Some Cheese with that Whine

Well, yesterday's post really did sound like a bunch of whining, because it really kind of was. I'll never be under the same kind of pressure as my mom is, because she's under a ton of pressure and here I am doing a comfortable amount of work each day and not pushing myself to do a ton more.

Yup, this was me yesterday.

This isn't to say that I should seek out the highest-pressure 70-hour work week job I can find. You don't bench press 200 pounds on the first day, you work your way up. That said, if you're comfortable lifting 50 pounds, maybe it's time to try adding some more weight. (I should disclose that I lift five-pound hand weights when I lift any weight at all and will likely never attempt to bench press any weight, ever.)

So for starters, I am going to spend a bit more time trying to post on this blog more than every four or five days. No, writing stuff isn't easy, and no, putting it out on the internet for other people to see isn't, either. I realize there's this thing called social media where people announce their latest bowel movements and describe their relationship drama in over-the-top detail, but I only use Facebook for playing their flash games until I get bored of a game and move onto a new one.

Today is self-deprecating humor day.

I don't want to get so comfortable I sleep through life, as it were. I don't want to push myself so hard I end up in the hospital, either, though. But luckily, there are such things as happy mediums, and it's mostly a matter of finding one. There is a lot more I could do, sure, but there's also a lot that I'm doing already. Lack of substance abuse, volunteerism, getting involved in my community, working, writing, and trying to help my family more are hardly doing nothing.

Much of what I have to say today is owed to the excellent work of my therapist, whom I saw this afternoon. The weight-lifting metaphor is my own, but he's the one who pointed out that I don't want to let myself get stuck again, even if it's in a somewhat better place than before. The best part was that he pointed out how far I've come and that it's not something to brush off or minimize.

Hooray, I'm sticking with my pic theme!

Making an effort to change your life for the better, no matter who you are, is worth it. It doesn't have to be zero to sixty, and in fact, I wouldn't recommend attempting that because it's setting yourself up for failure. Doing a little bit more day after day and week after week, however, can add up over time, until you are miles away from where you started. Just like that old saying about a journey of a thousand miles.

And to ensure that today there is some cheese to go with yesterday's whine, here is one last ultra-cheesy joke.

Under Pressure

It doesn't exactly take a genius to realize that we live in an incredibly high-pressure world. Whether you're in a post-industrial nation where everything moves at a million miles an hour or a third-world country where you fear for your life and safety every moment of the day, there's pressure all around. This isn't such a new development. It's hardly news.

This song is almost old enough to run for President.

In case you've never heard it before, this is by 

Queen and David Bowie.

We've all felt pressure, from society, from our families, and from ourselves. I will freely admit that, likely due to the fact that I have bipolar disorder, I do not deal well with pressure. It makes me want to curl up in a ball and hide, or break down, or do something really stupid like self-medicate. When three different people are all talking to me at once, vying for my attention and demanding my help, it tends to send my anxiety spiking into the stratosphere.

Since right now I am living with my parents as I try to get back on my feet, or get on them for the first time, this multiple-people-talking-at-me thing happens more often than you'd think. I do have a bad tendency to isolate myself by hiding in my room, but too many times when I walk downstairs, I get bombarded. I could just be trying to slip out for a cigarette, or I could be leaving for five minutes to check on the neighbors' dogs. The moment I open the door is usually the best possible moment for my dad to ask about tax forms, my mom to ask about how to use the computer (she's still hoping they're a passing fad), my oldest brother to ask when dinner is, and my youngest brother to ask about homework.

It was between this guy and a zombie

horde tearing someone apart.

Yeah, I know, first world problems. It still stresses me out. Not much I can do but try to take a deep breath, answer them all as efficiently as possible, and get out there for that cigarette as fast as I can. Trying to explain that it bothers me tends to provoke an angry backlash of offended people, so I have given up trying, which might not be the best solution.

Lately some of the pressure has increased, specifically from my mother. Now I realize that she's under much more pressure than I am: she is a teacher in an inner city school with a new curriculum and a bunch of obnoxious kids that hate her for being a teacher, she has five kids, her husband has a brain injury, her daughter has bipolar, the list goes on. I realize that I will never be under the same amount of pressure she is, largely because I will 1) never be a teacher, not even if they actually start treating them well and 2) never marry and/or reproduce.

An actual photograph of me.

Anyway, at the risk of sounding whiny, because my mother did make a much better effort to try and understand my illness, I do sometimes wish that she would stop asking me to put more pressure on myself. I am not trying to dive headfirst into doing everything at once. I have plenty on my plate right now, and I am trying to keep up and incrementally increase things once I've got a handle on them. But it often seems that I am not doing enough.

The other day she told me I "can't settle" for working at a part-time work-from-home job that will only afford me a low-cost apartment and some basic living expenses. She also told me that I needed to put more effort into my appearance by wearing makeup every day. She made sure that I knew that "better is not well" and just because I'm doing better doesn't mean that I'm well enough to be a facilitator at DBSA. And she decided to tell me all of this before I had my coffee.

Now, I've accepted that with a mental illness of this magnitude, there will have to be some settling in my life. I have to settle on a lower-stress job, which means I have to settle for something part-time, most likely. I have to settle for taking a handful of pills every day and not ever having a beer or a joint or going out to a wild party. I have to settle on knowing that many people will treat me differently because of my illness.

Just because I have to settle for these things that my mother and many others would find terribly depressing and pathetic doesn't mean that my life is over, or that I can never enjoy myself again. I will probably never make much money, but since I will also never have a family, that's really not an issue. I will never be able to drink again, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy other pastimes, like tabletop gaming. I will never be able to have shallow friends again, but... that's actually a blessing.

Cause and Effect

Anyone who has struggled with a mental illness has probably experienced things that affect them more than other people. When you're depressed, a TV commercial can make you burst into tears that make the people around you stare in bewilderment. When you're manic, a cup of coffee or a bowl of sugary cereal can have you bouncing off the walls. And let's not even get started on alcohol.

Okay, I lied. But now I'm finished on the subject.

It's really easy to forget these things though. I had a lot of trouble sleeping last night, and it wasn't until late afternoon today that I realized I'd had two immense iced coffees in addition to my regular coffee intake. It never occurred to me when I was over-indulging in my delicious, delicious caffeine fix that it might haunt me later. At 3 am, it was most definitely haunting me.

