JohnCoffey wrote:
Horses for courses with that. I was given it when I got home and within three days I was suicidal and had to stop taking it. However a friend of mine swears by it. Personally I take Sertraline, which is a yank drug. However, it must be expensive because my doc will happily hand it over but all of the shrinks I have seen want to take it away even though I have told them it's the only thing that will aid my depression.
I've even been told that I wasn't taking enough of it by a shrink but my doc got mega annoyed and said "how can they tell you what works for you?" which was excellent.
It's taken me 9 years now to find a 'system' that's about as good as it is going to get. I no longer take what they give me because I know how I feel inside and out of all the pills I have popped the ones I have now are about as good as it gets. Thankfully I can take them together, too. The only thing I have had to sacrifice are givey up smokey pills as apparently if I took them I would need to be sectioned and my super duper opiate painkillers. But I can live with pain tbh for even a couple of day's worth of a normal brain.
Unfortunately I made the mistake of telling a British shrink that I was diagnosed bipolar by an American. Which has set off almost a competition to prove the yanks wrong. Thus, I have been sent to a ADHD specialist who is refusing to see my depression and only wants to focus on treating my mania, which he mistakes for ADHD.
I'm pretty open to suggestions. To me it doesn't matter what I am labelled as long as I get the right drugs. But being diagnosed and treated for ADHD has had me close to suicide now on many occasion and each time I have ended up at my local docs crying on my hands and knees begging for a subscription of Sertraline to pull me out of a funk. So tbh? I think I will take the yank opinion on what's wrong with me (aswell as accepting that I have heavy autistic tendencies) because it seems to be about right. And the drugs for Bipolar seem to be about right.
Chap, have you made use of the CPA here?
http://www.mentalhealthleeds.info/infob ... proach.phpShort version - all people with a stake in your mental health have to get a representative into a meeting and agree a set of rules and common communication about your treatment. You can head this group up if you are able, or appoint a representative. You probably can't make anyone do anything they aren't willing to do, but you can improve the debate and the exchange of information and that can only be healthy, literally and figuratively.
Voices like yours are necessary on the front lines of mental health rights in the UK. For public services, even those involved directly with MH it's a bloody minefield and understanding of the issues affecting those with poor mental health is tough to come by. There's a lot of good will for change though and there are many whose job it is now to ensure people get not just heard but involved in the running of things. A smart cookie like you could do some use if you looked into local options for involvement - and you'd instantly have access to tons of further support through good networking. Also it's an environment where no-one bats an eyelid at conditions people have got, so it's like being on the internet, only fleshier.