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<Posted and Mailed> Thanks for posting your extensive odyssey with your husband (with BP I). I’m sure that many of us (and our partners) can relate to your experiences and recommendations. I greatly admire your persistence in standing by your mate through very difficult and challenging times. However there was one thing that I could not understand. It was your apparent reluctance to accept that your spouse has an illness that requires life-long medication. There are some wonderful meds available — why not explore (and experiment) to find the ones and dosages that may well help to significantly stabilize your husband? BTW I use the following: (1) Antidepressant — Effexor (2) Mood stabilizer — Neurontin (3) Anti-mania/psychotic — Klonopin All of the above are nothing less than medical miracles for me! Of course these may well not be effective for David. But these meds have proved effective for many of us. I suggest that you talk to your pdoc about making changes in his med cocktail to hopefully prevent the necessity of further hospitalizations. Since your SO has psychotic episodes, he might want to also take Zyprexa. IMO every person with a BP disorder needs to continue to take their meds — even when things are going well. A certain amount of the meds should always be in the system. I treat my symptoms by increasing and decreasing my meds according to how I feel. Some may understandably feel uncomfortable doing this on their own. However since David goes off his meds when things are going well and only resumes taking them when depressed or manic, isn’t he doing something similar — only more drastic? Some meds take a few weeks to become effective. Another aspect is that some meds may not be as effective as they were previously when a person resumes taking them again. In addition our brain’s neurochemistry can apparently change to such an extent that meds that once worked — are no longer effective. Thus we must again continue the search for new meds. There is Help and Hope out there! But each person must seek them out for themselves — and continue to do so. I wish you and David all the best from, James — * Since I do not get a complete Newsfeed, I would appreciate receiving * * a copy of any responding posts. Please also indicate if you are      * * posting as well as emailing me. Thanks for helping me out!           *

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Mental illness affects one in every four of us. When you look at that statistic, it can be very alarming. However scary mental illness may seem to be, there is one thing that I know for sure. I will never let any illness take me away from my spouse as long as I can do something about it. As long as I can fight for the one I love, I will do so. Marriage has become a thing of convenience and often left behind when it becomes something that requires work. But a real marriage, a true love, is worth work, and the benefits, without number. I have included the definition of manic depression in the preface so that you can become familiar with the affects it has on a person. Although you or your partner may not suffer from manic depression, it helps to understand to what we as a married couple are faced with. This guide is designed to be concise help and information for those of us who deal with mental illness. I made it a guide for couples, but it can also hold help for families as well. To be honest, people in general might find this book helpful when dealing with others, mentally ill or not. You will find out about my husband David and our family. David led a mentally stable life until the onset of manic depression in his early twenties. Up until this time, he was seemingly "normal" with no signs of mental illness. He had a booming lawn service with over 50 customers, and worked part time as well. But let’s just start at the beginning… (Manic Depression- also known as bipolar disorder. A person who’s moods can alternate from one extreme to another, during mania, there is little or no need for sleep. The person is very compulsive, and feels "the best they ever have". Elated even, almost like being on a high. But this will bottom out eventually and the person will become depressed. Not to be mistaken for the blues. This is real depression, the person will not even want to see the sun come up and will want to sleep most of the time. Nothing brings them joy and the sufferer often will think of suicide). Chapter One… The beginning David and I were like most young couples. We both had firey tempers and mood swings. Both our childhoods were filled with tragedy and triumph, but neither one of us knew, what we were about to encounter when David hit 22. It came like a thief in the night, not many warning signs, and from totally out of view, behind us. What I called a living nightmare, the doctors referred to as Manic Depression. David was in a GREAT mood. He would stay up all hours of the night, reading the bible. Becoming a Christian was the biggest thing that he ever did in his life, and he had the fire for God like no one I had ever seen before. I was raised in the Baptist church so I was used to the spiritual side of life, but to David, it was an awakening, a new beginning. A chance for him to become the father and finally husband that he had wanted to be. David and I weren’t married at the time. Although we had two small children and had lived together for five years. I still remember like it was yesterday, David down on his knees, asking me to be his wife. I was so shocked at what he was saying, I thought that we would never get married. Not for lack of commitment, it was always there. But for the lack of money. I was burned when I was two and received payments that would end if I married. David didn’t care, he wanted me to be his wife and that was that. I gladly accepted his sweet proposal, and we were married a week later at our church. The fire remained in David, we went to church three times a week. Never missing, unless one of the kids were sick. Scott then 5 and Sean 3 enjoyed their father being home for a change. He used to be on the go all the time cutting grass for his booming lawn service and working part time at the local