Wooooo, I'm a ghooooost!

Obviously this sucks. A lot. I can't have a bit of extra coffee (or a gallon of extra coffee) on a day when I'm feeling laggy. I can't just enjoy a couple of beers and keep my head on straight. I sometimes tear up watching comedy movies because someone is being bullied in a way that's meant to be hilarious. And I cringe in embarrassment at the antics of idiots on TV, feeling like I'm the one doing those things, which is why I never got into Workaholics.

Sometimes I'll get incredibly overwhelmed by really small things. Needing to do some extra cleaning up, having to do an errand, or trying to get through a tough level in a video game can turn me into a stressed-out mess. And then, of course, I feel guilty about being such a mess because I tell myself that I should be able to handle these things like anyone else.

The truth is that I have a mental illness. I don't handle stress the way other people do. My brain is actually very different from a 'normal' brain, and there is no surgery or medication or magic spell that will change it. The National Institutes of Mental Health actually define bipolar disorder as a brain disorder. There are several differences between the brain of someone with bipolar disorder and the brain of someone without mental health problems, and not just the neurotransmitters, either. The article in the above link actually mentions that the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for decision-making and judgment, is often smaller and less functional in patients with bipolar than those without.

Brain scans illustrate how differently our minds work.

It really doesn't matter if other 'normal' people can understand this, even if it is conveniently depicted in such a way that a child can see the differences. What matters is that we understand this fundamental difference between how our brains work and others' do. There's no point in comparing ourselves to people who don't have mental illnesses because it's like comparing a professional athlete to a politician-- their jobs and functions and lives are completely different. LeBron might be a great basketball player, but I wouldn't want him making decisions about foreign policy.

Not even with his lensless glasses.

What Dreams May Come

Dreams are sort of a new experience to me. I'm not talking about 'hopes and dreams' but actual dreaming when you sleep. When I was too self-medicated to feel most of my ups and downs, I also couldn't dream. On the rare occasions I didn't go to bed high, I would have strange dreams, all of which took place on the same world. Now that I don't, I have dreams every night when I sleep.

The other night I had a very unpleasant dream that began with myself and my two sisters in some kind of golf-cart thing, except the youngest one was suddenly eight again, and she was driving. She also didn't understand slowing down for turns or steering. This would have been stressful enough, but later I found myself wandering in a foggy town, seeking out some shred of human company, which was possibly worse than tipping over in a golf cart at sixty miles per hour.

I finally found a place where people were playing some weird game of throwing their shoe into a basket or something, with a series of disturbing variations like having to be in a glass coffin full of water while making the shot. I was terrible at it and after a few rounds, I gave up and walked out with only one shoe, back to wandering the foggy, lonesome town alone, now irritated and angry and resentful of the terrible game that had stolen my shoe.

I don't even own a shoes like these...

I am sure dream interpreters would have a field day with this, and that there is plenty of symbolism there indicating feeling out of control of my life, or like someone completely incompetent is driving my life, and obviously lots of feelings of isolation and not fitting in anywhere. I'm not worrying about that at the moment. What that dream meant for me was that I woke up feeling anxious and stressed out and irritable, and carried those feelings with me throughout the day.

There were other factors that added to it, of course. Being late everywhere, not being able to drive myself anywhere, and the fact that because of an unfortunate error with one of my work tasks, I was unable to get anything done, which set me behind for my weekly quota. All in all, not a great Monday.

I have never been great with stress and anxiety. After last night's DBSA meeting, which was the one thing that finally helped me to feel better, I know that I am not the only person with that issue. Most of us at the meeting have bipolar disorder, and most of us have difficulties with getting stressed out easily and dealing poorly with anxiety. It seems that I am more the rule than the exception, which is kind of a relief in many ways.

As I try to stick to the routine and the medication that are helping me, and remind myself that these things are helping, there is often a sense of loneliness and isolation. Sometimes Monday meetings are the only time I don't feel oddly severed from the world, like a phantom limb, except people actually miss their limbs after having them amputated. I sincerely doubt that friends of mine who have moved away, or who I've moved away from, even think about me. I know that old boyfriends don't miss me, and the one who claimed that he did hasn't spoken to me in over a month, which kind of proves that he was just full of it.

Speaking of that issue, I did finally grow enough self-respect to toss all his old emails into my Junk folder, where they belong. I also blocked him from all social media and then emptied my Junk Mail folder. I know he'll never e-mail me or call me again, but at least if he does attempt to, it'll get sent to Junk Mail and I can just bounce it. It doesn't make it suck any less that I'm accepting the fact that he probably only got in touch with me in hopes of sexting or getting a few photos to look at while he... yeah.

I'm not the girl I used to be, and I'm really proud of that. I don't want to be with someone just to abate the loneliness for a short while, and I definitely don't want to get attached to someone who doesn't care about me so much as they care about getting some. I don't do drugs or drink or go for days wearing sweatpants (although with the current heatwave I seem to be living in a slovenly combination of shorts and shirts I don't mind sweating through). There are still days when going back to that seems a bit appealing, and that causes me more anxiety than anything, the thought of backsliding into my previous oblivion.

 Unfortunately, having a mental illness means that there will always be cruel people ready to tell you that you're faking it, just trying to get attention, or boring, or whatever other childish pettiness they can come up with. There will always be people who don't understand because they don't ever want to understand, people who don't care because they don't care about anything but themselves. But there are genuinely good people out there in the world, people who may not understand but will still try to help, people who will bother to educate themselves, people who will care even if it's hard to.

Powering Down

Well, last night just as I sat down at my computer to type up a post, the power died. Fourteen hours later, schools were cancelled, nursing homes had to be emergency evacuated, and I was starting to get a bit grouchy about the lack of air conditioning (and internet). All thanks to the very same energy company recently caught illegally pumping contaminated water into rivers. (Actually, that wasn't the first time, if you read the article.)

So a special thanks is owed to these dingbats for not only being a terrible energy company in terms of service quality, but also for breaking the law to destroy our planet.

Does this even need a caption?

With that, I shall conclude my rant against certain evil corporations and step off my soapbox. It sure is easy to get to ranting, probably more so because I have a mental illness. I'll get very angry about people doing rotten things to others, and even sometimes to myself. Of course, forgiveness is one of the central tenets of my beliefs (and a major tenet of most religions, Eastern and Western) and moreover, it's much healthier than clinging to anger over past offenses.

