u/Blimp_Rider

Hi. A friend in France turned me on to the moka pot and the amazing coffee it produces. So now I’m back home with my own Bialetti 6 cup, getting up a little earlier every day in anticipation of brewing that incredible elixir.

Sorry if this has been asked and answered before, but I need to know: Is there a good way to take the basket full of spent grounds out without making a mess? I keep my fingernails very short and have a hard time lifting the basket out. What are your hacks for this?

Grazie!

Sorry in advance. This is going to be a long post.

I (66M) have had BP2 since I was 12 or 13, untreated until my mid-30s, when I went on Prozac. Prozac and therapy, flawed as both were, literally saved my life, as I was actively suicidal.

In 2018 a new psychiatrist switched me to Lexapro, which worked well enough for a number of years (and put an extra 30 pounds on me).

What I didn’t realize over those years was how thoroughly the Lexapro had blunted my emotions, both positive and negative. I just lived my life in a narrow emotional zone, never very much up or down.

Another new psychiatrist (after changing jobs and insurance plans) added aripiprazole (Abilify) about four years ago. Again, it was … meh. This is my normal, I thought.

Then this past winter, the drugs just stopped working. I fell into a deep depression. The only emotions I could feel were despair and irritation. I was hard to live with.

Doc dumped the Abilify and put me on Caplyta, 21mg for a week before bumping it up to 42.

It was a freaking miracle drug. Within three weeks I was starting to experience a complete turnaround, feeling strange emotions like joy and happiness and love. At 66 I was suddenly full of creative, productive energy, going to the gym, planning a big trip, showering my wife with affection and enjoying life as I never had (or could) before. I even lost 15 lbs. Caplyta really had “let the lyte in.”

It took me a couple of months to realize that maybe I was a little too energized — eating very little, sleeping even less, overpacking my schedule, driving too fast, talking too much. I started having bouts of AFib, which evolved into daily anxiety attacks.

Before things could get completely out of hand, I got hold of my shrink and told him what was going on and that it was scaring me. “I think we need to take our foot off the gas,” he said. He decided to keep me on the Caplyta but wean me off the Lexapro over a two-week period.

Now running on Caplyta only, the anxiety attacks have slowed down considerably and the AFib has stopped altogether. I’m driving more responsibly, talking more normally and living my life at a more relaxed pace.

And here’s the thing that prompted me to write this post:

I cried once yesterday and twice today. And I’m thrilled about it.

Yesterday it was happy tears for a young redditor who is simultaneously falling in love and discovering her sexual identity. This morning it was grief elicited by a powerful New York Times article about how Putin’s dirty war has upended the lives of innocent schoolchildren in Ukraine. This evening it was wonder and joy while watching elephants listen to a man play the piano for them.

I cried, y’all. I wept. Understand this: I hadn’t shed a tear, or even really come close, since my parents died in 1998. For the first time in 28 years, I feel something.

Welcome back, tears. I missed you.

When my psychiatrist put me (M66) on Caplyta on top of my ongoing Lexapro 20mg, I felt the best I have felt literally in decades. It was the best thing that ever happened to my brain. However, soon after going up to 42mg Caplyta, I started having daily mini-mania attacks lasting 2 to 6 hours, with increasing intensity recently. My psych said we needed to “take our foot off the gas,” so he had me taper down to 10mg Lex for a week and then stop it entirely and try going Cap-only. Four days Lex-free, the episodes have decreased but I’m not liking how I feel: grouchy, irritable and unmotivated. I see him again Tuesday. We need to fix this thing.