Winn Dixie. But during the winter, he had off time and only did part time tractor work. We always seemed to make it, no matter how much or how little money we had. This is when things began to change. David became obsessed with world problems and reading the bible. He began to not eat, and things were scaring me. I had no idea what was wrong. I had never been around anything similar to this and we always had stayed to ourselves, so I didn’t know who to turn to. Most of the time when I mentioned it to his mother, she didn’t believe me. She would just say that David was upset, or that it was normal for people to feel this way from time to time. But I knew it was wrong, I knew something was happening that I couldn’t do a thing about. As David would read the bible, I would go outside and pray. I would beg God to please stop whatever was happening and please to let him be okay. It all came to a head in the end of February 1991, just three weeks after we married. David had been up for almost 5 days now. He had not eaten much, and was walking around barefoot. Something he never did in the summer, let alone the winter. Soon it was obvious, David was in a psychotic episode. He didn’t even realize that I was loading the kids up in the car and taking them to the neighbors, where I called for help. The day progressed with David getting tired of people trying to help him. He felt that the preacher and others who came to help were wrong, and at this point, he became violent. The police had to be called, we had no choice. David had no history of illness, so there was no doctor to call, no help available. After five days of laying in a condemned jail, David was placed in the hospital. At this point I was terrified. I had no idea what I could do to help him, or what I could say to make him want to see me again. The first thing he said to me was, "I want a divorce". It scared me to death. But later, he apologized and said that he was mad at me for calling the police. The treatment he received in jail was terrible. They sprayed him with water, and left him in a cell with no light. But he forgave me and realized that I was just trying to get him some help. After about 14 days, David was allowed to come home with a handful of pills. The doctors had told me that our situation was hopeless, that he would have to take the medication forever. Every where I went, I kept hearing the same thing. "He will have to take that medicine forever". This is the point in which I became a detective.. Chapter Two….. Society Doesn’t help Unfortunately society doesn’t seem to help too much when it comes to mental illness. The phrases, "Your’e crazy" or "She’s a nut", have become such latent terms that people don’t seem to realize what is actually going on for the mentally ill. Try putting yourself in their shoes for a day. What would you do, if all of the sudden without warning, you no longer had complete control over your thoughts and behavior? What would you do? Most of us have no idea. I for one am scared to death that something like this would happen to me. We have to learn to be a bit more understanding but it appears as though hardly anybody does. If you can just look at this as being no different from diabetes, or similar physical ailment, then maybe together we can start to understand and give respect to each other, instead of ridicule and name calling. The one thing that I never did, was make fun of David. How could I, or anyone for that matter. To see the anguish on his face, to know what kind of pain he was in, it was terrible. People don’t know how to react to this sort of thing. They would clam up or talk to David like he was an idiot. Still the whole time, all I could hear in my head was the voices of people who kept saying, "Medicine forever". That bothered me to no end. I couldn’t believe that David would have to take those medicines forever. I do understand that some people do have to take their medications, but for me, it was as if I knew that with enough love and determination and understanding of the illness itself, that we would be different. That David would be okay. Being bombarded with all the negativity I could stand. I began reading up on Mental Illness, Manic Depression and even Schizophrenia. David had several diagnoses and I thought best to learn about them all. He had made a few more trips back to the hospital and even had a severe bout with depression. I kept hearing that same dismal outcome. "Medicine forever". It had reminded me of something that I had went through with my son Sean. Sean had asthma, but I noticed that the only thing that the doctors would do is to treat the symptoms. With the proper research we found out that allergies were the underlying problem, so with that knowledge we were able to beat his asthma with 3 years of allergy shots. Remembering this, I thought, why not look at WHAT is causing David’s problems, instead of simply trying to treat his symptoms that stem from his problems. With that in mind and with the hand of his therapist, we began to wean David off of his medicine. As we began this slow process, I started to take sincere notice of things that would make David "fall back" so to speak. Chapter Three- Help out!! The biggest factor that aggravates Davids’ condition is stress. As a matter of fact, as long as David is living stress free, he is in perfect health. Although this is the optimum way of life, not just for those with mental illness, it is not very realistic. Stress has become an every day factor for all of us. Coping with it seemingly makes all the difference in David. At this point in our lives. David is earning a 3.5 grade point average at college, studying computer programming. Something that we wouldn’t have thought about when this first happened. I found that the following steps can help when stress is a problem. 1. Know your limits- If you feel that going on a family outing would be too much for you or your partner, then don’t go. Have all members of the family understand that right now isn’t the best time for being around others. Limit visitors that are coming into the household. For weeks on end we had company- kids, neighbors, etc.. it was … read more »

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