doing six treatments while inpatient at a hospital located a couple of cities away. We are not sure what day I will be going in, we are waiting on clearance from my insurance company. I am now
prepared, awaiting the "Okay Go" from the ECT doctor. My dog's shots are now up to date for boarding, I have arrangements for a friend to pet-sit my cat. I have transportation set up and some clothes outfits ready. This weekend I will purchase a legal pad, I am not sure in which section of the hospital I will be, but I know on the psychiatric units they would not want me to have the metal wire of a spiral-bound . However, I will have a notebook, because I will be journalling daily updates on the hospital stay, the treatments and my status.
My first step in this direction was a visit with the ECT practitioner, whom I saw a week ago today. Although the hospital in which I Will be staying does take my insurance the doctor himself does not, so I had to pay out of pocket for my visit with him which lasted maybe thirty minutes. The goal of this visit was an approval for the ECT, and I spent quite a bit of time preparing. I made a timeline with pen and highlighter showing the course of my illness, hospitalizations and methods of treatment. I gave him a seperate presentation of this information in list form. I included photos of my anorexia at its worst, stomach caved inbetween my sides, ribs pressing against the skin stretched taut across them. I included photos of my self-injurous cutting from the past, with red thoroughly speckling the carpet behind the mutilated limb. I included every report, evaluation and test I had: neurologist reports, assessments from hospitals and specialists. I also threw in my GED and college intake scores as the arrogantly insecure part of me felt the need to reassure the doctor, and myself, that despite all of these flaws I do have worthwhile attributes that are
also documented on paper.
During the meeting I explained my condition: that although specialists have been unable to agree on a diagnosis for me, what is universally accepted is that I am on the bipolar spectrum, with depression being the most prominent manifestation of my mood disorder. We ran quickly over my traits of personality disorder and childhood abuse, and I reiterated several times that over the last eleven years my condition has deteriorated substantially, despite continual compliance with psychiatrists' medication regimens. Hospitalizations, arrests, suicide attempts... all of these had happened under the care of a doctor. I really have responded poorly to medications, with Depression always looming just under
the surface, bursting out of tranquilly medicated waters to gnaw on my mind, claw my skin, swallow me completely until I am trapped in the black oblivion of its stomach....
And then there's the side effects of the medications which I think have more effects on me than they have the proportedly beneficial effects. Increased hunger, irregular menstrual cycles, heat exhaustion, fluid retention, lactation, libido effects... basically, these meds have been turning me into a fat lump who can't go outside, and my body has basically skipped the whole sex part of reproduction, meds having made it so unappealing, as well as the pregnancy thing and went straight into breastmilk production. Yummy.
Well, apparently the doctor found me crazy enough to warrant the application of the still-controversial ECT. He explained to me that he does bifrontal ECT rather than traditional unilateral or bilateral. He told me that with unilateral the results were unpredictable, that yes there were few side effects but the positive effects were not satisfactory to him. With bifrontal he claims an 80% apparent remission rate, although he was hesitant to use the word remission because as I'm sure we all know, the effects of ECT are not exactly permanent: maintenance treatments must be done and even with those there is a chance of eventual relapse. I do see statistics online as lower then the 80% he quoted me, but either way I am sure I have a good chance of significant improvement at least. I will explain the different types of ECT in a follow-up post.
I am optimistic about this treatment, I am excited about the idea of not needing as much medicine. I hope this blog is useful to youif you are considering ECT or are interested in learning about and understanding the procedure and the people who get such a publicly controversial treatment.
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