Bipolar pregnancy

I started this blog while I was pregnant and having serious mental health issues.  One of the most frustrating problems I faced was a complete lack of information about mental health during pregnancy.  There's a ton of information -- both online and in print -- about postpartum depression and mental illness in the postpartum period, which is a good thing, but very little information about mental illness while one is actually pregnant.

There are a couple of books on Amazon.com that discuss having bipolar disorder during pregnancy:  Bipolar and Pregnant..., and Ride at Your Own Risk...   The first is more about managing your bipolar disorder before you get pregnant (therefore avoiding problems during pregnancy), and the second seems to be more of a personal memoir.  Both also suffer from the "way too long title" disease.  There is a good book called Pregnancy Blues that addresses mental illness during pregnancy, but it's written by a doctor and it's a little inaccessible to the Average Josephine.

With all this lack of information, I was initially excited to see a new article posted at psychcentral.com titled "Pregnancy Planning for Women with Bipolar Disorder."  The article has good information about how to talk to your doctor about your Bipolar Disorder and pregnancy, what drugs to stay away from, and what drugs may be less effective with birth control (and what drugs make birth control less effective).

Of course, my excitement flagged a little when I realized the article that it is about planning, and not about what to do once you're pregnant (yes, that's what the title says, so I shouldn't have been surprised). Out of curiosity, I did a search on "bipolar pregnancy" on Psych Central, and it yielded exactly two results:  the aforementioned article, and something about teen marriage.  I understand that pregnant women with bipolar disorder are probably a small population, but shouldn't there be something for them?  I was one of them, and it may have helped if I found even just one piece of information about how to deal.  In the world of the internet, where every tiny little personality quirk and population is indulged, how is this population being ignored?

The shoe never fits

I had a therapy appointment today, the first one in a long time.  I didn't feel like I really needed it, but the reminder call came too late for me to cancel the appointment (there's a $75 fee for cancelling less than 24 hours in advance).  So I went, and just bailed early by saying I had someplace else to be.

My therapist is a nice guy, but he spent 15 of our 30 minutes together talking about his vacation and his vacation home.  If he was just a friend, fine, but I'm spending like $90 to meet with him, so time is money.  I have decided I'm not going to go back to see him.

The problem is, he's the...let's count...fifth therapist I've seen and dumped.  To be fair, one stopped practicing, but that was after I stopped seeing her regularly.  I really have never found a therapist who I "clicked" with.  Is it me?  A doctor once suggested I had Borderline Personality Disorder, based on my serial doctor-relationship issues.  Maybe she was right.  I just know I've never found a good fit.

Now, much like a perpetual spinster (does anyone actually use that word anymore?), I'm starting to wonder if there really is a therapist out there that's right for me.  Maybe I'll never find my match.  Maybe I'll fumble through life without the all-important therapist-patient relationship, destined to walk the earth with unexplored psychoses.  And, much like the perpetual spinster, I'm ready to give up on therapy altogether, writing it off as a romanticized ideal that never lives up to its promises.

Or maybe all therapy is a bunch of crap, and I'm just coming to this conclusion now. 

Off topic:  I did a Google image search for "pencil and paper," and this terrifying picture came up (it really is terrifying, so if you don't want to see it, don't click).  What the HELL?

Routine, Interrupted

I'm not OCD; far from it.  I'm not particularly clean or organized or particular.  That being said, we are in the process of  remodeling our kitchen, and oh my, it is driving me nuts.

I should state upfront that I am really excited for the new kitchen.  It's going to be great.  I've worked hard putting it all together, and it's not going to take that long to do -- just a couple of weeks or so, then I'll have a beautiful new kitchen to enjoy.

However...there's something about my routine being disrupted that causes me to totally crash.  I've gone through two bathroom remodels and various other smaller projects, and it's always the same -- it get irritable, depressed, and anxious.  I can't cook anything, I can't really wash dishes, it's hard to get to my refrigerator (at least I still have one, though), and all the contents of my kitchen are strewn around my living room and dining room.  I found my two-year-old trying to eat a beef bullion cube she found yesterday because she assumed if it was in a shiny wrapper, it was candy.  She was disabused of that notion pretty quickly.

