My ECT Journey: A Reference & Experience Blog

My personal experience with Electro-Convulsive Therapy. This is a start to finish diary-style info blog that can be used as a reference on what to expect if you are interested in ECT. Includes: How I got a referral, ECT evaluation process, analysis on before and after each treatment, and my symptoms. CLICK ON THE POST DATES (at the bottom of each post) TO VIEW POSTS AT FULL SIZE IF YOU ARE VIEWING FROM A COMPUTER. -CHECK ARCHIVES TO VIEW POSTS BY DATE!-

[myectjourney]

So I went through ect last year. Mentally, I’m a much stronger person and it really benefitted me. The biggest problem I’m facing now is the memory loss. The more time that’s passed the more I realize I’ve forgotten. It’s frustrating and embarrassing to not be able to remember important things that have happened in my life. But I wanted to ask if you have any advice for digging up lost memories?

That's great to hear on the mentally stronger part!

I understand the struggle with memory loss all too well.

The best methods for regaining memories for me was honestly reading old diary entries, looking through your own photos and social media accounts, talking to family and friends about it and ask them to recall moments you had together. This helps you be able to put some pieces together and helps you visualize certain experiences.

It can be tiring and even a little disheartening because it's almost like a reminder of all the things you don't remember but these things DO help improve your memory some.

It's also important to do memory exercises and games as cliche as that sounds.

Your short term memory is the most affected by ECT and your ability to retain memories.

Basically, in order to keep the memories that you are relearning, brain/memory exercises are SO important.

Even though it annoys me, I play the game "SET" with my partner and am constantly quizzing myself on things.

Hopefully these pointers help and I know there is a lot of other ways to help regain memories that you can totally look up on the internet.

Most important thing to remember though is that it will take a lot of time for some folks. Your brain will automatically try and piece things together for awhile. Just make sure you're not pushing yourself TOO hard. 💕

[myectjourney]

hi! so, i finished ECT about 2 months ago and i still can’t remember most things i’ve forgotten. see, when i was in inpatient doing ECT, i met my current girlfriend and it’s so annoying that i can barely remember meeting her and talking to her in the hospital because i was going through ECT at the time. i think i had about 7 or 8 unilateral treatments and you seem to know a lot about ECT so i was wondering if you knew when and how many of my memories might come back, if they even will at all? :(

I am not a doctor and every person is different when it comes to when/how memories come back but I can tell you my personal experience and what I've observed from others:

My ECT doctor said it could take anywhere between 2-12 months to have memories come back. That's a VERY broad time frame. For me, I ended up being part of the 1% probability of not getting my memories back at all (I lost a good 3-4 years worth). That said, I don't want people to get anxiety about this happening since the probability is super low.

It's hard to hear but some memories might not come back, especially if it was during the duration of your treatment. When your brain is having those seizures induced over and over again on a semi-daily basis, it has trouble RETAINING memories during this time. This is definitely something I think all ECT doctors should mention before someone gets treatment.

Many month after my treatment ended, I started to remember some small things from during my treatment days but that came from people around me repeatedly telling me exact memories so I could reconstruct them in my mind. Sometimes, your memories will come in the form of short-burst flashbacks. For me, it was like seeing a snapshot, sort of like a photo. I never have had the conventional "flashback" that people tend to think of when they think of a flashback (aka like a short video) but I know other people who have had ECT do get those kinds of flashbacks as well.

TL;DR:

To summarize,

1. They might not come back at all because your brains ability to retain memories is compromised during treatment.

2. Best way that I have discovered is to hear experiences/accounts from the people who were around you so you can try to reconstruct the memories in your head. If there are photos or videos, that is an added bonus!

3. Remember that it's okay and totally normal that this is happening. It hurts, sometimes it makes you feel guilty, sometimes it makes things seem unreal, but you are real, those experiences were real even if you can't remember, and it's okay if it takes your brain a long time to remember or if you never do. It's so important to cut yourself some slack of else you will drive yourself into a hole of anxiety, guilt, and depression all over again. That's what happened with me...

Plus, if they don't come back, this is a great opportunity to basically start over/rekindle the relationship. Basically, starting fresh can be good! You already have the foundation, getting to know each other from the beginning might be fun and romantic?

I hope this helps and I wish you best of luck!

