed that, at the time, i kept getting really low about every 2 weeks to 20 days. so when it happened again, i could remind myself.

I've known a lot of people who've had ECT from my time on psych wards. Some are completely wiped out by it for a while, some pop along and have it, then come and have a ciggie and cuppa like nothing's happened. ALL had memory problems after.

I've seen it have no effect on people (as in not helping their symptoms), and I've seen it work. But in the people I saw it work, it wasn't because their problems had gone away, it was because they couldn't remember them. For example one woman who was devastated by the death of her husband, as depressed as anyone I have ever seen. After 6 months on the ward she agreed to ECT. After 6 sessions she was happy as can be. But she couldn't remember her husband or that he was dead.

I wouldn't have it.

KSx

That's frightening. I wouldn't want to lose my memories like that. I don't think forgetting is a great way of dealing with pain, especially as it could be devestating when you get your memories back.

It's been a while since I watched the doc. so I'm not sure whether Homeopathic remedies were mentioned.
I've been taking homeopathic remedies for a couple of years but recently took myself off them after watching "Enemies of Reason".

I still haven't decided whether the benefits that I thought I've derived from them are pure placebo effect but I've been off them for about a month now and I don't think I'm any worse than I was before, but then I'm not sure I'd be the first to know if I wasn't

And I've also been watching my diet too, so that may be where I've benefited.

Ruthy you have to be careful with homeopathic stuff. E.g. St John's Wort can cause mania. I think that if you have an illness as serious a bipolarity, you need to trust your doctors. (Can't believe I just wrote that considering recent treatment I have had, but there we go).

KSx
That might explain a lot. Before I went to the homeopath, just after I came off Paxil they were still only treating me for depression, so I tried St John's Wort for a while. At that time the only contra-indications I knew about were for people with hypertension and heart problems.
It was not long after that when I started to have really bad mixed episodes with supersonic mind-racing that I went back to the doctor saying that I thought that I had Bipolar. It was while I was waiting for her referral to the Psych Nurse to come through (over a year, bloody NHS! ) that I consulted a qualified homeopath.

Technically St John's Wort is herbal rather than homeopathic but she does sometimes prescribe herbal stuff. Though to be fair she does know her onions as it were and she did make sure I'd come off the St. John's Wort before she would prescribe anything else, but she didn't explain why.

I don't think Boots had started doing their "DIY" homeopathic range then but I don't like the idea of it. I'm not sure that I would trust myself to prescribe what I needed self-help style. Too many years of self medicating with alcohol!

PS I've just been reading through the list and I don't remember the Flow-charting bit; I think I need to watch it again.