Powering down after getting angry or worked up can be incredibly difficult. I've asked some of the people in my support group, DBSA, what they do to make themselves feel better when they're down, but we haven't discussed what we do when we're angry. I tend to stalk around smoking cigarettes and walk in circles even as I think in circles. Then I find a video game that lets me kill monsters with excessive amounts of damage.

In the earliest levels, no less.

I can't necessarily say that works all that well. Sometimes video games work me up more, especially when I have to try six different types of tactics for a boss fight or another super-annoying enemy. Such silly little frustrations only end up adding to whatever irrational rage is festering in me, which can't be a good thing. In my more calm moments, I wish I were better at meditating.

In truth I have been trying to work on meditating a bit more, usually via prayer. Now to be perfectly clear, I am not telling anyone they should pray or need to pray in order to meditate or calm down. If it helps you meditate, calms you down, and/or makes you feel better, then I won't stop you. It does those things for me, but I'm thoroughly against forcing religion on others. If praying makes you anxious or angry or irritable, then you probably shouldn't.

If one of these helps, awesome. If not, that's fine, too.

Calming techniques are probably the most difficult thing to master. I certainly haven't mastered them, and the old techniques I used were obviously not healthy. One thing I have noticed among people at the meetings is that many of us rely on distractions to get out of our heads. That is something I can definitely relate to, and something the internet is the all-time master of providing.

Lately I have been getting more involved in community things, from breakfasts to fundraising to peer facilitation with DBSA. More than video games or memes or even intoxicants, I've started to notice that being involved and reaching out to other people is one of the best distractions from my own problems that I have experienced. There are a lot of people out there in much worse situations than my own, not that this minimizes a severe mental illness, but it does go a long way to offer perspective. For example, if I had this illness and lived in an abusive family, or a third-world country with minimal medical care, my life would be a lot worse.

For all that bipolar disorder has made a lot of things harder, from relationships to work to finishing college, there are some things it can help with, and I think one of those is empathy for others. If you've ever met someone who truly understood what you are feeling, not just felt sorry for you, then you know a little empathy goes a long way. I've been very fortunate to meet such people at DBSA, and I know I plug the organization a lot, but they've done a lot to help me, and I'd like to return the favor.

The Whys and the Hows

There is this strange attitude that in order to undergo therapy "properly," one has to understand why they feel every emotion. This may come from some weird media portrayals of psychology or simply from psych 101 class, or maybe it's all in our heads as a society for no reason at all. Wait a minute-- it can't be there for no reason, can it?

As someone with bipolar, I'm going to heartily argue that yes, sometimes emotions manifest for no apparent reason. Sure, it might be helpful to identify what triggers bouts of anxiety or anger or depression, but delving deep into the past and obsessing about the childhood incident when your mom swatted you for something your little sister did probably isn't actually going to help overcome that emotion. Sometimes the best you can do is just ride it out and try to get through it.

Sometimes you're just anxious and worrying about it won't

do anything for you but make you worry.

I've said before that emotions aren't such rational beasts, and it's true. What is mildly frustrating to me one day might trigger a massive emotional breakdown another day. Most of the time seeing that my email is full of junk emails merits only a brief rolling of the eyes, but some days it makes me feel lonely and depressed. (That link is to a previous post in this blog, by the way.) I can't predict the future any better than anyone else, so I don't know what might set me off from one day to the next. I do know that obsessing over the past or a negative emotion is not healthy.

A few weeks ago, I bailed out on an event I had been looking forward to all week at the last minute. I was feeling stressed out and anxious and was getting pressured to hurry up and get ready, and finally when I was asked "Do you just want us to go without you?" I answered, "Kind of, yeah." It turned out that the event was actually pretty lame, and 'food trucks' turned out to be 'hot dog stands.' Now, I didn't realize this when I decided not to attend, but I do know that if I had been rushed and pressured to hurry up and go to find that it was a disappointment, it would've made me feel much worse.

You call that a food truck?

My mother, meaning well, asked me the next day why I had been feeling so stressed and anxious that I skipped out on our plans at the last minute. I had a few reasons to feel stressed, but not necessarily anything too major. Ultimately I ended up telling her that I had been stressed out because I have a mental illness, and sometimes I get stressed for barely any reason at all. The why of it really didn't matter, because the reasons weren't what I had to deal with; the emotion was what I had to deal with.

It's not fun to feel bad. I've been accused of wallowing in my misery by people who have no idea what depression actually is, and surprisingly, it did not help. I've had people ask me why I'd feel a certain way because it just made no sense. I've had people berate me for having trouble accepting things, and demand to know why I couldn't just 'let it go.' Well, the answer to that is that this is not a musical and I don't have magical ice powers and the catchiest Disney song since The Lion King.

Lucky you. The rest of the town needs blankets in spring now.

So my question is why would you put yourself through that? Why would you stick your worst emotions under a microscope and try to figure out where the root was and go digging around it when it will wither up and die given time? If you always feel a certain way after a certain stimulus, it's worth investigating, but having a sad or anxious or angry day isn't going to be solved by trying to figure out where and why and how it came to be.

If it helps you to analyze every one of your emotions to death, then by all means, don't let me stop you. But if, like me, you have gotten no help from trying to do that, if you've only found it makes that emotion consume you, maybe it's time to stop and say, "Who cares why I feel this way? I feel it, and I'm the one who has to live with it, so I'm going to live with it." And maybe you can also sing the song from Frozen, if that helps.

Metaphors

I've heard and seen a lot of fairly ridiculous metaphors for depression, primarily on commercials for antidepressants or other prescription medications. It seems like we're always seeking ways to explain how depression feels so that other people can understand what it's like. Listing off clinical symptoms seems cold in a way, but that might be better than calling depression a cloud. I've seen clouds, and they're fluffy and pretty, or stormy and terrifying (or awe-inspiring), but you can still see the world around them.

Or it's a completely nonsensical balloon.

Now, without getting on a soapbox and ranting about the pharmaceutical industry, I have to point out that, as many people who've suffered it might know, depression is not like a cloud at all. When you're in the midst of a depression, it's hard to see the world around you, and you certainly don't expect it to be gone the next day, like a cloud will be. In the darkest mires, there is nothing but the depression and loneliness. You can't see anything but darkness, you can't see a way out, and you probably think you wouldn't have the strength to get out even if you did see a tiny fissure in the walls of your prison.

