Boidhre, take care.

hope things get under control for you quickly.

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
A private blog on Asian go books and interesting go sightings
Now open only for a select few.
Go is such a beautiful game.

Well some details:

I'm in a mixed state: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_episode

They think it was caused by Prozac and Zispin (mirtazapine).

So now I'm on Rivotril (Klonopin in the US, for the agitation/highs) and Zimovane (Zorotrope, for sleep) and an increased dose of Abilify to try and bring me down.

My sister who's a doctor thinks this is a good course of action in my situation. I'll be pretty drugged in the short term but the idea is to deaden me enough that I stay manageable and able to stay hope, not become psychotic and just wait this episode out. Unfortunately cognitive impairment and motor impairment is a side effect of these new drugs so things like go are not really an option for me like this.

Anyway, maybe there's someone out there with bipolar who might find the above interesting.

Dear Boidhre,

this is Tom aka Bonobo aka trohde, the guy who prefers slow games

I wish you power and strength for whatever you may be going through. And I wish you … self-love. Perhaps I told you (and I know I’ve written somewhere else here) about my depression and stuff … so I can empathize. Currently also going through some Online Go Anxiety (OGA).

Remember Melanie Safka aka Melanie? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf5PnEEmOTw

The lyrics:Have a good journey, walk on well, shine your living light, hope to see you again,

Tom in Germany

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My usual first chat line in an online game: “Hello, this is Tom in Germany”
Let me know whether I should add you to my Go circle/list on … Google+ · Facebook · Twitter (not much used these days)

Hey Boidhre,

Your thread "A beginner's journal of little interest" has become one of the most widely read and commented here on the forum, and could hardly be less aptly named. As anonymous as such forums may be, rest assured that there are a lot of real people out here who want to hear what you have to say, and have been following your journey with interest and sympathy. Good luck regaining your balance!

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"When you are learning, it is not so important whether you are right or wrong." - Bill Spight

An interesting thing was said to me by an old friend: That Go was perhaps too stimulating for me as a hobby intellectually and that it could have helped drive me up as high as I've gotten. My wife countered with the point that this always happens and it's always something intellectually stimulating that I get involved in before each bad high/bad low and that there was nothing unusual about go in this regard. My psychiatrist seemed to think (she wouldn't go as far as diagnose) that I was hypomanic during this go phase, so his comments interested me. Though I strongly disagreed that go was or is bad for me because it's intellectually stimulating. I mean classical music and physics (my main shared interests with my friend, I researched under him at college and published with him) are hardly any less stimulating intellectually.

Anyway, I thought this might interest a few people given the previous chat about the causalities surrounding depression and go.

In an effort to keep playing despite the depression, agitation and medicating with benzos (which screw with mental function) I present the following travesty against a 7k EGF friend played in my home with the kids distracting us constantly. So less than ideal but I felt like it'd be nice to put something of what passes for go when I'm like this up here publicly to encourage other people going through bad patches to keep playing the odd game here and there.



Blunders galore from me. Forgetting that I owed a move here or there etc. As was expected. I was definitely losing focus as the game went on. Anyway, I hope this game proves amusing to someone.

Still broken shapes.

Thanks Ed.

So a small update:

I've improved but not far enough to be in the clear. I've 2-3 weeks to stabilise on more medication at home or I'll be sent in for another stay in hospital. Unfortunately the anti-anxiety drug they put me on isn't doing much for me even at a doubled dosage, so I'm spending more time pacing my hall than I am sitting down. But still, I'm no longer hitting the heights of mania that I was before the increase in the antipsychotic so that's a good thing and the sleeping tablets are helping me stay on a more even keel.

So we'll see how things pan out going forwards.

Still fairly ill. Well, still having mixed states, so one bad episode from hospital again.

I do miss the touch of the stones and the sound of the wood though (I haven't been going to the club due to agitation levels). I might get the board out tonight and try (with my impaired concentration) to play a game against an AI on my iPad for a laugh since I lack a human player this late on a Monday night to play in real life.

I've tentatively started taking turns on OGS again. Hopefully my renewed interest will continue. I hope to be able to approach go in an even handed manner rather than the quite manic manner that I approached it originally. My therapists have been telling me that I was hypomanic during my previous go phase and I tend to agree with them. I'm considering going onto KGS and doing some 9x9 to get myself back into things. We'll see.

