Coping strategies, early detection and prevention

schrodingers_cat_lives · #1 8th July 2012, 04:00 PM

What have you learned to cope?
I wanted this thread to be for sharing any coping strategies/skills you have learned through out the years, either from experience, therapy or specific research sources.

I'm trying to be more aware of the early onset of symptoms, learn to better identify them and figure out practical coping strategies before the episode gets out of control in order to implement some early preventative measures.

I would love to hear what you have learned as far as coping skills, identifying triggers/flags and things you have done to help lessen the impact of the episodes in the earlier stages.

Does anyone here track their moods, cycles, episodes? Do you feel that helps?
How has therapy, if at all, helped you with coping and managing when the episodes do occur? What kind of therapy have you had or found helpful? For example: cognitive therapy? psycho dynamic etc. What about group therapy? Anyone here tried group therapy? If so, has that been helpful...if so, why?

I feel like my episodes are becoming more frequent and therefore constantly interrupting my life and since my experience with medical treatment hasn't been very good, i could use all the help i can get and would really appreciate your input as to what has successfully worked for you. I just feel like this disorder has exponentially taken over my life and i need all the input/advice/info i can get. Links and info. pages appreciated as well.

rossignol · #2 12th July 2012, 06:49 AM

I had signs when I was a child that I am bipolar. I would bite when I was happy, wet the bed, not be in control of my emotions, have nervous ticks and habits, feel like the world was on my shoulders.... etc.

If I had a child who showed symptoms I would get them into cognitive therapy. Because of my responses to life, I put myself deeper into situations that made my life more stressful and my illness grew.

When I couldn't manage life anymore and couldn't cover up my illness, I was forced to get help, only after I made a mess of it. I found group therapy helpful after I shut myself out of life and people for so long. It helped me begin to relate to others again.

madison1101 · #3 12th July 2012, 01:43 PM

The coping skills I have learned in therapy are visualization exercises, Mindfulness Meditation, deep breathing, and exercise. Walking is a cheap way to exercise. All of these behaviors help my brain produce the feel good chemicals I need to stay stable. If you have a Smart phone, there is a Mindfulness Meditation app you can download.

Hope this helps.

TheMainException · #4 12th July 2012, 11:05 PM

Sleep has been the biggest help in my life. Getting solid sleep is one of the foremost ways to prevent mood changes, I've found. However, it doesn't stop them all. Going to bed and getting up at the same times are a good start though.

I do keep a mood chart, just a really simple thing where I give my mood and productivity a number, write the hours I slept, and a little blurb about some specifics I want to make note of...that way, when I'm depressed, it doesn't feel like an overwhelming task. This can be a great aid in figuring out triggers and early warning signs. I consider it the second most important thing in combatting the sway of moods in my life.

I've only recently started counseling for bipolar, so I'm not sure if it's helpful yet. I did get the bipolar workbook (you can probably get it online for not too much money), and that's been cool to check out and use, so i suggest taking a look at that.

schrodingers_cat_lives · #5 13th July 2012, 05:43 AM

Originally Posted by TheMainException

Sleep has been the biggest help in my life. Getting solid sleep is one of the foremost ways to prevent mood changes, I've found. However, it doesn't stop them all. Going to bed and getting up at the same times are a good start though.

I do keep a mood chart, just a really simple thing where I give my mood and productivity a number, write the hours I slept, and a little blurb about some specifics I want to make note of...that way, when I'm depressed, it doesn't feel like an overwhelming task. This can be a great aid in figuring out triggers and early warning signs. I consider it the second most important thing in combatting the sway of moods in my life.

I've only recently started counseling for bipolar, so I'm not sure if it's helpful yet. I did get the bipolar workbook (you can probably get it online for not too much money), and that's been cool to check out and use, so i suggest taking a look at that.

i started keeping a log of my symptoms/episodes/duration/patterns etc. Thanx to doing that, i did discover patterns, cycles and differences in mood when sticking to a regular/natural sleep cycle, which is a huge problem i have had all my life. I shared the mood tracking with my shrink, thinking it would help her assess me better and adjust my meds accordingly if needed and get this....she said doing that was obsessive behavior. Mind you i see her for only min. once a month and it's not one of those detailed mood trackers...it's just a planner where i record the date an episode began and ended and the hours i slept. Last time i visited her, she asked how i was doing, ...i pulled out my planner to see the length my last depressive episode lasted and she rolled her eyes back, cocked back her head and said: "we've already established you have bipolar disorder, we know you have patterns in your cycles, but you are obsessed with this. yada yada yada....she then decided she wanted to refer me to another Dr. and basically dump me. I said: "how is this obsessive? the only reason i log this information is for you...because you are my dr. Why else am i coming to see you if not to inform you of my symptoms?
Her basic advice to me for the last 2 yrs of never adgusting or changing my meds despite my worsening and more frequent episodes is: "oh don't give it another though....just live your life".
clinic govt. drs. are just gems aren't they?

schrodingers_cat_lives · #6 13th July 2012, 05:53 AM

Originally Posted by TheMainException

Sleep has been the biggest help in my life. Getting solid sleep is one of the foremost ways to prevent mood changes, I've found. However, it doesn't stop them all. Going to bed and getting up at the same times are a good start though.