You should check in with your ECT doctor about this too. They might have other useful tips! It's worth a try! 💗

[myectjourney]

Are you definitely done? I'm really struggling, in that I'd like nothing more than to not go to my 28th tomorrow...but I feel like it would turn out to be a huge mistake. I'm dreading it but I know I will feel a huge sense of relief when they give me the oxygen. Ugghh..

I have to be honest, I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to this at first.

After making an office visit with my ECT doctor, we decided mutually that it was okay for me to stop. So yes, I am done for now. My doctor made it very clear that I am always welcome to come back if I need it so now I know that ECT will always be an option for me if I feel like I need to go back to it.

As for you canceling, I can’t tell you what to do on that. I would go with your gut though. If you feel like it isn’t time for you to stop, don’t stop. If you feel like you can’t take it anymore, that it isn’t for you, or that you feel like it’s helped and it’s a good time to stop, then stop. THAT SAID, I would seriously advise you to make an in-office visit with your ECT doctor or clinic before you stop and talk about how you are feeling and why. Then you will have confirmation that you are making the right choice and hopefully gain some other insight as well.

If you feel pressured to do it even if you don’t want to after an office visit, you are your own boss and have the right to quit whenever you want. Like my doctor told me, you can always come back to it. It’s not like if you stop, you can never do it again. Quite the opposite actually! Most people with chronic depression who get ECT take breaks or feel an improvement for awhile and then decide to go back if the depression starts coming back or gets unmanageable. 

Stay safe and I hope you are able to figure things out!

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #28 (8/1/2018)

This is my twenty-eighth electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my sixteenth bilateral procedure.

Pre-treatment analysis:

I'm not going to lie, I almost cancelled my appointment today. This would have been my last appointment because I was going to stop ECT completely. The reason is:

1.) This is the last appointment I had scheduled at this point and

2.) I finally feel like my life is getting back to normal and like it's time for me to move on with my life...also I feel like my anxiety is now more at the forefront and I know ECT isn't really meant for treating that. It also takes a lot of money for me to go up to the treatment center because It's a 3 hour drive away from where I live.

I called my ECT doctor first because I wanted to get her opinion before I did anything and she convinced me not to cancel because she was worried that if I stop now, I will decline again. She told me that right now my treatments are just maintenance treatments, doing it every other week just to make sure I stay the way I am currently and not really to improve my depression anymore and that I have only one more month left of treatments and they will only be every 3 weeks after this one. So I'm going to keep going.

Now to how I’ve been feeling lately:

I feel anxious because I'm starting to realize just how much I have forgotten due to the ECT. For example, how to set the microwave to a specific time. Which is silly really but kind of bothers me. There are other things too but I can’t even name everything. I knew this was going to be a side effect, I was warned. But it’s much different being told it’s part of the side effects and actually going through it. At first it wasn’t even very bad and to be honest, even as my memory got worse, I held on to that hope of my memory returning eventually after all this is over and I give my self awhile to recover. Basically, I wasn’t really worried about it and pushed any doubt or anxiety I might have had at the back of my mind. But now, after reducing my treatments, I finally feel like things are coming back and that life is getting back to "normal" (whatever that means) to the point maybe I can start moving on with my life. I want to keep recovering my memory. I was told by my doctor over the phone that my with my maintenance treatments, my memory shouldn’t be affected anymore. The thing is, I am still having issues with my memory still. Granted, I am at MAX shock and doing bilateral treatments so I'm going to probably have maximum side effects. On top of that, I have a LONG HISTORY of always having complications or the worst side effects for pretty much anything so when I say all this, I don’t want others to worry and be scared that this is going to happen to you because you don’t know that, I don’t know that, and I have a lot of other things going on with me that may be causing this. :)

Here's the thing: I have an anxiety disorder and PTSD on top of Treatment Resistant Depression. I guess for some people, ECT has a chance of getting rid of depression completely. But with all the other things I have, I KNOW that MY depression is never going to be cured because of my PTSD because of all my trauma. It's different for different people and others with PTSD may feel differently than I do or improve more than I am. I know myself though and I know this will never go away for me and I'm okay with that because even if I'm not "cured", ECT has helped so much and made my depression way more manageable. That is good enough for me!

Anyways, that's how I've been feeling, what's been going on, and with some info about ECT.

Side note (reiteration): Maintenance treatments should not effect your memory anymore and your memory will continue to improve despite of treatments because they are, again, just maintenance according to my doctor.

