zeecookie

feel better

Hmm - shock treatment.

I've had that.

Of course, they don't call it "shock treatment" anymore, they call it Electro-Convulsive Therapy (ECT). It's very unpleasant. The idea is, for reasons that doctors don't fully understand, applying an electric shock to the temples of a sedated patient, causes convulsions - when the patient wakes up, they supposedly have an elevated mood. It is generally a treatment of last resort for people with severe depression who have not responded well to medication.

That's me in a nutshell.

I had the treatments for about nine months, before they suddenly decided that it wasn't working. I was optimistic in the beginning, but eventually, it just became a weekly ritual. Side effects are severe headaches (there's a surprise!), disorientation and memory loss. There are a lot of things I don't remember from during the time I was in treatment, as well as certain things that happened even before I started treatment. They told me that the effect would be temporary, but my experience is that it was permanent.

After the failure of ECT for me, I have now exhausted all standard treatment regimens. The only thing left for me is an experimental treatment involving applying a massive electro-magnetic field directly to the frontal cortex (I think). I have yet to really look into it, but as usual, doctors are claiming that "this could be it - the miracle cure!"

Time will tell, time will tell....

I hope this helps

LittleK15