Update

Just to give you a “heads up,” I am most likely going into the hospital today or Monday. Hopefully, I won’t be there too long.

Because of the economic and employment situation right now, among other things, I do not have any of the medications I supposed to be taking, for allergies and asthma, hormone replacement, thyroid stuff, etc.

I have been working with an organization for the mentally ill, a part of the Interim, Inc., program in Marina, CA, and called MCHOME. They are assisting me in finding housing (although, since I am married, that is harder for them, finding a job, securing SSI/SSDI, and obtaining appropriate psychiatric care and medication. Based on the last few years, my current state of mind, and my past history, their professionals now believe that rather than the various diagnoses I have been given over the years: depression, anxiety, dysthymia, borderline personality disorder, PTSD, OCD, panic disorder, etc., that these various and sundry issues actually all constitute the diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder Type II.

Bipolar Disorder Type II is marked by “mood swings without mania,” or alternating states of major depression and hyper-irritability, as opposed to the manic and depressive episodes that define Bipolar Disorder Type I. A person diagnosed as Bipolar disorder Type II presents symptoms that can be defined as “more than just plain depression, but not delusional or psychotic”. I doubt I could ever have been perceived as being “manic” in my entire life. But my problems with depression, anxiety, irritability, panic, fear, social anxiety, etc., date back almost as far as I can remember, or at least to when my parents first took me to a psychiatrist or psychologist, when I was 8, I think.

Bipolar Disorder Type II involves the following sorts of issues:

• Depression that doesn’t get better with antidepressants or psychotherapy. Or people who, even before such treatment, obviously don’t have "depression" alone. In addition to depression, such a person might have extreme anxiety; or severe difficulty sleeping; or fits of anger over something minimal; or episodes of crying over something like a TV commercial. Or you may have noticed, "mood swings": big changes in mood or energy for no clear reason.
• Psychiatry finally put this very different kind of depression into the diagnosis rulebook about 5 years ago, though many mood experts had been talking about it for years. It is a relative of manic-depressive disorder, even though people who have it do not have "manic" episodes as such. Instead, the manic energy shows up in all different ways, without any loss of contact with reality (not "going crazy").
• Bipolar Disorder has many variations. Bipolar II is one of them. You'll read here about those forms which do not have "mania" to make them stand out or easily recognizable. Depression is the main symptom, including especially sleeping too much, extreme fatigue, and lack of motivation. What makes bipolar depression different is the presence of something else as well.
• But that "something else" often does not look anything like mania: "hypomania" […] can show up as huge sleep changes, irritability, agitation/anxiety, and difficulty concentrating.^Benazzi And finally, some people can have some bipolarity without any hypomania at all. Really.
• Hypomania: Technically, this is literally "little" mania — the familiar symptoms but less so:
• • Mood much better than normal
  • Rapid speech
  • Little need for sleep
  • Racing thoughts, trouble concentrating
  • Continuous high energy
  • Overconfidence
• You may have noticed that "delusions" have disappeared from the list: these are by definition not found in Bipolar II. A patient who has had the above symptoms repeatedly, without having delusions, is much less likely to lose contact with reality (including abnormal perceptions such as auditory hallucinations, which are common in bipolar mania) than a patient who has experienced delusions.
• "Bipolar II" is technically the combination of hypomanic phases with separate phases of severe depression. If the depressive phases are only mild, the term "cyclothymia" is used.

OK, I’ll quit with the education stuff. I just wanted to give you a brief explanation of what’s going on with some descriptives of the symptoms so that you, hopefully, understand better.

The counselor from MCHOME says I should expect to be in the hospital for about a week.