Post-treatment:

Before I got put under, I asked the doctor performing my procedure this time if my shock is getting reduced as I go down on the frequency of my treatments. The answer is no. Just wanted to put that out there in case anyone else was curious too.

I woke up...feeling done. Once I was awake enough, they wheeled me into the discharge/recovery room, gave me some juice, and as soon as I got out of there, I realized that I think my body has had it’s limit and that I have had all the effective treatments I can possibly have. I understand the need for maintenance treatments and why they do it but I feel like if I continue to go, I will get worse again, which is counterproductive. Ironically, reducing my depression has made all my other mental illnesses worse because now I am focusing on them more...which is making me more depressed. It’s interesting how something can help/work for awhile and then contradict it’s self.

Like I said earlier, ECT had helped me a lot and I don’t regret doing this but I think this might be my limit. You know yourself better than anyone else so try to know your limits.

So this might be my last treatment OR it might not be and I might do my last month of maintenance, which really isn’t much. Every 3 weeks is only 2 more appointments. BUT we will see. I have an office visit next week to discuss what to do next and of course I plan to bring up everything I wrote here. I hope everyone reading is doing well and may all your treatments be the best they can be!  

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: All questions answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: All but one question answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (moderate)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Okay.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate-severe)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (minor)

Symptoms:

● Fatigue (minor)

● Nausea (moderate)

~ End of ECT day #28 ~

[myectjourney]

thanks so much for writing all this down. I've been really worried about my own ECT coming up and even though it still terrifies me, I feel like I know a bit more of what to expect

Thank YOU! I’m so glad this blog has achieved it’s goal! I made this blog because before I started my ECT, all the research I had done was so vague and there wasn’t much out there so I thought “hey why not document my experience as throughly as I can so others can see”. I really appreciate you reaching out, especially because I am always wondering if it’s actually helpful. I hope your ECT goes well and if you ever have any questions or talk, feel free to message me!

[myectjourney]

Hi. I’m considering ECT but I’m terrified. Will I forget the people I care about, who are around to support me everyday?

Oh, I would say definitely not! I can't speak for others and of course I'm no doctor but for me the memory loss is more like "what did I eat for dinner last night again?" Or not remembering all conversation I've had. Mostly difficulty recalling my memories but when someone reminds me or tells me something that happened, I vaguely remember again. A lot of people who have messaged me with fears and questions about the memory loss side effect who are also going through E.C.T. have said they've had similar experiences. It's important to remember the severity of the side effects varies so much from person to person too. Apparently I am having more issues with this side effect specifically more than most people, according to my doctor. It's also important to remember that any memories you've lost from E.C.T. will come back. It's all supposed to be temporary. I hope that answers your question and eases any anxiety/fear you may have! :) I am here to answer any questions to the best of my ability if anyone wants to message me on here.

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #27 (7/18/2018)

This is my twenty-seventh electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my fifteenth bilateral procedure.

Pre-treatment analysis:

This is my first appointment in 2 weeks which means I had a pretty long break.

To be honest, it really hasn’t been so bad! I had a day or two where I felt a lot of anxiety or depression mostly based on things happening around me but sometimes those kinds of things are unavoidable. I really felt like these last two weeks went pretty well and I was happy to notice some of my memories coming back to me. This is a huge deal for me because losing some of my memories was the hardest part of doing ECT for me. In fact, one of those days I was feeling a lot of anxiety was actually yesterday because I was/still am really nervous and doubtful about going to ECT today mainly because I feel like I’ve made so much progress with regaining memories that I am scared I am going to lose all of that when I go back in today. Part of me thought “maybe I should cancel and just stop doing ECT altogether. I am feeling mostly fine and my depression is manageable now (which is wasn’t before) so whats even the point of going back? I want to remember the things I forgot more than anything right now.” but then another part of me thought “I need to go back and finish what I started. There is a reason they tapper you off so you don’t go into a full depressive relapse. Do you want that? No. You have to go and take the risk.”. It’s never fun to be felt like your own brain is pulling you in two different directions.

So here I am, about to drive up to my appointment. I decided that it was worth the risk and even if it sucks to feel like you are recovering memories just to have them ripped from you again, it’s not worth being SUPER depressed all the time. It’s not worth feeling like you want to die all the time. It’s not worth sitting on your couch or bed wondering what is wrong with you because you have a mental illness or multiple mental illnesses and hoping that somehow you will just fade away from existence.