In my last post I compared it to having a serial killer tie you up and throw you into a dark basement, and that's what I'm going to stick with. It's a lot more accurate, especially given that suicide has been ranked the tenth leading cause of death for all ages in 2010. See more facts from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). If you click the link, there are some pretty upsetting figures in there, so be warned.

Back to the serial killer's basement metaphor, when you get pitched down a flight of stairs, it tends to be quite painful and can cause some pretty serious injuries. Not everyone who is depressed attempts to hurt themselves, but there are a lot of indirect ways to injure yourself, too. Not taking care of your health certainly causes it to deteriorate and there are a multitude of ways to do it, from not exercising to eating unhealthy foods to using alcohol and drugs. Depression can often cause impairment to one's ability to work, making their job and school performance falter. '

Then there's the social aspect of how isolating severe depression can be: you withdraw from others and sometimes the more shallow people withdraw from you because you're "too depressing." I'm going to take a moment to point out that if someone stops hanging out with you for that reason, avoid them at all costs, because they are obviously bad for you.

After you've fallen down all those steps, you're on the floor, aching and injured and alone in the dark. You can't see anything or feel anything but your own pain and cold concrete. On top of that, you have no idea how long you'll be stuck down there, and it sure doesn't look like you'll be getting out before you die. I think this is a much more obvious reason for why people choose suicide when they're deeply depressed than a cloud or balloon or whatever silly cartoon the drug companies come up with next.

This is a lot worse than a black balloon.

I realize that it seems like an incredibly extreme metaphor, but having been in that basement, I don't think it is the least bit exaggerated. Neither do my fellows at the Depression-Bipolar Support Alliance, who agree that the cloud metaphor actually minimizes depression to the point of being offensive. The minimizing of depression and the pain it causes only makes it worse, so better we should stick with something more extreme and horrific than a cutesy cartoon.

Quick Pick-Me-Ups

Today is a pretty nice day, and yes, it's because I went shopping. Getting some new, cute clothes that look good is definitely a way to make myself feel better, and I've heard that it makes plenty of other people feel better, too. Yesterday I posted about depression because of Robin Williams' death. So today, in hopes of adding a sprinkling of hope and positivity, I'm going to talk about things that can make people feel better (and some of them are things that work for others, not always for me).

Before I get started, I definitely know how hard it is to be excited or happy when depression strikes. A loss of interest or enjoyment in otherwise pleasurable activities is actually one of the biggest signs/symptoms of severe depression. So it might not be entirely realistic to do something over-the-top like going on a huge camping trip or a fabulous vacation, or even making a fantastic homemade meal. Not everything works for everyone, and what makes you happy might be excruciatingly boring to someone else, and vice versa. I'll try to keep that in mind, but I also ask anyone reading this to do the same-- I'm trying to make a fairly thorough list here, but that doesn't mean try everything on it.

Look at that roar of triumph!

1. Exercise: Yeah, it can suck, but there's a lot of different types. Taking a dog (or a friend) for a twenty or thirty minute walk can be as refreshing as a Zumba class, and walking around is quite inexpensive. There's other types of exercise, too-- hiking, biking, yoga, Pilates, weight lifting, jogging, swimming, sports (and a lot of those), dancing, and simple at-home things like push-ups and sit-ups. You don't have to try them all, you just need to find one that works. Here's what the Mayo Clinic has to say about it.

That's how happy my puppy makes me!

2. Pets: They're a lot of work, but they love you in a way that humans can't. My dog has witnessed some horrific sobbing breakdowns and instead of judging me, she cuddles me. Whether your pet is sweet and snuggly, hyper and playful, or small and squeaky, they are one of the best friends you'll ever have.

OMG! More than one type of art?!

3. Art: I'm not just talking about drawing or painting, I'm talking about all the various forms of art out there. Writing, music, and film also qualify. It doesn't matter if you wouldn't show your artwork to anyone (I don't show people most of my fiction stories), because just making it is a break from life, a chance to get lost in creation. If you really, really don't want to try your hand at making something, just enjoy others' work. There are art galleries, concerts, internet radio, movies, and books aplenty out there, and as many different types of art as there are people who want to enjoy it.

Whether you like classic rock and science fiction, country western and romance novels, or hip-hop and spy thrillers, there is art out there for you to enjoy. You can enjoy a lot of it from home, no less, so if you're especially mired down in depression, you can just sit at your computer and pull up Pandora or Spotify and google whatever e-books or images you want to see, or pull up Hulu or Netflix and watch a movie or TV show.

Aw, yisss.

4. Food: Everyone loves food. I hate olives and tomato sauce (yes, I hate spaghetti and meatballs) but I love a lot of other foods, from cheeseburgers to Chinese take-out. Eating healthy is tough to begin, but once you start, you do feel a lot better, and you'll probably look better, too. I eat the same peanut-butter-and-jelly on wheat every day. Boring, I'll grant, but it's healthy and easy and cheap. Now, I love cooking.

If you love cooking, there are millions of recipes to check out on the internet, and in fact, that's where I've gotten the best roasted chicken recipe of all time. Now, not everyone likes to cook, but eating good food, whether it's you making it at home or some talented chef whipping it up at your favorite restaurant is a good way to enjoy yourself at least a bit every day. Going out to try a new restaurant is almost always fun (unless the food and service are awful, like the Dairy Queen in my town) and you don't have to worry about the cooking part. You don't have to try a new place every day, or even every week. Making space in your budget to treat yourself a bit is definitely worth it, though.

5. Hobbies: We all have them. I personally love gaming, be it tabletop games (like Dungeons & Dragons) or flash games on kongregate.com. Other people have hobbies like gardening (which I'm terrible at), decorating, boating, going to church or community events, volunteering, sports, cooking, scrapbooking, music, or critiquing movies and TV shows. If you haven't done that thing you love in a while, give it a try. Find a group in your area on Meetup.com so you have someone else to push you to do it and someone to do it with you. Or try something new. I didn't get into cooking or tabletop games until I was in my late twenties, and those are two of my favorite things now.

If only all showers were this awesome...

