Symptom Evaluation

I went back to bed after typing yesterday morning's blog and I rested, thinking that would be it for the day. I wanted to sleep through any tough parts of the day. After about an hour I started feeling remarkably better, got up and started doing regular, everyday things; making necessary phone calls for a mural I am needing to do, cancelling an appointment, setting up a photo shoot for images for the mural.

Right now my body feels like lead is coursing through my veins. Very sluggish but I had no shaking last night. Yesterday morning I felt a little like lead also. How do I describe feeling like lead? My joints hurt and my movements are slow. I don't know how this relates to side effects, but I did feel the same way for a little while yesterday. Once my regular meds kicked in I started feeling better. So we will see how it goes today.

There is a little feeling of loss of energy today. I have a symptom evaluation form that I fill out daily listing different symptoms of bi-polar disorder to rate on a scale of 0 to 3, three being the worst. These help the participant see accurately just where they are on the chart and when to get help immediately. The list includes such symptoms as: feeling worthless, helpless or hopeless; sleeping more or less than usual; hard to concentrate or decide; avoiding other people;loss of energy, feeling very tired; hyperactivity or racing thoughts etc. Loss of energy is a 2, sleeping more or less than usual would be a 1 because if I didn't have to go somewhere I would be curling up in the bed right now.

On the evaluation sheet there is a place to track my medications and what dosages. This is so that over time I can see my progress. It is going to take a long long time to get through this. Hopefully this transition will take less than a year, but if not my journal will go on.

This morning I have an appointment in Iowa City with my Psychologist. Last week I was enjoying my first normal day. I think this day will get better. I know I've been through worse. My husband is driving which is probably the best thing.

Last night my husband said to me, "It's good to have you back today." He always knows when I am "myself" or when the illness is more prevalent. It was good to be back. I'm looking forward to more days like that.