Remember that if you can when you are also feeling doubt about going back to your ECT appointments. Remember THERE IS A REASON THEY SCHEDULED YOU THE WAY THEY DID. This is the treatment plan they thought was best for you so you can have the best results and recovery.

I understand what it’s like to have that doubt and anxiety in your head that tells you “Is it worth going to if I feel crappy about going and that in its self is making me more depressed and anxious?”. I wonder that too and am going into my appointment feeling that way. “Is it worth it?” is the big question. I don’t have all the answers but I can say if you can manage to get past that doubt, I think it’ll be okay and you will make it through. If you can’t get past it, maybe you should stop because maybe that means it isn’t working out for you OR maybe your shock level needs to be upped or if you are doing unilateral, maybe you need to switch to bilateral. EITHER WAY, make sure you tell your doctor what you are feeling and thinking. Get their opinion on what to do next. Don’t just quit out without saying anything because that could potentially make you so much worse. I will always say this over and over again: communicate with your doctor! I can’t even emphasize how important that is. If you don’t, you will be stuck with that doubt forever and possibly spiral into that pit of fear and depression again and doctors can only help you to the best of their abilities if they know what is going on and you are fully open, honest, and receptive.

I plan on bringing up my doubts today before they shock me and will update on what they say if I can remember. If not, I will schedule an office visit to discuss these fears and doubts.

For all the people out there reading because they are getting ECT, STAY STRONG! You are doing your best and you GOT this! <3

Post-treatment:

I feel like this treatment session went well. I talked with my ECT doctor about my fear of losing the memories I am regaining and before they put me under for my procedure, they reassured me that one ECT treatment will not reset my all my progress with my memory. They also reassured me that my recollection of memories will improve as I go down on the frequency of treatments as well. Hearing that definitely helped me feel less anxious before the anesthetic was injected.

This confirms what I was saying earlier on how it is so important to talk to your doctors about how you are feeling not just physically but mentally. It can also be beneficial for you if you are already getting these treatments done because keeping it all bottled up and not having your questions answered can counteract your progress because it’ll make you feel more anxious and depressed.

That aside, after I woke up I felt fine. Just a hungry and a little spacey as usual. The rest of the day I was able to do things like run a few errands with the help of my partner. I didn’t feel like I lost much memory after this session. Maybe a little harder to recall the previous day but it wasn’t completely wiped from my brain or anything.

Over all, I’d say things went well.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: All questions answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: All but one question answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Good.

Tiredness: Yes (minor)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (very minor)

Symptoms:

● Headache (moderate)

● Loss of balance (minor)

● Fatigue (minor)

~ End of ECT day #27 ~

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #26 (7/5/2018)

This is my twenty-sixth electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my fourteenth bilateral procedure.

Pre-treatment analysis:

Another up and down week. Its been hard to reduce my treatments because I can feel my depression kind of coming back and I'm having mental breakdowns when I get triggered or too depressed to the point where I'm afraid that I need to be hospitalized. The good news is I haven't.

I'm going to keep on saying this but its important to know that ECT isn't a cure. It feels like it for awhile but it really isn't and sometimes it doesn't hit you until you are only doing it once a week or every 2 weeks.

I have an appointment to sign myself into an Intensive Outpatient Program which is a lot like being put in an Inpatient facility without, well, being stuck there or forced to take medication. It'll go well alongside the ECT because it will have group therapy and will teach me coping skills, etc. and It'll be good for me because I think with all my mental illnesses, I have a hard time figuring out how to calm myself down, hence the mental breakdowns.

I also have been having really strange dreams, especially since I reduced my treatments but when I wake up, I don’t remember them…it’s strange. I just know they were really weird.

I meet with one of my doctors before my ECT procedure to discuss all of this and talk about my next steps. Hopefully I will get to stick to the original plan and this will be my last once a week procedure!

Post-treatment:

The talk with my doctor went well and she agreed with my plan to do Intensive Outpatient Therapy and continue with the original ECT schedule which means this was my last once a week procedure! My next appointment will be in 2 weeks. The plan is: If after my the new program I will be participating in I am still feeling really depressed, we will increase my treatments again. The program will last around a month so until then, I will continue doing the ECT once every two weeks.