6. Grooming: Whether you're shopping for that new adorable dress (or supremely dapper suit) or getting your hair cut, knowing you look good, or at least better, does have a pretty direct effect on feeling good. Some days I put on makeup just because it makes me feel pretty, even though I don't have anywhere to go. Believe me, I know what it feels like to go a week without a shower and live a winter in sweatpants. Every single time I bothered to get myself cleaned up and dressed in something nice, I always felt that tiny bit better. You don't have to put on a party dress or an expensive suit, you can just put on your favorite superhero tee shirt. Looking good feels good, except when you're wearing a corset.

7. Helping Others: I know, I know, it sounds weird. Why bother helping others when I can barely help myself? Why should I help other people when they don't bother to help me? How can it possibly help me to put my dwindling energy toward another person when I can barely crawl out of bed in the morning? It might sound counter-intuitive, but it actually feels great.

There are millions of opportunities to volunteer in every community. You don't have to go build houses for Habitat for Humanity, you can just go to the nearest nursing home and offer to read to a sickly patient. Doing just a little bit of good for the world around you can help take your mind off of the bad stuff inside, give you a bit of perspective about how badly some other people have it, and make you feel better simply because you've done something worth being proud of.

We'll Miss You, Mr. Williams

I didn't actually read the news yesterday until about ten at night, and so I didn't realize Robin Williams died until then. Worse, he killed himself. The news has said he was battling major depression and had relapsed into an alcohol problem.

Sometimes it seems like we Americans overuse the word "tragedy." In Shakespearean terms, a tragic hero is one who brings about his own downfall (like Hamlet). In the case of Robin Williams' death, though, I think that the word tragedy is appropriate. He was, by all accounts, a wonderful man. His movies brightened many people's moods just for the watching, and his smile was comforting and loving to see.

In this picture, I can see the smile looking dimmer, almost more of a grimace than a happy expression. It makes me wish, even more than reading the shocking news, that I could have met him, just for a few seconds; just long enough to give him a hug and tell him that he is not alone. Even though depression is the loneliest feeling in the world (aside from perhaps being deserted on a desert island), even though it's the hardest thing to realize when you're in that pit, none of us are alone there.

According to statistics from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), roughly 16 million adults in the USA had suffered a major depressive episode in the past 12 months. That's 6.9% of the population, and from a less clinical perspective, that's a lot of people. Anyone suffering from depression in the US alone has about 16 million other people who are going through something similar. Check out the NIMH page here: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1MDD_ADULT.shtml

Since I can't say this to Robin Williams, I can say it to people who look at this blog: you're not alone. Everyone experiences pain, and millions of us have suffered through major depressive episodes. If you can't find support among family and friends, there are dozens of support groups out there-- the Depression-Bipolar Support Alliance or DBSA (which has become a major pillar of support in my own life) has both in-person and online groups, which their website can direct you to; the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill or NAMI; and countless other support groups.

If you are depressed, the hardest thing to do can be to seek help. I've been there, too. You feel like a burden, feel like it's never going to get better, feel like there's no point in even trying. It's not some cute cartoon cloud following you around like the antidepressant commercials. You've been tied up and chucked down the stairs into a serial killer's dark, dank basement with no lights and no sound, and you have no idea if you'll ever get out alive.

What those NIMH statistics, and what support groups have taught me, is that there are other people in that basement, too. It might not be easy to find them, might not be easy to reach out to them for help. But it's worth it, because if you work together, maybe you can find a crack in the wall and dig your way out. Sure, it'll hurt, but it's a hell of a lot better than dying down there.

So please, to anyone reading this, please don't give up hope. If you're depressed, don't try to go it alone. Don't hate yourself for feeling that way (even though that's really tough). If I can reach out, anyone can.

And if you are considering suicide, please call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255, or call the person you trust most in the world, or call your therapist. Your life means a lot to someone in this world.

Crash

I woke up this morning to find I had something like thirteen emails waiting for me by 9 am, and all but three were junk mail. It wasn't exactly thrilling, to say the least, and on some level I had hoped I might hear from that old boyfriend who's disappeared. Obviously I didn't.

I guess that this is the end of whatever hypomania has coasted me through the summer. As fall approaches (and in Indiana, the latest-opening schools start this week) it's inevitable that my mood will take a downswing. I hadn't expected it to happen quite yet, but it happens when it happens.

At this point I'm not in a full-blown depression, not down in the subbasement just yet. I'm trying really hard not to look down the stairs, either, not to look ahead and see the all-consuming dark that's waiting down there. It's funny how little things can hurt that much more when your mood starts slipping, though.

Today I had trouble with my work server and ended up getting less done because of a system crash than I normally do. I'll live, I can always put in some more hours the rest of the week and since I typically work Saturday and Sunday for at least a bit, it'll even out. But I've been fighting the urge to crawl back into bed all day.

It does look pretty comfy...

I'm tired, I feel old and alone and worn-out. Thank God I have a DBSA meeting tonight so I can talk to people about things, but it's only once a week. I keep telling myself that things will get better soon enough-- I'll make new friends who don't require that I'm a drunk or a druggy to hang out with me, I'll save up some money, I'll get back on my feet more completely-- but today it seems like this limbo might be exactly that: endless nothing.

Apathetic depression is worse than the ones where you cry all the time, because there's just nothing there, nothing to interest you or excite you, no reason to do anything. You have to basically become an automaton in order to function at all, and even hurting would be something more than being dead inside. Unfortunately, I'm pretty prone to those apathetic depressions, although we'll have to see if that changes now that I'm not severely self-medicated.

It looks as though the coaster has changed directions, and now we're going down the hill, and hopefully not into a long tunnel. Again, I can't predict the future. I can only try to keep myself busy, keep myself writing, and get through each day to the best of my abilities. Most importantly, it's a matter of not beating myself up for feeling this way, because it is what it is, and that will only make it worse.

Viscosity

Some days just feel slow. Or maybe it's a bit of mild manic impatience with everything. It seems like the whole world is moving at a snail's pace, or possibly slower, and I just want it to hurry up.

I could go on some introspective hunt for the roots of these feelings, but the truth is where they stem from doesn't really matter. Emotions aren't rational, especially when you're living with bipolar disorder. Why do I feel one way or another? Because I have a mental illness. It doesn't really matter why, what matters is getting through it.

Is there some childhood trauma I've locked away deep down? Eh, maybe. Is there some childhood behavior that seems distinctly reminiscent of a bipolar episode? That I can answer with yes. Tomorrow I'll post the immersive narrative short I wrote about the first manic episode I can remember. I was three or four years old when it happened and some aspects of the memory are blurry, but others are sharp and clear, like fragmented glass.