Out of curiosity, I did a little web searching on bipolar disorder and routine, and found quite a few articles that talk about how people with bipolar disorder may be helped by regular routines.  I'm not surprised, because a disruption to my routine certainly wreaks havoc with my mood, so it would stand to reason that the opposite is true.  Here are the articles:

From webmd.com:  Daily Routine May Help Bipolar Disorder
From the American Journal of Psychiatry:  The Importance of Routine for Preventing Recurrence in Bipolar Disorder
From healthyplace.com:  Stability in Bipolar Disorder Requires Routine

At least I feel a little justified that I'm not just making up an excuse for my bad mood.  Here's hoping the reno goes quickly.

It's MINE, dammit

One thing that I'm really bad about with my kids is setting boundaries. And I don't mean that in a theoretical, therapy kind of way; I mean it in a literal, physical way. Mainly, setting boundaries with my stuff.

It's such a conundrum. We teach our kids to share, that it's wrong to be selfish, to hoard their crayons or their trucks, to not let others play. But aren't there things that a kid shouldn't have to share? I know there are things I don't want to share. Like my markers. Or my various odds and ends of yarn (yes, I will use them for something, someday). Or my iPod. Especially my iPod, since my two-year-old used my old one as a chew toy and killed it. But how can I hoard my own stuff (or, let's face it, be "selfish" with it), and then make my kids share their stuff? It seems contradictory.

I'd like to think that in life, there are some things that are just mine, and mine alone. There aren't many of these things, and most of them are pretty mundane, but they're vital to my well-being, especially as a parent. When you're a parent, you give so much of yourself -- I've given my body, my time, my job, my house, my car, and the list goes on. To preserve my sanity, I should be able to hoard a few things and keep them, just for myself.

A different form of craft therapy

I have decided I am going to create a new word: "craftherapy." There, I did it. M-W.com, suck it.

Anyway, I see knitting as part of therapy, hence the whole name and concept of this blog. But knitting isn't the only form of creative therapy I engage in. In fact, I'm kind of weird, in that when it's hot outside (as it has been this summer), I don't really want to knit. I guess if I moved to Florida I'd never knit. But that won't happen, so whatever.

My point is, there are lots of other ways to be creative and focus on mindfulness and healing at the same time. I found a great book this spring called Art Journals and Creative Healing, which is wonderful for anyone who likes to draw or journal or scrapbook. And, less intense, there is the Zentangle series of books, which the authors call "Yoga for your brain." The Zentangle stuff is kind of like glorified doodling, but, if you're like me, doodling is a great outlet, because you can lose yourself in a drawing, without the added stress of having your drawing look like "something."

I'd love to compile a longer list of books or workbooks that are good for craftherapy (there! I used it in a sentence! It's really a word now!), so look for more suggestions later.

By the way: if you do a Google image search for "crafts," some seriously weird stuff comes up.

To DBT or not DBT? -- that is the question

After Lyddie was born in April, I spent some time in an inpatient program at a facility called the Lindner Center in Mason. It helped me immensely, but the doctor there also suggested that I find a Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) workshop to enroll in.

Per DBTselfhelp.com, DBT is an offshoot of CBT (cognitive behavior therapy) that combines CBT and Eastern philosophy. It is beneficial for people with Borderline Personality Disorder, self-injurers, and the like. I think the philosophy is summed up with the phrase, "You're okay -- now change."

I found a DBT program here in the area, at Good Samaritan Hospital. They had an unexpected opening for the program that starts next week, so I am going to go check it out tomorrow. It's every Tuesday for 25 weeks.

Come on, people, I have bipolar disorder -- I can't commit to anything that long.

We'll see how it goes. I like the idea of the therapy, but right now, I'm kind of soured on therapy all together. I don't think therapy has ever really helped me, long-term. Why should this be any different?

Bipolar Knitter...back at it

Well, I kind of fell off the blogging wagon around March. I started having early labor symptoms and was in and out of the hospital pretty much until I gave birth in April. But, I had a healthy baby girl, Lydia, who is beautiful, sweet, and easy (thank God).

So, technically, I'm not Pregnant Bipolar Knitter anymore. I think I am going to keep this blog, though, and just rename it to Bipolar Knitter. Look for a new title/logo/etc. I still believe in the spirit of the blog -- bringing information and awareness about mental illness, specifically in women, to the public. This being said, I'm going to regroup and refocus my energies back to this blog and other outlets.

Also, my brain is rotting, so this is a way to try to prevent that from happening. With three kids 4 and under, it's probably a losing battle, but I gotta try!