Treatment went well and fast. I woke up a little disorientated and sore in my shoulders and for some reason my feet but other than that I was fine.

The rest of the day I was a little spacey and sore too so I decided to relax and not to much.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: Answered all questions correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: Answered half correctly and half incorrectly with moderate hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Okay.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (minor)

Symptoms:

● Loss of balance (minor)

● Disorientated (moderate)

● Sore (moderate)

~ End of ECT day #26 ~

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #25 (6/28/2018)

This is my twenty-fifth electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my thirteenth bilateral procedure.

Pre-treatment analysis:

***TRIGGER WARNING: Talk about depression and suicide***

I’ve not being doing well this last week. It turns out having those bi-frontal procedures was not a good idea for me and probably didn’t work AT ALL, meaning it was pretty much like taking 2 full weeks off when I was not quite ready yet. I mentioned this before, that my doctors had warned me about how this could happen and it could just not work at all; but I’m noting yet again that this doesn’t happen for everyone and sometimes it works just fine. It just turns out that for me, I do better with bi-temporal treatments.

Moving on, because of practically taking a 2 week break, I had a huge downward spiral with my depression. I have had a hard time coping with pretty much anything, having panic attacks and mental breakdowns on a fairly regular basis, feeling crippling depression (not being able to move, not being able to speak, etc.), and thinking about my own death. There have been many times this week that I have thought about ending my own life and have asked to be taken to the hospital if it progressed any further. LUCKILY, I am okay and that didn’t need to happen.

My partner and I have been talking about why this is happening right now and speculate that I am going to have get back into the swing of bi-temporal treatments before I start to see improvement again. I’ve only had 1 treatment (last treatment) so far since I decided to switch back so that makes the most logical sense that I’m going to need a few more treatments until I start feeling better again. Of course this makes me feel really sad and disappointed in myself even if it shouldn’t and there is no reason for that...I was just doing really well and now I feel like that has been ripped from me. I have a fear of losing my memory so having memory loss and not being able to retain memories being one of the possible side effects is terrifying for me. It makes me depressed that the treatment type that reduces those side effects doesn’t work for me and I feel like somehow it’s my fault for being flawed even though that’s not true. I have an office visit next week to talk about what to do next and I’m nervous that they will tell me I need to go back to having more treatments a week. I guess I’ll have to wait and see.

I just have to do my best to keep my head up and continue my treatments. I have to believe that things will get better and my depression will improve again. It happened before, it can happen again.

Post-treatment: 

Before the anesthesiologist put me under, I told my ECT doctor about my week and I told him that I thought maybe the reason I am so depressed again is probably because having those bi-frontal treatments was like pretty much not doing any treatments at all and he agreed that may have been the case. Of course, as I predicted, he mentioned that it might be a good idea to go up on my weekly treatments. He said I should talk to my other ECT doctor when I have my office visit next week about if she agrees I should go up to doing them twice a week.

I am going to honest, the frequency of these appointments and how long I have been doing them is bringing me down and tiresome. My partner has to pay a lot of gas money in order to drive me up and down to the hospital I get my treatments. He also has had to take a lot of work off which means we have less money. Things will be okay but I am tired. I don’t regret doing any of this. For the first time ever, I have some hope that my depression can be managed and that I can actually be happy. At the same time, it feels ironic how counterproductive this all is; I start to feel more depressed thinking about the fact that I have to keep going back. At first, it was fine. I was fine with how much I had to go out of the way because I wanted to feel anything but the way I was feeling. When the procedures started working, I was ecstatic. I started having hope again. Hope that I could get out of the house again, find a job, move on, keep my mental illnesses under wraps. I knew it wasn’t a cure all but something is better than nothing, especially when pills or anything hasn’t worked for you. But right now it just feels...like I want it to be over because I’ve already been doing this for pretty much 3 months. It’s like I am having a hard time getting that I will probably be doing this for a long time. That I will be having to come back to keep myself less depressed. That it’s a TREATMENT not a cure. When I started to feel better, it felt almost like I was cured. Having that ripped from you is terrifying. Realizing that you might be doing this for the rest of your life, even if it’s rarely, feels so TIRESOME. I guess I am fed up with myself. I have to keep reminding myself it will get better again. I plan on being part of a program to help me learn coping skills so that way I am not solely depending on ECT and others.