Today the world is moving slowly and I want to hurry up and get somewhere. I just don't know if there's anywhere to get. I have things to do later on-- a ten p.m. tabletop game tonight, my first time reading in church tomorrow morning-- but right now I feel like I'm just killing time. Even following my routing of work, lunch, work, write seems like it's just a means to get through a series of days that won't change.

It would be a lie to say that routine is exciting. It might be stabilizing, it might be good for me and for others who have this illness, but it can also be very boring when every day is repetitive. I also work a very repetitive job, rating webpages for quality and usefulness to search engine queries. Sometimes I see interesting things, but most of the time I have to wade through harmful file-sharing sites and the horrible, useless wikianswers, wondering who on earth would think it's a good idea to use that site for information (seriously, it's not).

The routine isn't exciting. And right now I think I'm being very negative about it, and about everything, which I certainly don't want to. Ultimately I do need this routine to keep myself from slipping back into old, bad habits. Sometimes I worry that I might do just that, and the most frightening part is how appealing the idea is. But didn't someone once say that nothing worth doing is easy?

The day might feel slow, but I can always do something about that. I'd actually really like to go shopping for some much-needed clothes. The game tonight will be lots of fun, and no matter how worried I am that I might much up my reading tomorrow in front of a church full of people, the people who know what I'm doing have been supportive and encouraging about it.

Overall, if the worst thing I have to complain about is feeling like a Saturday is slow, I'm in a much better place than I was three months ago. And if routines and medications have helped me get here, they've obviously done more good than any of my previous methods.

Let's Talk About Wrecks, Baby

Before I get into the content of my post today, I want to share a very important link and (yet another) plug for the Depression-Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA). http://www.dbsalliance.org/site/PageServer?pagename=home This is the url of the DBSA homepage, which has a ton of great resources and can also help people find chapters near them. (I tried to link it a few times, but it seems the link function is not working.)

Now let's talk about wrecks. I have definitely fit the bill of 'trainwreck' in the past. These days I might be doing better, but obviously I think back to worse times and recall what a complete disaster I was.

I remember a night during my sophomore year of college, sitting in a bathtub full of water while wearing a lace dress and chain-smoking cigarettes and pot, when I found myself staring at the white tiles of the walls and wondering if I was going insane. Where did reality and sanity end, I thought, and how could I know?

Lucky for me, you have to be at least somewhat sane to wonder at your sanity. It wasn't the last time I would wonder this, though, nor had it been the first. Over the next ten years, I spiraled into a deeper and deeper mess, dropping out of school, dating drug dealers, trying more drugs and drinking excessively. I did some incredibly stupid things like driving drunk, going to class or work high, going home with men I met in bars, and refusing to go to therapy or take medications.

Delusional ego-trips are a common symptom of mania. I believed at some points that I would write the most amazing piece of literature of the twenty-first century, or become a famous filmmaker, just by showing up with some ideas. Obviously I have yet to accomplish either of those ideals. More dangerous than these very foolish notions, however, was that I knew better than every doctor in the world.

I have always been a bad patient, in part because my father is a doctor and I get free medical advice at home. I've also taken a few classes like Anatomy, Physiology, and Organic Chemistry that made me think somehow I know more than professionals with actual working experience. (I might be able to do literary analysis better than a few doctors, but my diagnostic abilities are far from accredited.)

Some statistics estimate as many as 50% of people who have bipolar disorder don't take medication, and for a long time, I was part of that statistic. It took hitting rock bottom to start picking up the pieces of my life and doing what needed to be done to manage my illness. I wouldn't wish rock bottom on anyone (okay, I'd wish it on Putin, Trump, and Bevos), but sometimes it takes a massive slap across the ego to make you realize that you need to make some serious changes.

The good news is that if I can start taking the steps to improve my life and manage my illness, anyone can. I have met some incredibly high-functioning people through the DBSA who work incredibly stressful jobs like nursing and legal investigations. I am trying to join their ranks, but it is a slow process, and one I have to accept is no more instant than any other aspect of treating a disease.

Even the most gruesome vehicle wreck eventually gets cleaned up. It might take a while, but bit by bit, the debris and sometimes also the dead bodies and chemical spills will get cleared away. Figuring out where to start is the hardest part, of course, but once you start the process, it gets easier to do, because there's a little bit less wreckage each day.

P.S. Here is the article from Psychology Today that I referred to in my last post, and again today. It's a good read. (Again, this is just the url, and I have no idea if it will work as a link because my link function is not working.) http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200311/managing-bipolar-disorder

Unconditional: Relationships and Bipolar Disorder

Here is a fun and dreadful topic. If you have bipolar disorder and have ever tried to be in a relationship with someone who doesn't have it, you have probably had a lot of fights, many of which include words like "you're being irrational" directed toward you. While this may not be a fun thing to hear (or a fair thing to say), the truth is that romantic relationships in particular are built around emotions. And emotions are not the most rational things.

In November of 2003, the magazine Psychology Today published an article with a particularly chilling statistic that many of those of us who are trying to learn about and manage our illness have already seen. According to this article, "Managing Bipolar Disorder," marriages with one spouse who has bipolar have a divorce rate estimated around 90%. I've never been married, but that statistic makes me really doubt that I would try it, even if I did have a prospective partner.

I'll freely admit that because of my disease, I tend to isolate myself. I haven't actually gone on a date in two years. I have heard so many guys call me crazy that I eventually stopped trying to meet anyone. I ignored or shot down attempts to flirt with me until I finally just stopped taking part in social situations where I would encounter single men interested in finding a date (or more likely a one-night-stand).

Today my therapist asked me if I could picture myself being in a relationship in the future. My answer was that I wasn't so sure. Then, of course, I had to admit for the sake of honesty, "Sure, I'd like to be in a relationship. It's a pretty common human desire."

I went on to explain that while I had been in touch with an old boyfriend, lately his emails have come fewer and further between, and I haven't bothered to try emailing him in more than ten days. The main reason is that I don't want to get too attached, but there's also the fact that I suspect he's not especially interested in pursuing anything, even if he initiated the contact.

Let's face it: getting attached to someone romantically tends to end poorly anyway, but if you're living with a mental illness, those attachments tend to end far worse than 'poorly.' This probably isn't the healthiest attitude toward relationships. Okay, it's not healthy at all, but at least it's common among people who don't have mental illnesses, too.

