Does anyone get seemingly inexplicable and unexpected mood swings? When I do I try to analyse for any possible antecedents and come up with fatigue, pushing myself too much and frustration with unforeseen events that potentially take up my precious energy! Would like to hear your experiences / thoughts.
Mood swings are a part of our journey with MS.
We are more susceptible to them. I find mine worse when i am fatigued or stressed. I can go from being cool to Mrs angry very quickly i was never like that.
NOISE too affects my mood sometimes just noise will send me on a tail spin of emotions.
It can come from the oddest quarters.
I can feel the anger for example creeping up into my body and literally i could smack someone lol.
I go to a good place in my head and listen to my music to calm down which usually works.
Having MS sure as hell chucks up some variable stuff to deal with.
2 Likes
I am beginning to think that I might! On several occasions now I have become uncharacteristically angry. One such occasion was when I discovered that my husband had deleted my recordings of Corrie. I was so mad and it just kept building and building.He was totally bemused at my level of anger which only made me crosser! At the time it felt totally justified but afterwards I realised that it didnāt really matter at all!
However on the flip side I walked across the park ,alone, the other week to my Mums house. It was a lovely sunny day and I was listening to music, I started to get this feeling of absolute joy or bliss. It just kept getting bigger until I felt I might burst with happiness. It made me want to throw my arms wide and twirl and sing (I didnāt do it I might add) I could see the beauty in everything (the ducks,the flowers.the breeze on my skin) and everything looked so vibrant.On several times I could have burst into tears just because everything was just so beautiful. It was wonderful but slightly disconcerting. When I got to my Mums I told her I thought that I had finally gone madā¦and no I hadnāt taken any kind of drugs or alcohol lol
Hello Robyn, You are most definately like many of us. Very often I can be my old self easy going and cheerfiul, then suddenly I can be really nasty and like you I put it down to being tired or trying to do something you once did with ease and now find you canāt. Perfectly normal for MS if you ask me!!!
1 Like
I can relate to Crazy Chickās sensitivity to noise. Sudden loud noises make me jump, much more than they ever used to. Itās almost like being physically hit.
I cannot talk over continuous noise either. My wife has to turn the TV off if I need to say anything.
I have the same reaction to bright light. Iāve very sensitive to sudden changes in light levels.
Noise in particular makes me snappy.
Anthony
1 Like
Yes mood swings are so called ānormalā and I think anyone who has a condition like ours will regularly experience them. For me, the fatigue and physical aches and pains drag me down and then the frustration and anger of not being able to do what I feel I should be able to do kicks in, and hey presto my mood is definitely ālowā. I take Modafinil and co codamol daily and when they first kick in then my mood is always much better (because they alleviate the fatigue and pain!) usually about 1/2 hr after first taking them I feel happy and positive ā¦ but the good effects of the tablets ware off too soon and back down I go again !. So for me I would say that my moods are predictable to some extent but other factors certainly mess them up too eg. heat, noise (I canāt tolerate either well) and as for stress, well that completely messes me up (I used to be able to handle stress in my job and personal life but now everything seems to stress me out). I think that knowing what the triggers are that are likely to affect your mood can help, as you can then hopefully avoid a situation or take steps to make things happen ā¦ good luck x
1 Like
Yep, itās like being a teenager all over again!
Keep trying to identify triggers. I know for me, when there is too much stimulation coming at me I have a difficult time controlling my moods as I get super overwhelmed. Think shopping mall: lights, noise, smells, heat.
If you donāt already, give meditation a go! Great way to learn how to control your thoughts, clear your mind, and stay present in the moment. Check out the app āhead spaceā if you want a little guidance.
Hope this helps!!
Autumn
Check out my blog www.missmalady.com
yeah i definitely know what youāre talking about Robyn as the same inexplicable mood swings are torturing my girlfriend for a good while now since sheās on some peptides she got from https://suppsforlife.to/category/peptides. thanks for sharing that as sheās having something super similar to what you described and also thanks to everyone else who answered here as i found useful info. Autumn iām going to check your blog later for sure! Robyn, how do you feel now? any updates?
We all get this from time to time - I take Prozac to stablise my moods and I donāt like loud noise - ITV Breakfast TV does my head in Piers Morgan and his team shoutingā¦aarrrggghhhhh
I am very grateful for all the responses. I feel reassured that I am not the only one and can relate to what people have said. But am sad too that this is something else we have to deal with. I worry about mood swings with friends and colleagues. It is tiring having to try to stay in control on top of everything else. I still have a long way to go and I would like to apply meditation or mindfulness to this symptom when I need to.
Hi Redman.I canāt stand Piers either. I much prefer BBC Breakfast as the lesser of the 2 evils!
2 Likes
Hi all,
Yes me tooā¦ on that rollercoaster MS ride of mood swings! When Iām fatigued my voice slurs into an unrecognisable rabble.I get fractious and find it very difficult to tell my hubby exactly what I want. I become a raging banshee! Trying just to simply explain what I mean or want is like a torrent. How he puts up with me god only knows! I guess and hope he understands MS!
We MSers canāt help it can we?
I get them. I have found that letting things build up, without talking about what is wrong, led to outbursts of emotion. I now have counselling once a week and we talk about the things that get me down and all the frustrations. It really does help me to get it off my chest and it saves my better half from the emotional fatigue of me going on about it. Itās like letting a bit of air out of a balloon to stop it going pop
Thank goodness for these posts. Iāve been feeling kind of a slave to mood swings over the last year. Itās a complicated mix for me of life pressures, age, MS progression & Lemtrada to try to slow it downā¦plus anti-seizure meds (thanks MS for that particular gift!) which make all sorts of other meds difficult.
The very worst thing about them for me is the intense guilt about how I affect my loved ones when Iām like this. For those folks posting about their other halves who have MS & mood swings, I can try to imagine how it might feel from your perspective. Like youāre an emotional punching bag.
I think it can be a bubbling cauldron of unexpressed hurt, anger, fear, myself (for both parties). And itās complex. But expressing how it feels when not in a right old state can help ; that itās a rollercoaster with a Batman baddie at the controls sometimes but that hurting the other person isnāt the intention. But itās up to us to get what help we can get as well, to try & reduce some of the impact on others (exhausting to do, when weāre already exhausted enough, right?).
I donāt know. Seems to me that this side of MS is hidden from general view & itās our closest who suffer. But knowing that itās reasonably common is a help in some way. Good luck to us all