I am losing it!

[Heather]

Hi all,

Well I am starting to worry about myself, like to start off this was funny now it is a real worry! This has been getting progressively worse.

Ok I am losing it and I am not joking or being silly I really am losing it.

I have been so forgetful of late and mixing everything up and also I loose time. Like the other day I sat down and thought that I was sitting down all the time but then I came out of this period and thought oh I need to wash that cup up and I went to where I had left it and it wasn’t there and so I went to look for it and found it washed and wiped and put away and I was the only one home!!! And I am losing more and more time like this and I do not know where it goes. It was Thursday and I thought it was Wednesday and I was ringing my friend to ask her what time she was coming to my house the next day but it was that day! You can not trust me to remember much at the moment I forget EVERYTHING!!! Today I was on a train that I catch quite a lot but I missed my station – not by one but by three stops and had to get off and go back! Also today I struggled to work out in my head what half of 56 was! This is so not me and this is getting worse and it is happening more and more, at first it was funny and I put it down to lack of sleep and stress but now it is getting to be a worry.

I know that I am under a lot of stress, I am now on 4 different types of medication and I have to go to physio twice a week and I have other health concerns but I do not think this is my problem (sure it doesn’t help – especially the meds but…).

I am going to go to a doctor about this or maybe first talk to my counsellor but I am just getting it out on here first sorry guys I am in tears I am really worried about it. Mental illness runs in my family on both sides and so does memory loss, amongst other things. And I mean I know that I am not like heaps young or anything but I am only 24 so this shouldn’t be happening to me.

I just want to do nothing and stay at home 24/7. I am so behind at uni and actually EVERYTHING else I do i.e. work, teaching etc… and I am struggling to fix this, this is so so so out of character. Instead of getting on with work I cry and there is nothing to cry about.

So many people are noticing the difference it is quite out there.

And it is enjoyable to self harm right now.

You know what I want right now??? Is to be placed in hospital (my most feared place almost) and just helped, I want my sicknesses to be helped which is needed but I am neglecting them, I want to have a break from work and uni and I want to sleep and be forced to eat. How dumb to want that, I am so worried about myself.

Anyway if I do not shut up I will go on and on and on and on and on and er… um… yeah.

I am going to go if you read this thanks in advance.

Heather…

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Make that appointment with your doctor, HJ, and also ask for a recommendation for a psychologist... what yiu are experiencing could be a symptom of many things, including depression or anxiety.

 

[ThatLady]

Yes. Please see your doctor as soon as possible, hon. Also, please keep us informed as to how you're doing. We're concerned, too.

Hugs!

 

[Heather]

Thanks for that, I will make an appointment. I do see a counsellor but maybe I need more and need to go more often!

And I have been diagnosed with depression and am on anti-depressants but I have never had this before!

Heather...

P.S. Thanks for your concern I will keep you informed, I have been quite absent from here of late as there has been so much going on!

 

[David Baxter PhD]

What medications are you taking and what doses, HJ?

 

[Heather]

I am on Citalopram tablets and only 20 mg.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Is that a new medication for you? Any side-effects?

 

[Heather]

I have been on them for about 3 months and the only thing that is different is maybe increased nightmares, which I have been meaning to see the dr who put me on them about but I have had a work placement for uni since then etc...

Heather...

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Vivid dreams aren't unusual with SSRIs. The medication doesn't really change the content or frequency of your dreams but because they can be more vivid or intense you may remember more of them.

Talk to your doctor about the memory/zoning out issues. It's possible it's medication related. It's also possible that it's a symptom of the depression or anxiety the medication is treating. But it would also be worth checking out some of the standard blood tests if that hasn't been done recently.

 

[Heather]

Thanks heaps for that I am going to make an appointment tomorrow as that is Monday

Heather...

 

[Heather]

Today I went to the doctor and I just felt awful going, more uncomfortable than usual, but anyway I went and went through with it.

Anyway it was a doctor that I have never seen before and she made me feel uncomfortable but I decided that I needed to stay and tell her anyway (see it is a medical practice so I do not always see the same dr there) well I told her about the loosing time thing and she asked many many questions (once she started to believe me, at first she didn’t believe me until I described it well and she said oh I believe you now) and then she said that she thinks that my mum may have had Munchausen’s Syndrome by proxy, which if you don’t know is a parenting disorder where parents, usually the mother, fabricate symptoms in their children, thus subjecting the child to unnecessary medical tests and/or surgical procedures, because even though I was a sickly child I have been on that many medications and was always taken to the doctor about this and that and I couldn’t possibly have had all of those things! So now I am trying to work this out and decide if I think that she did have that!

Anyway she wants me to get my medical info from when I was a child as she wants to know the meds that I was on because she said it could be linked to that, the other thing she wants to do is she wants me to have a neurological assessment. But she said it could just be that I am burnt out and stressed and that my past has caught up with me and my brain wishes to detach from the body to survive (I was abused as a child), in other words I have a long way to go with getting this one sorted, yay another journey

Heather…

 

[David Baxter PhD]

I don't know about the Munchausen By Proxy thing - not sure how that would cause the symptoms you describe, true or not. But regarding the rest, it sounds like the doctor is investigating what needs to be investigated - certainly anxiety/stress or dissociation are two possibilities, as the doctor indicated.

 

[Heather]

She thinks that I may have been put on too much medication and it has effected me that is why the Munchausen thing but I dunno if I agree that mum had it I am still thinking about that one.

Anyway thanks for the reply, I think that it probably is just stress, I have had a lot going on recently!

Heather...