I really wish I had something positive to say about this whole matter, but my experience has been distinctly negative. Now that I'm actually working to manage my disease, maybe there is a possibility, however distant, that I could one day attempt a relationship again. I certainly don't plan to put any money on it, though.

Riding the Wave

I don't actually surf, and the best I've ever done with skateboarding involved clinging to my friend's shoulders and wobbling along awkwardly in a straight-ish line that abruptly ended when I needed to turn. So for me, this works well as a metaphor for manic and hypomanic (low-level mania) states: I totter along, trying to balance on this narrow board and not splatter on the pavement or crash into someone's car, hoping I can just get off this awful thing and walk on my own two feet again.

The best I can manage while hypomanic is to try and channel the excess energy into something positive and productive, like writing or housework or exercise. Sometimes the anxiety and irritability mount to the point where all I want to do is hide and play mindless video games or watch mindless TV shows-- anything I can do to distract myself from racing thoughts and irrational fears.

Tonight I had my weekly DBSA (Depression-Bipolar Support Alliance) meeting, and I was asked to co-facilitate (help lead the discussion) for the first time. This was at once an exciting honor and a mildly terrifying new territory, but my co-facilitator had lots of experience and helped me a lot. We talked about our anxiety levels over the course of the week, as well as what we did to deal with stress and anxiety.

I realized that I am not the only person who deals with stress and anxiety in either an unhealthy way (drinking, drugs, self-harm, cigarettes, isolation, etc.) or else by trying to find a distraction. I am aware that unhealthy stress relief is a distraction of sorts but I obviously don't recommend or condone it, even if I've done everything on that example list and still haven't quit cigarettes. But for people who are managing their illness and using healthy methods, distraction from bad anxiety or stress is sometimes the best method.

Not all distractions are bad, either. Watching a fun movie or an episode of a TV show, reading an interesting book (if you can focus; if not, don't stress about it), playing a game, going for a walk or another type of exercise like yoga, gardening, meditation, prayer, making art or music, writing-- all of these are healthy distractions. Not all of them might work for every individual, of course. I can tell you that I'm truly awful at gardening and the thought of watering plants and weeding flowerbeds stresses me out at least on a low level. But obviously writing helps me somewhat.

Everyone at the meeting has their own chosen distraction. One woman loves exercise, another man loves art, while still another loves gardening. What I felt I should do as facilitator was to listen to what caused people anxiety, and then to ask what they did for stress relief and what made them feel happy. It taught me a lot, and hopefully it helped people to focus on the positive action they could take as opposed to the negative feelings.

To be clear, people come to DBSA and other forms of therapy when they are ready to start taking their treatment seriously and managing their lives. Every level of trying to deal with our illnesses is present in the meetings, from people who have been successfully managing their disease for years to people like me who are only just starting to take their treatment seriously and get their lives on track. I would recommend it to anyone who is dealing with depression, anxiety, bipolar, or borderline personality disorder, and to their friends or family. It's free, first of all, and it can be a huge help to know that you're not alone (at least it was for me).

I'm still riding that hypomanic wave, trying to stay on the surf- or skateboard or whatever hideous piece of too-narrow support is between me and the turbulence. Every time I go to a meeting and talk to people with similar illnesses, if not always similar problems, it gives me a bit more hope that I, too, can manage my disease successfully.

Whatever's Clever

Usually I have a lot of fun coming up with titles for things but today I seem to be a bit dried up for inspiration. Maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's that my mother was on my case about everything yesterday.

Or maybe I should just stop making excuses.

I didn't write yesterday, and I'm trying not to feel guilty about that, but feelings of guilt can be tough to deal with. It's even tougher because I am trying to make writing at least a little bit on this blog part of my routine.

It's still a struggle to get through this hypomanic state. On the one hand, I do have lots of extra energy, but on the other, there's a sort of irritable undercurrent and it's more difficult to wrestle my temper. I am a bottle under pressure type with my temper, except during manic periods. That's the addition of heat to the pressurized contents of the bottle that blows it up and shoots glass in every direction.

Lately I've been working on expressing frustration and annoyance to the people who have frustrated or annoyed me rather than stewing and blowing up. It isn't easy all the time (okay, most of the time) but it turns out to be better in the end. Let out the irritation or annoyance before it turns into anger and hate.

Letting go can be one of the hardest things to do with this illness. Ruminating about the past, negative thought spirals, and anxiety about small things are apparently very common symptoms of bipolar disorder. If people who don't have to live with this can have trouble letting go of things, then it should come as no surprise that people who feel every emotion magnified might also have some difficulties with it.

Unfortunately there is this notion that letting go is just a simple matter of saying to yourself 'I'm letting ___ go.' The only time I have ever seen this work was in movies and on TV, where people solve all of their problems in the space of an hour or two. It would be lovely if the world worked like the movies and we were all amazing action heroes who looked perfect all the time, but there's a reason that media is unrealistic: it's meant as an escape from reality.

I don't have any solid solutions for letting go, except perhaps for therapy. The problem with therapy is that it's not a miracle cure, and it doesn't only take place in the therapist's office. If you're not working on the things you talk about in between, you're not going to benefit from it very much. Yet there are plenty of people who lie to their therapists, refuse to discuss their problems, and most of all do not work on anything outside of their sessions.

No one can achieve anything if they refuse to work on it. Even celebrities like Kim Kardashian, who many people think is just famous because of who her parents are, have to work to stay famous. Ms. Kardashian has to put in a lot of time to keep her appearance up, not to mention how exhausting it must be to have camera crews follow you around your everyday life, and you can't show up to every paparazzi event unless you do some research and nurture a vast network of connections. So in order for her to become and stay famous, Kim Kardashian has a lot of work to do, even if it seems to some people like "all she does is pose for the cameras."

The point is that managing an illness like bipolar disorder is a lot of work. People who aren't willing to put in the work, for whatever reason, inevitably find that the disease manages them instead of the other way around. And who wants to live like that?

Grumpy Cat

So, I have this blog and I have yet to post a picture in it. Today, this one seems appropriate for my mood:

I got the Grumpy Cat picture here: http://buymelaughs.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Funny-Cats-Top-49-Most-Funniest-Grumpy-Cat-Quotes-4.jpg and obviously I cannot take credit for this meme, or any other.