Back to how the procedure went:

Things went fine. I am actually feeling like my depression is more tolerable after this treatment. This means my partner and I were right and switching back to the bi-temporal treatments and having more of them IS helping.

I just have a lot on my mind.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: Answered all questions correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: Answered all but one question correctly with minor hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Good.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (minor)

Symptoms:

● Headache (moderate)

● Nausea (moderate)

● Dizzy (minor)

~ End of ECT day #25 ~

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #24 (6/21/2018)

This is my twenty-fourth electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my twelfth bilateral procedure.

I’m also switching back to bi-temporal electrode placement.

Pre-treatment analysis:

I’m going to be completely honest, this has been a rough week. I was doing extremely well when I was having the bi-temporal treatments done; I was seeing major improvement in my depression and how I was coping with things that upset me. Since I started doing the bi-frontal treatments though, I’ve definitely felt myself slowly spiraling back into old habits and my depression hitting me what feels like “full swing”.

First I want to say: I was warned before I started doing bi-frontal that it may not work for me. My doctor told me that for some people it doesn’t work as well or at all, so just because it doesn’t work for me doesn’t mean it can’t potentially work for anyone else who is reading this and considering ECT. I also want to reiterate my reason for switching to this type of treatment; As I said previously, my memory hasn’t been coming back or improving as quickly as I’d like (a semi-rare thing to have happen) considering I’ve been decreasing my amount of treatments and I felt like my lack of memory improvement was being counterproductive to my progress since it was making me depressed and giving me more anxiety.

Moving on:

The first treatment doing bi-frontal, I wasn’t doing so bad but as the week went on, I could feel myself slipping little by little. After my second treatment with that electrode placement, I really started to crash and burn. This week I have been so depressed...I have been having breakdowns regularly, crying a lot, anxiety through the roof and although I’ve seen improvement in my ability to retain memories as well as having a lot come back to me, it isn’t worth it if I am getting this depressed again. Basically, if it’s not helping with my depression, it’s counterproductive and a waste of time as well as potentially dangerous to my mental and psychical health. At least I am fairly self aware and caught onto this almost immediately. Anyways, because of all this, I have decided to go back to doing bi-temporal treatments. My doctors might decide to have me continue doing them once a week after I tell them all this (originally this was my last week doing treatments once a week and was going to go down to doing them once every 2 weeks) but if that’s what needs to happen to get back to being less depressed, so be it. We’ll just have to wait and see I guess.  

Post-treatment:

I went in there with wishful thinking, hoping that they wouldn’t change my scheduled ECT appointments and I would go down to once every 2 weeks, as scheduled. That didn’t happen. When I told my doctor about my rough/confusing week, he seemed really concerned and immediately suggested I go and have an office visit through their main clinic to talk to my primary ECT doctor about how I’ve been feeling with the bi-frontal and to schedule more once a week appointments (as predicted) to hopefully get me back on track to recovery. He agreed to doing switching back to the bi-temporal treatment too.

When I woke up from treatment, I seemed to be doing fine. When the nurses wheeled me out into the discharge room (as they always do for people to take their time to recover/give you juice and snacks if needed), my partner who always comes to my treatments followed me in per usual and one of the nurses came in to hand him a paper with my new scheduled appointments. I guess I had sort of forgot about that when I woke up until I saw that sheet of paper.

As we started leaving/walking back to the car, I started to cry and by the time we got INSIDE the car, I was sobbing. My partner held me and talked to me about how I was feeling and if there was anything he could do and I explained that I was just really looking forward to going down on my treatments. After awhile, it gets tiresome and I felt guilty having him have to drive me 3 hours away from our town to take me the ECT hospital.

To wrap this up, I am having a harder time than I’d like accepting that I will not be going down on treatments but if it’s what needs to be done in order to recover and get back to my former state of recovery, than I will do it.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: Unable to answer this time due to emotional instability.

Short-term Memory Questions: Unable to answer this time due to emotional instability.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Fine. Not necessarily good but not bad.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (moderate)

Symptoms:

● Crying (moderate-severe)

● Loss of balance (minor)

● Confusion (minor)

~ End of ECT day #24 ~

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #23 (6/14/2018)

This is my twenty-third electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my eleventh bilateral procedure.

Also, my second bi-frontal electrode placement.

Pre-treatment analysis:

Lately I've felt sort of up and down.

My memory has been improving a lot especially these last few days which has made me really happy and relieved.

