Bipolar Support Group

Hi! I'm new to the group. Just had a question that I hope to get some insight into. I do realize that I should make an appointment with a pdoc, just haven't felt up to it. I've always struggled with mild depression and have had social anxiety since I was a kid. This past year has been very stressful my son was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and my daughter who also has mood symptoms has been in treatment for a severe form of social anxiety called selective mutism. This added stress has tipped me over the edge somewhat. I often feel depressed. My most troublesome symptom right now is that my mind is on overdrive. This has been happening for about a year now on and off. But my thoughts start coming one after the other and it is driving me nuts. I feel like someone needs to shock my brain to make them stop. My thoughts are almost always related to issues with my kids. They impact my ability to think clearly and sleep. Very intrusive but they come and go. Does this sound like symptom of bipolar disorder or a symptom of an anxiety disorder. Besides my son, my brother and possibly my sister has bipolar disorder. Mood and anxiety issues run down both sides of my family. I've had a prescription for celexa that I got from my doctor but have been hesitant to try it. Sorry this is so long. Thanks for your input. A.

Do you feel like your thoughts take off without your control? Going a mile a minute? I have had racing thoughts. I have to say that meds helped them. I actually at the time I had them real bad, took som eof my husbands neurontin (a bad thing to do I know) BUT it was the weekend and I could not get in to see the pdoc and did not want at that point to go to the hospital. Well th eneurontin actually did help slow down my racing thoughts. But they came back and I got worse and ended up in the hospital. BUT I believe you can get in to see your pdoc and you will be fine.

I believe racing thoughts are part of mania (a bipolar issue) You can check that out on webMD or ask your pdoc.

I have racing thoughts both when (hypo)manic and depressed.

When hypomanic I have trouble sleeping cuz of the thoughts. I have several movies playing in my head that I switch back and forth too as so I can think about something cool and not become depressed thinking about bad things. I also am overly outgoing when hypomanic, giddy, smiley, laughy, get that "crazy" look in my eye as my wife calls it. I am also overly creative and decide to do things on a whim....

Today, maybe not so hypomanic, but tired of typing in URL's and having my internet browser slowly goto a start a page I made my own start page using notepad and HTML and went to all of the websites I goto and used the "prntscrn" button to take snapshots of the screen to then edit in paint to make the banners the size and proportion I wanted...

Anyway. I might be hypomanic now, I seem just happy but I could type forever.

Objective: Racing thoughts while manic and depressed. I believe I have covered the manic. As for the depressed, I think about dark shit, my death, dying, suicide, other negative shit and used to dwell on things like how I'd feel/cope losing a family member until it felt like I had and it's a terrible feeling. As a youngster my heart would litterally hurt so bad that I often just wanted to stab it.

I now do better at managing my racing thoughts and not acting on bad impulses while hypomanic and am managing.

Anyway, msg me if you need anything.

I think this kind of non stop thinking can also be a part of severe anxiety independent of bipolar disorder. It sounds like you have alot going on in your life that is stressful, and it's only natural that you are feeling such intense anxiety as a parent. in bipolar, I think racing thoughts are usually paired with flight of mind where the mind skips from one thing to the next without anyone else being able to follow the logical connection, which appears 100% natural to the manic mind. However, it is important for you to actually get a diagnosis....because taking the celexa without a mood stabilizer can make a bipolar person's racing thoughts/mania worse whereas it would help alleviate the symptoms of an anxious person. Go to a pdoc and get an answer, so that you can put this one thing out of your mind and focus on calming down the stressors in your life.