I do keep a mood chart, just a really simple thing where I give my mood and productivity a number, write the hours I slept, and a little blurb about some specifics I want to make note of...that way, when I'm depressed, it doesn't feel like an overwhelming task. This can be a great aid in figuring out triggers and early warning signs. I consider it the second most important thing in combatting the sway of moods in my life.

I've only recently started counseling for bipolar, so I'm not sure if it's helpful yet. I did get the bipolar workbook (you can probably get it online for not too much money), and that's been cool to check out and use, so i suggest taking a look at that.

Regarding sleep cycles---you might find these articles interesting:

New insights about Bipolar disorder treatment

Bipolar Disorder News | 29 May 2012
The extreme 'mood swings’ associated with bipolar disorder have been associated with disruptions in circadian rhythms for a number of years now. Circadian rhythms is the body’s internal clock system that governs your day and night states. For years lithium chloride has been one of the main treatments for bipolar disorder. However, there has been a paucity of research to find out whether and how lithium impacts on the brain and peripheral body clockwork.
But studies at Manchester University have shed new light on the topic.
"Our study has shown a new and potent effect of lithium in increasing the amplitude, or strength, of the clock rhythms, revealing a novel link between the classic mood-stabilizer, bipolar disorder and body clocks," said lead researcher Dr Qing-Jun Meng, in the University of Manchester’s Faculty of Life Sciences.
"By tracking the dynamics of a key clock protein, we discovered that lithium increased the strength of the clockwork in cells up to three-fold by blocking the actions of an enzyme called glycogen synthase kinase or GSK3.
"Our findings are important for two reasons: firstly, they offer a novel explanation as to how lithium may be able to stabilize mood swings in bipolar patients; secondly, they open up opportunities to develop new drugs for bipolar disorder that mimic and even enhance the effect lithium has on GSK3 without the side-effects lithium salts can cause."
These side-effects include nausea, acne, thirstiness, muscle weakness, tremor, sedation and/or confusion. Promisingly, GSK3 inhibiting drugs are already in development, as they have been shown to be important in other diseases, including diabetes and Alzheimer's disease.
Dr Meng added: "Lithium salt has a wide spectrum of targets within cells, in addition to GSK3; drugs which only block the actions of GSK3 would therefore have the major advantage of reduced 'off-target' effects of lithium.
"Our study has identified the robust rhythm-enhancing effect of GSK3 inhibition, which has potential to be developed as a new pharmacological approach to regulate body clocks. The implications of our study are that there may also be beneficial effects leading to new treatments for bipolar disorder, and this now needs to be tested."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

How the brain's daily clock controls mood: A new project

Published on Apr 24, 2012
Written by Nicole Casal Moore

ANN ARBOR, Mich.—A math professor at the University of Michigan will lead an international, $1 million project examining the links between bipolar disorderand abnormalities in the circadian, or daily, rhythms of a mammal's internal clock.
In humans, this grain-of-rice-sized timepiece is a cluster of 20,000 neurons right behind the eyes. It's called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of the brain's hypothalamus, and it is responsible for keeping our bodies in synch with our planet's 24-hour day.
Scientists believe it's off kilter in patients with bipolar disorder. Some of the genes implicated in the disease are the same ones that regulate the biological clock. The common treatment drug lithium is known to change the period of that clock, and when manic patients are forced to stay on a 24-hour schedule, many experience a reprieve from the episode, said principal investigator Daniel Forger, an associate professor in the U-M Department of Mathematics.
Exactly how the brain's clock controls mood remains a mystery, though. This new project aims to change that through complex mathematical modeling and experiments involving mice.
"We're going to continuously monitor the state of the animals' internal clock. We'll watch it tick, use mathematics to understand its function and test how it controls mood," Forger said.
The researchers will examine the brains of depressed and normal mice and look for abnormal electrical activity. The researchers aim to determine what state of the clock region corresponds with different moods in the animals.
"We're going to learn an awful lot about the circadian clock, which could also, in addition todepression, play a role in Alzheimer's, cancer and heart attacks," Forger said.
Also involved in this project are Toru Takumi, a professor in the Laboratory of Integrative Bioscience at Hiroshima University in Japan, and Hugh Piggins, a professor of life sciences at the University of Manchester in England. The project is funded by a competitive international Human Frontier Science Program Grant, which supports basic life science research with funding from 13 countries and the European Union.

