Giving up hope

Thank you. Xx

Thank you for your kind words.

I've just had a medication review and been told to stick at the ones I'm on, I've been on so many in the past, I know they can take a while to kick in but these are making me so much worse.

I'm beginning to think meds don't work for me but unfortunately the waiting list I'm on for psychotherapy is 9 months - a year long, so feeling a little desperate.

Thanks again xx

You are the expert on your own well being so if a certain medication isn't making you better then your doctor needs to listen to you , there so  many different types and it can take a long time before you find the right one that suits you , i am on 375mg Venlafaxine morning  , 45mg Mirtazapine night and  i like you am struggling but fortunately i am under local CMHT and the psychiatrist there is going to try other medication .

See I've tried venlafaxine before and it didn't suit me.

Currently on citalopram (which isn't working and causing my sleep to be even worse) and then I went to see CMHT and the psychiatrist there said I should increase citalopram and add in mirtazapine (which I've also been on before and it didn't suit me).

So I've followed their advice but if anything I feel worse/ it's only been 2 and a half weeks on the increased citalopram and mirtazapine so they want me to give it another 2 and a half weeks...

I just don't think it's working or that it will start to work but feel I have to at least give it a go as that's what they've recommended for me...

Just feeling fed up with it all I guess! xxx

Unfortunately all medication takes a while to work , my own doctor prescribed me Mirtazapine and in the early days it work - slept well , my physical health has worsen since i was diagnosed with blood clots on the lungs last  Summer ( no reason for it ) and my breathing is bad , i have arthitis as well , so my physical health has made my mental health   worse . I am to start Art Therapy soon ,please take care xxx

So sorry to hear about your health problems.

I totally understand about physical problems feeding in to the mental health problems.

I've just been told I have severe changes to my cervix after latest smear test. So now I have to wait and find out how bad the changes are...

Doesn't exactly help the low mood or anxiety.

I hope you feel better soon and thank you for being so kind xxx

Yes -  changes to ones health can make us struggle to understand , make us more depressed  , i hope your health matter is not as bad as you though i appreciate it can be serious , please take care xxx

Thank you yes, hopefully all will be ok.

I guess it's just bad timing, it's never easy to get used to new meds and so adding further worry and stress about my health wasn't exactly what I needed right now!

You take care my love, hope you feel better soon xx

Hi it's quite common to feel worse for a while until the meds kick in.  Please stay with them for at least 4/6 weeks to start taking effect.  If they haven't by then go back to your doctors.  You might benefit from a combination of 2 or more but it can take time to find the right ones.  x

Hi,

Thanks for the advice; I've been on both separately in the past and they haven't worked.

I am going to give this combo a good try though, I'm desperate and I give everything my dr/psychiatrist advises a good go.

Only few exceptions when I've taken them and literally thrown up an hour later. But that's in the past.

I really put my all in to getting better, I try my hardest.

On an unrelated note, I received a letter today from my new psychiatrist that ccd in my new GP, in it he mentioned very specific details that I know for a fact I didn't tell him. He also stated things as fact (such as my living situation) that haven't been true for 18 months, again nothing I mentioned to him (this was my first appt with him).

I understand that notes are shared but his letter to my GP was outdated, infactual, and not anything I had told him.

I'm pretty angry about it.

Do I have a reason to be?

Sorry for the questions and thank you xxx

Hi Audrey,

I've experienced the misinformation in my medical notes and cc'd letters between GPs, psychiatrists, OH, etc. All I can say is, try not to take it too personally as long as the facts don't compromise your immediate medical care. For the time that we are with our health professionals for our appointment, they are very professional but then sometimes after the event when they are writing up our notes and remembering the details of our case (amid the jumble of all their other cases!) some things can get distorted, wrongly-remembered, or exaggerated so that they don't reflect the truth of our situation. I remember the first time this happened to me and I took great offence (my psychotherapist was referring to his notes and trying to insist something had happened to me in a completely wrong time-frame which was giving him wrong assumptions). In the grand scale of things I realised that it didn't really matter and I gave him the benefit of the doubt, thinking of all the other patients he must see. However, if you think the wrong facts could have implications on your future care and treatment then I would ask for them to be corrected as politely and assertively as you can manage. Perhaps make a copy of the letter and make the corrections yourself and hand it to your health professional at your next appointment. Hopefully it will set your mind at rest but I'm sure the misinformation hasn't been entered deliberately.