Anyway, thank you all for your kind messages during this tough period for me. Hopefully at this point I think I'll avoid hospital (yah!) and be able to ride out this episode at home.

I've been working through my OGS games this evening. (I took on far too many when high) Go is almost alien to me, but it's good in that I've more of a whole board vision than I used to I think. Maybe it's because I'm healthier psychiatrically. Once the kids go to bed tonight I think I'll play a game on KGS, I'm itching for a game on a real board but that'll have to wait until Sunday most likely.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

Ok, so a friend called over to see me and check up on me and we played a game. I've put it up for review on the review forum as I want a broad selection of views on it.

What I thought was a tentative recovery seems to just have been a false dawn and I've now entered a depression. The good thing about this is that depressions are far easier to deal with than mixed states and I should lead something closer to a normal life. Just not quite there obviously. Hopefully again I can stay out of hospital in this phase. My depressions tend to last months so we'll see how this pans out.

Take care man.

After a few days quite to very depressed, I'm having a good evening this evening and worked my way though my (far, far too many) OGS games. I played against IgoWin HD in bed last night which was fun enough.

I've a pretty concrete idea what I need to do now. Learn to fight better. As far as I can see the only way to do this is to study tesuji (problems mostly, maybe some theory for the problems to drill) and play more fighting games. So while I'll still mess around with information on fuseki and the endgame this will be for fun rather than for efficient improvement. The kids are down at the grandparents for a few days, and if my mood continues to be good, I'll do some study this week hopefully! If I don't, well there's always next week etc.


Oh, and in good news, it looks like I won't be hospitalised, which is really nice. I really didn't want to go back there for another set of months (last stay was nearly 4 months long :/).

I'm getting some study done and my mood is holding up ok. I'm horribly distracted by the Steam sale of course.

What I've noticed is that tesuji problems are a quite a bit harder after a month away from the game but after 20/30 you start getting into the swing of things again. I've restarted Get Strong at Tesuji on the one star problems. My plan is to get through these relatively fast and then restart on the two star problems and get stuck into Speed Baduk 7 again. I'm also going to do some simple life and death problems from various sources. This might sound like a lot but I'm taking a relaxed approach and fitting in a few problems here and there isn't adding much stress to my day (doctor's orders to take it easy for a while in general).

If I had one wish it'd be that I'd have bought Get Strong at Tesuji at 20k KGS not 13k! I think that being exposed to these kinds of simple but clever moves (i.e. 1 and 2 star problems) early can only be a good thing. Others may disagree of course.

I'm getting games in on OGS but it's been difficult. I've been cycling between high and quite to very depressed quite regularly and this impairs my functioning greatly. Go, depression and benzos do not a happy mix make and I'm avoiding playing a lot because I know I'm cognitively impaired much of the time. I've gone on Automatch a few times on KGS but no one my level ever seems to be on at the same time as me which is disappointing. It's a bit annoying because I've no idea what my KGS strength is these days, I won a few games as a 12k, my rank inflated to 11k and I haven't been able to get a game in since. Most of my play is on OGS and in real life so I don't know what to expect to happen as an 11k. It could be a brutal massacre or I could be stronger than that (my money is on the former). I also haven't gotten to play someone my own level in a real time game in absolutely ages, all my real time games have been against sdks from the club. So I get to lose a lot but get some interesting games.

I must say though, it's a bit lonely being the only person my level in my city, I'd love a real life training partner to play with regularly. I've lost one of my most frequent playing partners recently because he got a job in another city so I'm down to one semi-regular guy who is going through a love/hate thing with go at the moment. Some new people have joined the club since I went into the mixed episode (I've been too anxious/nervous/whatever to leave the house in over a month) but they're either sdk or weak ddk so no true even games for me unfortunately. I'll get to give some handicaps at the club though which will be interesting, I don't get to give big handicaps out often enough in real time games. I think I'll learn something from these games.


Oh, and in happy news, my son who'd gone off go for a few months decided he wanted to play a few games with me today. He managed his first victory against me with 5 stones and a -7.5 komi on 9x9 board (I know, too many stones but he can't fight yet so he needs all the help he can get). I'm happy for him, hopefully it'll encourage him to play more often. I'm letting him explore the game at his own pace, if he wants a game I'll give him one but I won't push him to play in any way.