A mixed episode

I've been reading old posts that I wrote when I first started blogging. I'm surprised to see how hard my stuff was to read. My sister says I've gotten better since then, I hope so. I found this one and decided to transfer it to this blog. I've had a few people ask me about bipolar disorder and I thought it might be helpful to them. I know it was helpful to me when I wrote it. I was very sick when I wrote it perhaps that explains why it was so disjointed. Anyway, I've edited it, so hopefully it will be easier to read.

A mixed episode

In the beginning, I seem to have an increase in goal-driven behavior. I want to do everything and it all seems feasible when in reality I could never do all of those things unless I stopped sleeping. I want to learn Spanish, I want to do artwork, I want to start working out, I want to cook...and on and on I go.

It is a good feeling a charged feeling. Your supposed to go and see a doctor when you start showing these symptoms but it's the last thing you want to do. You feel so wonderful, how could anything be wrong? And honestly, you don't want it to end.

You begin to feel like there are no limitations, no barriers to anything, everything seems possible. You can't imagine why you ever felt depressed about anything, Now you can't even fathom why you ever thought that you had limitations at all. If I could bottle this, I could make a fortune!

I smile a lot, become very friendly and outgoing and talk to people like I never met a stranger. But a lot of my conversation will become this sort of 'stream of consciousness'. I prattle on and on, my ability to censor what I say goes away, I'm often embarrassed and ashamed of what I said afterwards.

I feel expansive, almost as though some boundary between me and others and even the universe has melted. I experience it as a metaphysical merging with everything. I begin to see synchronicities everywhere and feel somehow as though I can follow them and be led to something wonderful. I have an anticipatory feeling, though I don't know what I am anticipating. I begin to feel as though I am chosen for something, like I'm meant to do something special.

As an aside, I am not entirely convinced that the spiritual aspect of all of this is a false perception. I sometimes suspect that when one ones consciousness is altered, as it is with bipolar disorder, that one is actually perceiving things on a heightened level and that the things they are perceiving might be a version of reality that we are not aware of when in a normal state of mind. I've heard other bipolar people say the same thing.

The downside to all of this, is that I can't stop. And then, there is my temper. I have had a horrible temper most of my life, starting when I was a teenager. It went away when I starting taking medicine and this is how I know I was diagnosed correctly. I used to be like a wildcat when I lost my temper. I still had enough self-control somehow not to hurt other people, the violence was turned toward myself. I felt so ashamed of myself, ashamed of my lack of ability to control myself, ashamed of how I treat people. The shame that I felt made me punish myself.

Things begin to spiral out-of-control. I expend a lot of energy trying to apply the brakes, but my brakes are almost out. I begin to ruminate on things, on my past, what someone said to me. I get very worked up about these things. I brood and worry.

My thoughts begin to feel like wasps buzzing in my mind. They begin to spin so fast that it is no longer fun. I begin to lose my ability to concentrate. I try to do something and my mind is 10, 100, 1000 paces ahead of the task that I am on. On to the next and the next and the next; in the space of 30 seconds my mind has left me in the wake of it's dust. I have a pen in my hand, it is gone as though it evaporated, I have no memory of putting it down. I go to the store and buy things that weren't on my list and forget to buy what was on my list.

Right before I finally got medicated, I locked my keys in my car twice and locked myself out of the house twice. Altogether combined, this costed me $200. It's so frustrating. I knew that I shouldn't be at work but I didn't know that I had a choice, so I would go in anyway and screw everything up. One time, my younger daughter needed her diaper changed. I asked my older daughter to get me a diaper and when I went to change her, her diaper was already changed. I had changed it and I had no memory of doing it.

When I try to think about something, it feels like it does when you look into the sun and afterwards everything you see, appears to have a hole in it. That is how my mind feels....holey. It feels like a sieve that everything runs through. As I still have to function and I still have all of my responsibilities, everything becomes overwhelming.

I become very irritable, very tired. But I can't sleep. People begin to get on my nerves. Everyone seems like they are moving too slow. When I am in traffic and I am in a hurry, I get so tense. Everything seems overwhelming. I just want my mind to stop and it won't.

I feel like I did some bad angel dust. I have all of this adrenalin coursing through my body. It is a very physical, somatic experience. I can't sleep, my stomach hurts. I stop eating. I read every chance I get. Reading stops the thoughts, it calms me.

People with loud voices or people who talk too fast irritate me. I want to leave the room, they get on my nerves so bad. They drive the wasps inside of my head into a frenzy! Everyone seems stupid and they all get on my nerves. A store with loud music playing bothers me really badly, even lots of bright colors bother me, everything makes a discordant noise in my mind.

Then begins the depression. I haven't slept much for such a long time. My become hypersensitive. I begin to be paranoid. Things people say seem to have hidden innuendos. I don't know when to trust my own perceptions. I am tired and only want to go to sleep, but I can't sleep. My dreams become disturbing and atmospheric so that when I wake up, they stay with me throughout the day, coloring everything.
I feel very hostile, and luckily I am somehow able to, for the most part keep this a inside of me. But energy I expend doing this causes me to be infinitely weary.

Thank God they have medicine to help people with this and I'm so lucky that it works for me. Apparently the medicine doesn't help everyone. When I get stressed out, I get really scared because I'm afraid that it will all happen again, but so far since beginning the medicine, I've never gone into a full-blown attack.

I know that I need a job that is not high-stress. They say that stress makes everyone sick but it kills me. Bipolar disorder is truly a destroyer of souls. I wouldn't wish it on my worse enemy. But I know that I am strong simply for the fact that I have survived it relatively intact. Bipolar disorder has the highest rate of suicide out of all the psychiatric disorders. I truly believe that I am lucky to be alive.

I'm lucky that I have my kids, my husband, my sister..I'm lucky in a lot of ways. I lost my job and I am still lucky. I've been given a new lease on life and I am so grateful. But the bogeyman never goes away entirely. I am very afraid of losing control. Maybe as time goes on I will become more confident that this won't happen. My life has been very hard but I've had gifts too and I choose to concentrate on those.

One of the things that I'm really proud of is that I have not let this make me a bitter person. There are things that I am angry about, I'm angry that the professionals that were supposed to help me didn't, until I was 40 years old. But I am grateful for the understanding that it has given me.

It's bad and it isn't. But I'm happy, not deliriously happy, but I'm working on it.