Hi!

I'm really glad you reached out to us. I would guess that the people on this site have all "pulled their hair" out in some form. Bipolar is a VERY difficult thing to live with, and it seems worse in the beginning. You said you had 7 Dr.'s you'd gone to and it sounds lik your on the medication guessing game. It does help when all is sorted out and you are not getting different stories from different Dr.'s and you don't have to wait 4-6 weeks to even see if a medication is going to work. I was wondering if you had been in thehospital or if you went to the different Doctors to get different opinions. How long have you been diagnosed with it? Are you on meds and do they work, or have you felt this hopeless, fearful, and frustrated since you felt the sypmtoms of bipolar?

I'd really really appreciate it if you could write back on the board or E-mail me at MistRaeven@aol.com so we'd know when this all started and at what point it is at with the Dr.'s and meds. How did you find out you had it? I'm 42 and my daughter who is 18 was diagnosed when she was in 7th grade, but only after I pushed and pulled at the psychiatrists where she was 2X before a diagnosis. Were you in the hospital like my daughter ad I have been?

The way you are feeling is very normal considering you have a terrible disease and don't want it, and can't get rid of it. Besides all the feelings an illness brings, it's even harder when , like bipolar, it's one that somany people don't understand. People who explain how to jump out of bed and ge out of the "blues" when you are depressed. Do you have family, or any kind of support system that understands what this is? I hope so. That makes such a huge difference in feeling hopeless or not. Please write back and tell me more. Even if you don't, know I'll be thinking of you. I'm on disability for fibromyalgia and have a lot of time to think about my fellow bipolar friends who have written on this board. I know it doesn't seem like it, but it will get better when the meds get right, and the initial anger and "why me?" begins to wear off. But even when it's better, the biggest advise I'd give would be "GET SUPPORT". Writing in here was great. I never went out and kept up friendships or made new ones. I hid out and isolated instead of getting support and lost a lot of years.

I wish you the very very best. (PLEASE call the hospital or go there if you get worse. Some things you wrote made me afaid you were on the edge and might do something even more to harm yourself than pulling out your hair. Thanks.)

Love and light,

Raeven

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Replying to:

I pulled out my hair today at work. I got really upset and frustrated and didn't want to think about what i was feeling, so i ripped out a clump of my hair. I t didn't hurt. I have been to 7 different dotors and they all tell me i'm bp. I'm tired of taking the pills and hving the blood drawn. I;m tired of the dr's visits and them telling me i've got something new wrong with me. i'm not living. i'm scared. I can't go on like this. i'm so tired at 22. I'm so alone, scared, unhappy, and i didn't do anything. What did i do to get like this, so i can warn people who have kids not to let it happen to them. None should have to live like this, I'm a caged animal. A walking zombie. Everything is boring and monotonous.



Thanks for listening.



mlm