On the flip, I've been having some problems with anger or flipping out due to stress and anxiety because of the reasons I mentioned in my last post about what I'm getting treated for. Like I said, my depression is a whole lot better and I've gained a lot of motivation to do things including get a job (which I haven't had in a long time) but all my other mental stuff has been dragging me down. I talked to my therapist about it on Tuesday and I plan on talking to my ECT doctor about it today.

I've been overwhelmed with outside life stuff like not having money and having responsibilities dumped on me last minute and that doesn't help the stress. Anyone would feel crappy due to these things regardless/despite of ECT.

I am worried I will wake up from anesthesia in shock or crying because I have been talking about stressful things all morning. I mentioned this before but if you go into you treatments really stressed or negative, the likelihood of you waking up in a bad place goes up. Not always but sometimes.

Anyways, I hope to get some good input from my doctor today about these outbreaks.

Post-treatment:

I woke up with a really bad headache which has happens before but it hasn't happened in awhile. My speculation is that 1. I was hungrier than usual today so that might be it and 2. I have upped my dosage on anxiety meds recently (something I talked to my therapist about due to all the panic attacks I've had lately). BUT thats definitely a SPECULATION. I have no idea if that makes any sense considering I'm no doctor.

I was also extra nauseous when I woke up today, maybe the reasons for that being the same ones for why I had a particularly bad headache.

I also had really irritated eyes. They hurt and were sort of red. The first thing my partner pointed out when he saw me was how red they were. I have no idea why and no speculations on that. It went away pretty quickly after I left the hospital.

I did talk to my ECT doctor about the anger and anxiety and my speculations on why that might be happening. He seemed to think that made sense but didn't want to definitively say that was the case since he's not my therapist and also we talked about how switching to bi-frontal from bi-temporal also could be one of the reasons these symptoms might be happening but we both agreed that we will kind of have to wait and see considering this is only my 2nd bi-frontal procedure.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: Answered all questions correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: Answered all but one question correctly with minor hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Good.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate-severe)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (minor)

Symptoms:

● Headache (moderate)

● Red/Irritated eyes (moderate-severe)

● Cough (minor)

~ End of ECT day #23 ~

[myectjourney]

This isn't a question but more so a statement. Thank you so much for starting this blog. I think it's really smart that you're doing this "start to finish" type of style. I had actually planned on doing something similar chronically my treatments, but for some reason I never really got around to doing it. Hope you're doing well and I hope the treatment is going well for you.

Thank you so much! It's really nice to know that people are reading and appreciating this blog. Honestly, there is so little positive personal info to do with ECT, I just thought it might be a good idea to document my progress (negative and positive) so there's more out there. If you ever decide you still want to do an ECT blog, let me know and I will follow you! I hope you are doing well too ♡

[deejay]

[deejay]

[myectjourney]

What ECT is treating me for:

So, I’m not sure if i’ve already said this, maybe I have, but I want to remind people that I am doing electro-convulsive therapy to treat my DEPRESSION.

I know that I have mentioned a few times all the different kinds of mental disorders or illnesses I have but I think it’s really important to remind people that this procedure isn’t treating my other illnesses or symptoms. This isn’t treating my anxiety, my anger problems, erasing my trauma, etc. This is treating my depression and although it is working for me super well in that aspect and making life a whole lot better for me, I still need my therapy and I still need to take other steps to help with the other things I have.

To help manage my anxiety and anger problems associated with my other mental illnesses, I plan on starting an Intensive Outpatient Program which is really similar to DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) or CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) but not quite the same or as intense, probably sometime in the next month or so.

One of the things I have noticed since my depression has gotten more manageable/better is that my other symptoms are not going away and are now kind of at the forefront of my mind and behavior. They haven’t worsened per se (other than my anxiety being slightly amplified as a side effect of the ECT) but it’s more like I am paying attention to them more than I did before. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It means that my depression is definitely improving and that’s great! It does mean it’s time to focus on managing all the other things going on and learn better coping skills so they are not potentially dragging me back down into a depressive state.

I just felt like it was really important to talk about this and point this out to anyone reading who might be under the impression that ECT is a cure all because it definitely isn’t!

I hope everyone is having a great week!

[myectjourney]

ECT procedure #22 (6/7/2018)

This is my twenty-second electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my tenth bilateral procedure.

Also, my first bi-frontal electrode placement.