Wishing you all the best :-)

Thank you for your reply.

I've experienced this before too, it's just that this letter was such a mash up of incorrect details and information I hadn't given to the person writing the letter or anybody on his team.

To be perfectly honest, the psychiatrist in question wasn't all that professional/helpful/sympathetic in person either...

The fact that I'm most unhappy about as he stated in the letter that my father engaged in a type of illegal activity. This has absolutely NOTHING to do with me or my situation and it was only something I mentioned 2 years ago as a suspicion of mine to my then psychologist. So to see it written in black and white as if its a) a fact b) recent c) something I've spoken to him about d) remotely relevant was quite a shock.

He also stated in the letter that my uncle has committed suicide (he hasn't or even been suicidal, but he is terminally ill with a completely unrelated medical condition) so this upset me.

He also stated I was abused as a child, which I wasn't, and I don't really know what he meant by that at all.

There were numerous other errors about meds, dates etc that to be honest, I normally shrug off and don't mind, but the bigger things I mentioned above, those I mind.

I'm just scared to rock the boat and say anything incase they're even less sympathetic next time I see them.

Not sure what to do.

xxx

Hi,

This level of inaccuracy sounds as if it needs to be put right so if I were in your position, I'd detail the corrections just as you have hear to reflect the truth. Someone you trust your health to should be acting on all the correct information as something as inaccurate as childhood abuse is very serious and leads to all kinds of assumptions. Health professionals have a duty to keep our medical records as accurate as possible and these just don't sound like minor errors. Don't be afraid to put things straight so that everyone involved in your care has the correct picture and no wrong ideas. Are you still needing to see the unsympathetic psychiatrist in the future? There should be others on the team whom you could see instead. They have thick skins so you are entitled to ask to see someone else without being penalised.

Good luck! Let us know how you get on. Hugs xx

When a therapist that i had been seeing for CBT ,she ended the sessions as i have trouble verbally expressing myself , when i got the copy of the letter that was sent to my GP there was a comment in it that wasn't true and i was upset about it , my GP said that she had to put down why she ceased the appointment , i left bad feedback on our local NHS Healthcare webpage and the customer service gentleman asked if i wanted to make a complaint , i thought about it and decided yes as i did not want that comment on my record , so i went forward with the complaint with the help of a local Advocacy , the womans higher up boss said it was a badly written letter so did my doctor so that helpeda little it took from May to September last year ( i stopped the therapy early May ) to eventually have that letter recalled from my record and a rewritten one sent instead - the reason we told it took so long was because the therapist was off sick all summer and in the end her boss at the centre rewrote it . The psychiatrist i saw at my local Cmht i didn't like as he would be watching my every move and he would put down in his report things like i was sighing a lot - of course i was i had breathlessness from my lung problem , his reports always caused much upset and it made me weary of him and i dreaded seeing him , he has since moved to another Cmht in the county , the lady they got now is fmuch nicer , more understanding to my anxieties , difficult i have verbally getting things out more patient , the room has a more relaxed feeling to it , she isn't jotting down little notes and i have probably got out more to her then i ever did with the old psychiatrist - he must have been in his 60's , it is difficult having someone who isn't very good , making force claims , etc as it then makes you look bad when another official reads your notes .

Yes I think you're right.

I only got the letter yesterday so I decided to sleep on it and see how I felt about it today.

I'm still not happy so will have to address this.

I'm supposed to be seeing the psychiatrist again in 4 weeks to have a medication review, but to be honest I might be able to just do this with my GP. I will speak to her about it.

Thank you for the advice, take care, xxx

Agh I'm so sorry you've had similar experiences.

It's not nice getting the letters that aren't correct and sometimes quite insulting!

I'm pleased you've got a nicer psychiatrist now, I hope I can get one too as I know it can make the world of difference!

Thanks for your replies, take care xxx