I cancelled a psychologist appointment over lunch today when a psychiatrist I preferred called me and told me he had an opening instead. The bad thing is I lost $75 on that decision but I felt better about it overall. This psychiatrist has a practice that focuses on cognitive therapy with medication as a last resort. He's out of network, so it bit me in the ass pretty good, but I think it did some help. And he said he can get me some of that back. Plus I now have the power of Xanax.
We didn't talk for too long. Just over an hour and 20 minutes, and a lot of that was for the initial psyche eval. The good news is that both he and my doctor agreed that I am neither crazy nor bipolar. I do occasionally get a bit depressed (whenever I don't have the kid) however I don't have manic or grandiose episodes, suicidal thoughts, consistent crippling depression or any other serious symptoms. I do, however, suffer from anxiety attacks. General Anxiety Disorder. Lucky me. It runs in our family to varying degrees of seriousness, and I have a moderate version of it. The same things seem to set off my episodes each time, which I will get to in more detail below, and anything from physical exercise to valium and deep breathing exercises should help. Of course I already knew that because I've been dealing with it since I was 20 or so.
We agreed that additional therapy sessions will help me. I have a lot that I want to talk about and get off my chest, and I need an outlet for it. So I will go in to talk with him once a week for the next month and see how it goes.
Apparently I have numerous residual emotional issues related to my breakup and relationship with my son's mom, abandonment issues regarding her and the kid, feelings of inadequacy, personal resentment, and destructive self defense mechanisms. I sabotage myself, or whatever.
My primary problem is the anxiety. My anxiety attacks, which can be mild and annoying, or more severe and cause me to completely panic and forget how to breathe, or throw up (which happened this weekend) are usually triggered by the same things each time: money worries, the kid, and the kid's mom.
I can't turn the anxiety off, but with the help of Xanax I can mitigate its effects. Therapy sessions should help keep it at bay by giving me a vocal outlet for my emotions and concerns.
Good luck with those treatments (and I don't mean just the Xanax) and it's good you get that sorted out now before it becomes a major issue. I think when your kid grows up a bit more, you physically heal up a bit more, your emotional levels will calm down a bit. Changing up the diet for the better and talking things out is the healthiest way to do that.
good luck!
If you are free(ish) next weekend, chim and I could bring you an emergancy bottle of help if you need it.