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[Fun]

For people who suffer from mood disorders, how do you manage the constant shift in mood? Medication might ease the intensity, but I still struggle with it.

Any idea?

[tyme]

I was on mood stabilisers for years. @Fun  I agree with what you said about easing the intensity. In the long run, it was talking therapies which made a difference for me. It was long term therapy, and I find I don't have the mood fluctuations anymore even when I'm super stressed.

[Mlw]

hello, 

i find that exceptance helps.

ecept that in that moment im in x mood ,

followed by asking myself that who what why when questions.

what has happened in the past few days.

what am i feeling, thinking

why am i reacting like this?

also using a mode tracking app helps me see dips and allows me to reach out early, or take more self care, talk to others, change my environment.

i find im snappy, at thous closest to me when really im upset, or hurt by them but fear showing sadness and tears as a weakness so inturn i change it to defensive ( not by choice , instant survival mode reaction)

im not sure im much help but please know your not alone in this

[DownMoreThanUp]

i found that medications mask the symptoms but all to often do not heal us. i have taken mood stabilisers for years, but found they keep my mood steady alright - but rock bottom!

i'm diagnosed an ultra rapid cycler, and just before psychosis time, i can cycle moods as fast as every 10-20 minutes, which is why i go psychotic i suppose. The emotional upheaval from each cycle is already enormous, let alone cycle up to 5-7 times a hour for a bit. Send anyone off to space i reckon.

So yes, no more psychoses while on mood stabilisers, but such a heavy cost! However when i became more and more suicidal, i knew i had to get rid of them, and find alternative ways of dealing with myself instead. (This was after 7 years rock bottom, and the last 18 months, or so, dangerously suicidal.)

For me discovering what caused my moods to cycle so fast helped me most. Good counseling, that reached the core of my heart and mind, was what i needed. (For even as a child, i had been deprived of love, and was in desperate need of just that - LOVE.)

Since then i have been hard at work loving the bad life, living within me to death, letting love replace the bad with the good life that grows when i give the thirsty inside of me a drink, instead of hating myself and bashing myself with my depressive mindset.(believe you me it is hard to deny depression and give out love and compassion when it feels undeserved. Yet this is all part of the rebuild i had to go through to learn to deal with myself a rapid cycling person.

This was my biggest problem, when depressed i hated myself a weak, no good for nothing, no hoper. For everyone always told me i was, when i was in that state. So really no wonder my moods were going that fast trying to get away from myself, harming myself with my self hate.

Yet once i learned to give out love and forgiveness to myself, and let love Himself united me a broken person inside, my cycling began to deliver good life instead of bad. For in all of moods i learned to heed love, and let love, compassion, goodwill, and healing take place within me.

At the moment i cycle moods between twice a day, at worst, and once every three to ten days, when i'm doing well, the longer periods, are slowly, year after year, becoming more often.

i have not been taking any psych medications for some time, but if i need them i have them laying ready. i weaned myself off them over many years. Today i only struggle with depressive bouts, some anxiety at times, and still bad insomnia all the time, but my manic and psychotic times have completely left me. For quiet some time now already. Which is slowing down the cycles, each year without psychosis a little more.