I’ve been on Depakote since July. I had a very dark October, and with the help of my therapist and a lot of what she called “psychological first aid” things started to trend up. I realized that Octobers are always hard for me, but this was the first without Lithium since I was a teen.

I had a couple weeks that were nearing hypomanic and everything was awesome. Now I’m feeling low/anxious again. My doctor wants to put me on Latuda. I’m too scared to try another antipsychotic, but he says maybe that’s because I’m helpless/hopeless. It’s hard to understand how he knows that after five minutes on a televisit. The other three drugs we tried had bad side effects (one included anxiety sooo much worse than this). I like to think it is partially due to the darkness and SAD. It gets hard when it gets dark at what feels like 2:30pm. I’ve also caught the respiratory crud, and have had it this week during my birthday and today on Christmas.

I contacted the therapist that I really liked, and she said she can’t ethically see me anymore, because she is through work and they can only offer short term therapy. She had “graduated” me in November. Ugh. Getting fired by a therapist is not pleasant. I started with a new therapist on a therapy app last week. I’m hopeful that she will help me crawl out of this hole.

I know part of what I miss is people, because they lit up my world. I’ve been remote since the beginning of the pandemic. I feel like a drain on my husband who also works remotely. I miss taking breaks and chatting with coworkers with out a screen between us. Now that I think about it, that is how I have met new people since the friends I made in school (many, many years ago). I have a few close friends, but we only talk on the phone. I want to get connected with church when I’m feeling better.

Crap, this vent sure is starting to make my doctor sound right. My husband is a light in the storm, but I feel like I’m taking all of his energy. He is ready to do whatever helps, and he just walked in the room singing a song from Paddington 2.

I want to connect with people and go to the pool again. I’m going back to my third(?) rewatch of Ted Lasso.