I recently read something by Kay Jamison, a famous expert on bipolar disorder. She suggested charting mood.
What a great idea I though. Her argument really was rather compelling. By doing so I would be able to see trends in my moods, predict my next cycle, and so on.
But quickly reality set in. I can not do this, at least not by myself. And when I am finally stable enough to remember to do such a thing every day (not to mention at the same time each day), then I suppose I will no longer need to chart anyway.
Part of success with bipolar (at least for me) is knowing yourself. This attempt to chart mood, would most likely just add to life's daily frustrations. Not to mention, creating the chart, would be a whole other issue.
I think I would like to someday chart my mood, but not today.
Has anyone been successful with mood charting? What did you learn about your bipolar?
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
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I chart my moods... I started with these charts:
http://www.cci.health.wa.gov.au/docs/WS-Mood%20Monitoring.pdf
http://www.cci.health.wa.gov.au/docs/WS-Symptom%20Monitoring-bipolar.pdf
To begin with, it was my therapist who made me chart... but now I chart for her, and for me.
I can be really really hard on myself, and it helps me to be able to say, oh, yesterday was a -3, so it was good that I managed to get to work, I won't worry about how much I actually achieved there...
The charts are also useful because when I get stuck in the middle of a particularly bad depressive period, they're there to remind me that I never stay that low forever!
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