I find on Salon a number of people who suffer from depression or some kind of anxiety/depression disorder and many, many bipolars, both I and II.  I’m not sure why – maybe it has to do with creativity – maybe it’s a coincidence. Maybe we're just obsessed with telling people we're nuts.

I suspect that most of us are on psychotropic drugs. That is drugs which affect the brain, as these disorders are not usually from having bad childhoods, but having lousy brain chemistry. Psychiatrists try to balance the brain with these drugs in order to keep the brain awash in the good stuff, not the bad that we inherited for the most part, genetically.

Bipolar Is are usually treated with lithium (to even the moods from mania) and an anti-depressant. Some are also treated with yet another mood stabilizer, such as clonazapam, a highly effective but extremely addictive drug. Better to be a junkie I say, than out of your mind and climbing walls.

Depressives are usually treated with a good anti-depressant (so many that only some work for some people - how confusing is that) and those with anxiety disorder are often treated with clonazepam. Now, I am not going to get bogged down in drug names (boring) so I'll just tell you the type of drugs that work for me.

 I am a Bipolar II which is much harder to treat, as we cycle in mood rapidly, do not have bouts of mania, but the next level down, hypomania which can be a good thing if you have a lot to do (it’s sort of like being on cocaine at times) or a bad thing if it makes you too hyper and all you can do is pace the floor. For some reason, there aren’t a lot of drugs out there for Bipolar II s as we are harder to treat perhaps because our brain chemistry is more diverse. I myself have gone through 45 different medications in the last 10 years, most of which did not work. Whoopee.

It is believed that a drug for epilepsy or other seizure disorders evened the mood and about 15 years ago, they tried me on one of them in massive doses (about 3 times the amount for an average epileptic). It poisons you at first (2 weeks of nausea and constant headache). Then the body adjusts (amazing things bodies) and hopefully evens the mood. Almost all of these drugs affect body organs in not such a great way. Liver function is checked regularly as are the amounts of the drug in your system. Suprisingly enough this drug seemed to even me out and with an anti-depressant got me functioning again. I did however feel I was wrapped in a mattress.

This worked for a few while, until my liver and blood tests said NO MORE. I had reached the level of poison again. Bye bye to that drug. So we were left with more anti-seizure drugs. Some were for epilepsy some even for such terrible diseases as Parkinson’s. Nothing seemed to work. I was up and down and all around within a week or even a day. Rapid cycling, if only we could use the energy in a spinning class. 

One of the other drugs which has such side effects which help us (there are not a lot of drugs specifically for Bipolar IIs, I guess there’s not enough money in it). I take an anti-psychotic medication which keeps the mixed state away. I am not psychotic (although I have great sympathy for those who are) and have never run naked through the streets with a tin foil hat on my head. But these drugs work. I also take the aforementioned clonazepam (have for years, boy, talk about junkie) an anti-depressant, and ANOTHER mood stabilizer meant for epileptics.

Nothing seemed to work. I was without a mood stabilizer, so put my hypomania to work into getting another  university degree. It worked well, except I would crash, and my professors would know that they would not see me for a week. Then hypomania would set in and I would get all the work I had missed – done. It was rather confusing for me and them, but we all dealt with it.

I have had a great shrink for the last 10 years. She knows her chemistry and the only thing she wants to know when I go for my ‘visit’ is how I am chemically. Up, down, anxious, mixed (that’s when you’re hypomanic AND depressed, a lovely state) etc. Drugs are juggled, sometimes changed, and sometimes, if you take them long enough, they just wear out.

Recently, my anti psychotics – wore out. I was in a mixed state not knowing whether to go up or down, swing from a chandelier, or get into the ocean and keep swimming out. It was not pleasant. It resulted in bouts of crying and pacing, crying and pacing. Not a good way to spend a day. So my shrink, at wits end, sent me to a psychopharmacologist (I even have trouble spelling that one). This guy or gal deals purely in drugs. They know drugs that are not even on the market and can get their paws on them. They can usually diagnose the problem in ten minutes. Wow. So my guy ( luckily was good) sent his suggestions of drugs to my dear shrink and we tried a new anti-psychotic. The spinning class ceased.

I went in to her recently after a series of depressions and mixed states. I smiled. She jumped up and did a happy dance all around her chair (I don’t think most shrinks do that but I may be wrong). I did tell her I thought I was a bit hypomanic.

Her response was, “I don’t think so, I think you’re just not used to being happy”.