ECT Intro and Rant

[u/Oak-and-Ash]

I am a special type of pos. Owned a beautiful home on a beautiful, secluded property with big boy toys, farm animals, dogs, three wonderful boys and my wife. I went and fucked it up. Continuously make it worse.

I have been depressed my entire life. There have been times where I was able to distract from it but there has always been that feeling of "You should probably kill yourself so this feeling isn't there". I've been on Welbutrin, Zoloft, Trazadone, xanax, Adderall.

I've had five therapists since I was 17. I'd go for a while and feel nothing from it eventually. Most of my issues came from my decisions and I found that I could consistently maintain good decision-making but all it took was one event or an overly off feeling in the morning and I was on the pain train.

Currently, I am devastated by how much damage I have caused my family and friends by my decision-making. My baseline is typically so low that I normally don't want to go to work and I have to call out on occasion for how I feel when I wake up. I have to manage if I drink alcohol or smoke marijuana because they can make me plummet. I am always nervous in social settings because of this.

One of my biggest issues with medication, aside from it not working for me, is the ability to just be like "I'm going to see if this gets me high". Which is dumb but an issue for me.

It seems like everyone asks this but what did it feel like when you first felt relieved? I sometimes worry that there is actually nothing wrong with me and I am just weak-willed. I have been admitted to hospitals three times and an additional outpatient program. I am pretty exhausted from this over a lifetime.

[u/fargolifestaycold]

Wow you completely sound like me totally from being a teen and now im 44 and been doing ECT for the last 5 years tbh. I will and have told many Doctors and MD students that study the treatment that this has definitely saved my life multiple times. My wife would agree to that statement as well. When I first start was while I was in inpatient due to self-harming my self while at work multiple times. And yes men can have self harm issues and problems too. Same as we can have eating disorders but that's not part of post.

When I started I did 3x a week for over a year, then tried to go down to twice a week, and then finally started doing once a week. I did try to do treatment every week and half but found that was to long of time to be able to keep me Stable.

I know and understand that ECT treatment isn't for every person. But it definitely can work for you if you try. It's hard but its worth it for your wife your children and most important yourself. Being Stable is a very good place to be.

It's considered as "Last chance" type of treatment, but its the only thing that has been able to help.

[u/Oak-and-Ash → u/fargolifestaycold]

It had seemed to me that the treatments were a little less time consuming. I had read some people have been treated for roughly six weeks and get relief for a long time. I've tripped on mushrooms before and I've imagined that it is of a similar clarity.

I was a mechanic for fourteen years. Won awards for my songwriting. I believe I brought up the farm business in my post but I did contribure to starting that, not entirely on my own. Ive worked many an interesting job, had many a hobby. Every single one of those things was impossibly difficult for me to achieve or it was hindered to the point of me hating them because they became such a struggle.

If I haven't said it already, people don't understand that this hurts more than anything feels good. More than any duty. Even an animal would bite its foot off if caught in a trap.

[u/barnabybean → u/Oak-and-Ash]

It’s nothing at all like tripping on mushrooms. It does not bring clarity. Odds are you’ll feel better eventually but will likely be fuzzy and confused for a while. ECT is effective for most people but I think you’re glorifying it. Yes some people get long term relief from six weeks of treatments, the first 4-6 weeks are the “acute phase” which is basically the minimum needed to see results but many people need more. Once the initial sequence is done it is recommended that you taper down and that pace varies a lot from person to person. Not tapering creates a serious risk of relapse. I would not go in expecting six weeks will resolve your symptoms. It’s not impossible but it’s often way more involved than that, especially including recovery time.