Rapid mood cycling

Is there anyone out there that suffers from rapid mood cycling? Just curious what the symptoms are like how long they last for does it cause anxiety that kid of thing.

[x89rt]

i do. symptoms are just that, mood changes in short periods of time. sometimes they can change for no reason or little things like a single almost meaningless thought or just someone looking at you or anything. mine usually change in hours. i just had one recently. yesterday i cried myself to sleep, today school started fine, i suppose. things went from meh to ok back to meh and down to "oh god!" at psychiatris, i had a few small ones. back home went up a little, down, and right now a little lower. and yea, they can definately cause anxiety, worry, stress, and other stuff.

[paranoid_cataclysm]

I still have anxiety that can turn on and off very rapidly but it is always caused because of something such as having to be around people or an upcoming appointment or event.  Before I started medication I experienced episodes where my emotions changed randomly for no reason within seconds to probably any emotions you can think of.  Antipsychotics fixed this however.  I used to think I was getting depressed but then I found out it was anxiety attacks I was experiencing.  As you can imagine, it was extremely hard to function like this so I distanced myself from my emotions as much as I possibly could even though they were already very alien to me to begin with.  Multiple people have told me I have flat affect and my sister has even said she would love to see me scared when I was talking about being scared, just to see some emotion out of me for once since I never show it and don't know how to.  I was first diagnosed with bipolar disorder for a while by a general practitioner but in the end they went with schizophrenia for now after they learned of all my psychotic symptoms and thought disorder I experience and when I was actually evaluated by a psychiatrist.  I've been expecting it to be changed to schizoaffective disorder (schizophrenia + mood disorder such as bipolar disorder) for a while now due to having had mood symptoms but so far it hasn't happened so I don't know how they determine what to diagnose you with on that spectrum.

[Painkillernightmare]

Well anything I have read on rapid mood cycling sounded nothing like my symptoms thats why i asked. My moods are the same I can be fine one hr then be off the charts the next..and it takes me hrs sometimes days to recover. They leave me feeling empty and exhausted. The only way I could describe it is a relapse and recovery mode.  I relapse with anger and upset, uncontrollable crying angry outbursts irritability for no reason, then I recover and feel exhausted, try to recollect my feelings and thought process at that time..when I have these "episodes" its like a haze when I come out of it.  Then I have to pick up the pieces of my hurrican behaviour and apologise to those it effected.  Dring that time of "losing" it I am impulsive, want to spend money or drink etc...not easy to say the least. I am also 4 months off Percocets after being on them for three yrs..I dont know if that is contributing to the behaviours I am exhibiting.  it seems to have gotten worse over time. I used to be a high achiever got a high off of being "perfect" in everything I did..now I dont have the strength to achieve like I did before the wind has been blown out of me.

[Xila31]

I also have rapid cycling. Symptoms are the same as regular depression/mania but much quicker. You can have rapid cycling which is 4 mood shifts in a year, or ultra rapid cycling which is a lot faster. My psychologist thinks I'm an ultra rapid cycler. My most common cycle was several months of "normal" moods, then a few months of depressed mood, then about a week to two weeks of hypo/mania. (Not sure at this point.) But in the last year and a half I've been going through some pretty sever cycles that last less than a week. I've had some times when my moods felt like they were cycling all day, so the question is was I cycling or mixed? It is all very complex.

I also have generalized anxiety disorder and I think they effect each other. So I get anxiety and it causes me to cycle. Or I'm cycling and it causes me to become anxious. I would say I have at least one episode of high anxiety every day. My cycling has become exhausting and pushes my mind to the point of complete confusion and disorganization. I am becoming more forgetful, have very little concentration, and and irritable and aggitated pretty much all the time. It is not fun at all and I don't wish it on anyone. :(

[paranoid_cataclysm]

There is such a thing called ultradian rapid cycling where your mood will cycle multiple times throughout the day.

[x89rt]

that must be the one i have.

[Painkillernightmare]

me too seems to only make sense to me. I have been keeping track of my moods triggers etc..my anxiety gets me too.  I havent had enough apt's yet with my doc to specify exactly whats goin on..but that seems to be me in a nut shell so thank u!