Pre-treatment analysis:

Honestly, I don't feel like going today because I've been sick all week but I have an in-office appointment right before ECT so I at least have to go to that and then I'll ask my doctor if I should cancel my ECT treatment for today.

This last week I've been feeling pretty good depression-wise and that's been nice. My over the top manic happiness has definitely mellowed out over the course of time I've been getting treatments only once a week.

Thing is, my anxiety is now at the forefront of my mind at all times. I guess before, my anxiety disorder always came 2nd in terms of day to day severity but now I'm worrying a lot about the future or things I obviously can't control and it's kind of ironically making my depression worse. Luckily, I'm not at the depression level I was before I started ECT so it's not making it as worse as it could BUT still. I mostly keep worrying about the medical debt this is probably putting me in because, y'all, I ain't rich. (If any of you feel like donating some money to me, lemme know so I can give out my paypal) but seriously, I already get debt collectors from other things calling me every day and I'm worried all these treatments will add up and I'll start getting calls from them. But maybe not. It was at least mostly covered by insurance because I was diagnosed with treatment resistant depression...sorry, I'm ranting. SEE? This is exactly what I was talking about. Now you see my point. Anyways. As they say in the movies, "I'm goin' in".

Post-treatment:

Firstly, my office visit went well. We just talked about my progress with the ECT and how I've been feeling. As I've said before, I've been doing the bilateral procedure (both sides of my brain) and I'm not sure if I've mentioned before that it's also a bi-temporal procedure too which means the placement of the electrodes on my head are on my temples/temporal lobe. Because of the fact my memory hasn't been recovering as quickly as I'd hoped and I've had some slowed cognition that's lasted a little longer than usual, we decided to switch to bi-frontal (which means they place the electrodes on my frontal lobe). This makes a difference because apparently it helps the memory side effects lessen. This only works if you've tried the bi-temporal first and it's been effective treatment-wise.

My doctor wanted me to know that my set of issues isn't really common and is probably happening because I have a dissociative disorder along with all my other illnesses, so for those of you reading: keep in mind that this is happening because of my specific set of illnesses and that unless you have depersonalization-derealization disorder, you'll probably not have to deal with the recovery being as slow as how it's going for me. Doesn't mean it CAN'T happen still but I don't want people to worry and expect it to happen or make people worry. I'm doing fine, the memory recovery process is just taking a little extra time.

As for my procedure, it seemed to go well and I woke up in the recovery room feeling fine. Like I said before, it helps to be in a good mood/think of good or positive things before you get put under. If you're freaking out beforhand, you'll probably wake up feeling the same way.

My head hurt less than it has previously and I felt less dizzy than in the past! That was nice.

Over all, everything seemed to go well.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: Answered all questions correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: Answered all but one question correctly with moderate hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (from previous treatments), No added memory loss

Attention span: Good.

Tiredness: Yes (moderate)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (minor)

Symptoms:

● Headache (moderate)

● Loss of balance/dizzy (moderate)

~ End of ECT day #22 ~

Side Note: Sorry that I posted this late! I didn’t know that I didn’t post it and it was just sitting in my drafts. Whoops!

[myectjourney]

It can get better!

I know that sounds cliche but I know from experience that sometimes you literally CAN'T believe that when it's told to you when you are deep into depression.

So let me tell you, as someone who has struggled to the point ECT was the only option left, in hopes that maybe that fact will make you listen, if only just a little: IT. CAN. GET. BETTER.

You hear me?

It CAN get better.

I'm not going to tell you that everything will be cured and life will magically get better. I won't be that person. But there are ways for it to get easier that isn't dying because don't I know how it feels to be in the position where death seems like the only option left.

If you are on the fence about ECT and you are reading this blog, if any of what I just said hits home, please...go for it if you can...do ECT. I know it seems super scary but it really isn't as bad as the media has portrayed it. It's really working for me and this is the best I've ever felt in my whole life. I have major depressive disorder, PTSD, anxiety disorder, BPD, and depersonalization-derealization disorder. I never saw the light at the end of the tunnel until NOW.

If any of you have questions, fears about the procedure, etc. please feel free to message me! I made this blog for a reason; to keep people informed, document my experience and help break the stigma surrounding ECT.

I love you all and I hope that you read this and feel not so alone. ♡

[uchanda]

therapist: how was your week?

me: mm.. i can’t remember