Related Links:
• Daniel Forger: UM Mathematics-FacultyDetail

TheMainException · #7 14th July 2012, 09:10 PM

Originally Posted by schrodingers_cat_lives

i started keeping a log of my symptoms/episodes/duration/patterns etc. Thanx to doing that, i did discover patterns, cycles and differences in mood when sticking to a regular/natural sleep cycle, which is a huge problem i have had all my life. I shared the mood tracking with my shrink, thinking it would help her assess me better and adjust my meds accordingly if needed and get this....she said doing that was obsessive behavior. Mind you i see her for only min. once a month and it's not one of those detailed mood trackers...it's just a planner where i record the date an episode began and ended and the hours i slept. Last time i visited her, she asked how i was doing, ...i pulled out my planner to see the length my last depressive episode lasted and she rolled her eyes back, cocked back her head and said: "we've already established you have bipolar disorder, we know you have patterns in your cycles, but you are obsessed with this. yada yada yada....she then decided she wanted to refer me to another Dr. and basically dump me. I said: "how is this obsessive? the only reason i log this information is for you...because you are my dr. Why else am i coming to see you if not to inform you of my symptoms?
Her basic advice to me for the last 2 yrs of never adgusting or changing my meds despite my worsening and more frequent episodes is: "oh don't give it another though....just live your life".
clinic govt. drs. are just gems aren't they?

WOW. That sounds like one of the worst psych's I've ever heard of...and I thought my last one was bad. When they get to be know-it-all's, that's when it's time to find a new psych.

Those with bipolar need a way to see what is going on in their lives amidst the confusion of the illness. Without a more objective format for recording our moods, we can't as easily see what is going on and how our life is effected by the illness. It simply makes sense.

Schrodingers_cat_lives: Thanks for that info. That's really good stuff.

Jer · #8 15th July 2012, 06:08 AM

Originally Posted by schrodingers_cat_lives

i started keeping a log of my symptoms/episodes/duration/patterns etc. Thanx to doing that, i did discover patterns, cycles and differences in mood when sticking to a regular/natural sleep cycle, which is a huge problem i have had all my life. I shared the mood tracking with my shrink, thinking it would help her assess me better and adjust my meds accordingly if needed and get this....she said doing that was obsessive behavior. Mind you i see her for only min. once a month and it's not one of those detailed mood trackers...it's just a planner where i record the date an episode began and ended and the hours i slept. Last time i visited her, she asked how i was doing, ...i pulled out my planner to see the length my last depressive episode lasted and she rolled her eyes back, cocked back her head and said: "we've already established you have bipolar disorder, we know you have patterns in your cycles, but you are obsessed with this. yada yada yada....she then decided she wanted to refer me to another Dr. and basically dump me. I said: "how is this obsessive? the only reason i log this information is for you...because you are my dr. Why else am i coming to see you if not to inform you of my symptoms?
Her basic advice to me for the last 2 yrs of never adgusting or changing my meds despite my worsening and more frequent episodes is: "oh don't give it another though....just live your life".
clinic govt. drs. are just gems aren't they?

She sounds useless. I would try and get someone else. I guess she either doesn't 'believe' in being bipolar, or doesn't understand it (or perhaps how it can vary). I know at one point I had 2 pychologists, one normal and one bipolar expert. I found it good as it balanced out. The bipolar expert perhaps blamed too much on bipolar - basically all issues are from it and none from your family background so only look at the future. The other pydchologist didn't fully understand bipolar fully, and was happy to admit it. However it was good talking about past issues. Just i don't have the money to carry on now. So yes, get someone who understands as the last thing you need is someone who is supposed to help making it worse.

Live In Stereo · #9 27th July 2012, 09:30 PM

Originally Posted by TheMainException

WOW. That sounds like one of the worst psych's I've ever heard of...and I thought my last one was bad. When they get to be know-it-all's, that's when it's time to find a new psych.

Those with bipolar need a way to see what is going on in their lives amidst the confusion of the illness. Without a more objective format for recording our moods, we can't as easily see what is going on and how our life is effected by the illness. It simply makes sense.

Schrodingers_cat_lives: Thanks for that info. That's really good stuff.

Exactly.

Jer · #10 28th July 2012, 06:33 AM

Going back to coping stratigies:

After my latest episode where I have ended up needing help again they have created a crisis plan. This has things like warning signals, what to do when you see these, more serious warning signals and what to do when they happen (e.g. approach certain health services).

For me my warning signals are talking a lot (sometimes not letting the other person speak, or not letting them go/ not going myself when I have something else to do). I also feel very happy sometimes for no reasons. Lack of sleep (at least wanting to fall asleep - I find serequel helps a lot for actual sleeping). Buying things can be a little signal, but is not as bad as some others.

Sleep, regular meals, and although I am not sure myself apparently not over stimulating - do something to relax.

It's not an option for me, but if you have people in your life who are close and know you can ask them to point out if they see some signals too.

Something I have found that can sometimes help is distracting myself by reading if I start panicing etc about stuff in my life. Get lost in something completely different and it can help calm things a bit more.

My biggest problem is knowing what to do when the emotions go out of control around other people. Not a clue what to do to stop it... And it's where you're most likely to hurt others too, so it's not so good.