Today began with agitation, when my mother called me just to make sure I was awake. Yes, I had overslept beyond what I meant to, but I didn't actually have anything pressing to do in the morning, and I do not enjoy waking up to phone calls. I wake up in sort of a panic, trying to squint at the blurry cell phone shrieking for attention, lurch out of bed and start pacing around my room. All in all, it's incredibly unpleasant, and yes, I realize that it's just my own reaction, but that doesn't make it any more enjoyable.

Unfortunately a bad wake-up tends to set the stage for a not-so-great day, and in my case, this meant a day of excessive anxiety and irritability. These are two very common symptoms of mania, which I am trying to deal with as best I can, but unfortunately there are not a plethora of solutions. For the most part, the best you can do is up your dose of medication (done), stick to your routine (doing), and if need be, hand over your car keys (done) and your bank cards (ahem... no).

I am certainly not at the point of needing hospitalization, but the jittery, irritable, anxiety-prone feelings plaguing me today in particular have me wishing I could do something more productive than riding it out. Of course, anyone who has ever dealt with any form of mental (or physical) illness knows that there's really no miracle cure. There is no instant gratification that will make your problems go away, and things that masquerade as such (drugs, promiscuity, alcohol, spending sprees) actually tend to cause more problems than the temporary relief they provide is worth.

So today, I just have to live with a bad day. Everyone has them, whether or not they have a mental illness. All I can really do is hope that tomorrow is better. Luckily I have an appointment with my therapist bright and early. I still have to get through today, though.

Family Matters

Last week, at my Monday night Depression-Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA) meeting, the facilitator made a joke as the group split up into supporters (friends, family, and partners) and consumers (those of us with mental illness). He said, "In there they cry and in here we laugh." It made me wonder why it is that those who come to support us are crying and bemoaning their misfortune at being related to or friends with a mentally ill person.

I'll be honest that I do find it frustrating, and even resent a bit, the 'why me' attitude of some supporters. Yes, they have chosen to live with our illness, to try to support us through our ups and downs as best they can, but they aren't experiencing those ups and downs firsthand. Yet as I try to learn more about my disease and treat it, I do have to accept that it's a lot of work to take care of another person. Even if you don't have to do everything for them, providing emotional support can be incredibly taxing on the psyche.

My family members found it horrifying to learn about the psyche of a person with bipolar when they read An Unquiet Mind by Dr. Kay Redfield Jameson. I read that book ten years ago, and I found it inspiring and amazing that someone with the same illness I had could do so much, not to mention learn how to manage her illness so well. So I was puzzled (and yes, a little hurt) when my mother read it and expressed shock and horror at the extremes of bipolar. My brother even described the thought processes Dr. Redfield Jameson detailed in the introduction as "completely alien."

After considering it and attending DBSA for the first time, I realized that the issue was that people with normal brain patterns think very differently from people with mental illnesses. While they might have an impulse to buy something they don't need, or to punch an obnoxious person in the mouth, my impulses include things like rolling in the grass with my dog or throwing my pooper-scooper bag into the face of an obnoxious neighbor. And those are the tamer ones.

The truth is that I can't understand a rational mind any more than a rational mind can fully understand mine. When I do and say things that make no sense to people around me, it frightens them. When I become so depressed that I can barely function, not only does it scare people, it makes the more empathic ones feel sad and depressive as well. So it actually makes perfect sense that the people who fall into the role of core support or even caretakers might feel distressed at the situation more often than not.

I wish I had good advice for family members, other than to attend DBSA (really, the group is incredibly helpful and there are chapters all over the United States) and learn all that they can about the illness of the ones they support. And of course, to keep up the good work of supporting family members and friends with mental illness. You may never know how much it means to us to have someone who cares, but I can tell you that from my own experience, it really can be all the difference in the world.

The Stigma

Today I want to tackle one of the least pleasant aspects of having bipolar disorder: the stigma that goes with it. There is exactly one media portrayal that is remotely in the realm of realistic, The Silver Linings Playbook, but it also portrays people with bipolar and mental health issues as being unable to control their behavior and prone to making massive public scenes of outrageous behavior. Do these extreme behaviors and outbursts sometimes happen? Yes, but not nearly as often as the media would have you believe.

Some of the stigma that accompanies bipolar stems from the modern belief that showing emotion or even having it, is somehow 'crazy' or 'melodramatic.' As bipolar disorder does involve feeling the greatest extremes of despair and euphoria, anger and excitement, those of us who have this illness actually do feel emotions more strongly than most people.

To be clear, I am not saying that all of the negative stigma is entirely undeserved. Many of the symptoms of this disease can and do cause extreme behavior during episodes. Promiscuity, substance abuse, and aggression often accompany both manic and depressive periods. Obviously these behaviors are not healthy for us or for those around us. But by and large, those who do not understand or know much about bipolar disorder tend to exaggerate how terrible it is for them to deal with-- often without considering how difficult it is to live with for those of us who have it.

However, a lot of the stigma that exists isn't deserved. Many people think that a person living with bipolar disorder is a ticking time bomb who will inevitably go off on a rampage of insanity. This is not the case. Someone who is properly medicated and managing their illness can actually see manic and depressive episodes coming and take actions to head them off. Even someone who is not fully engaged or actively treating their illness is not necessarily going to act out in an out of control fashion all the time, or even most of the time. With treatment and management, recognizing the onset of mania, depression, or mixed states means that we can prevent them from becoming all-consuming or dangerous.

You may notice that my last name is not included anywhere in my blog. That is because most employers these days check potential employees on the internet, and even such common things as posting Facebook photos of yourself getting drunk at a party can have a negative effect. While the Americans With Disabilities Act clearly states that it is illegal to discriminate against employees with mental health issues, all an employer needs to say is "we've found a more suitable candidate," to circumvent the issue.

I have only recently disclosed my diagnosis to some of my closest friends, because of the incredibly negative reactions that others have had. While only a small handful of people in my life are trustworthy and compassionate enough to know about and make an effort at understanding my illness, this is a fairly recent development. For more than ten years since my mental health issues have come to light, my own family did not understand it, and consequently did not understand how to help or support me.

There is only one solution to the stigma that accompanies bipolar disorder, and that is to educate others about the disease. The media may never be much help, but then, they portray love as consisting of steamy sex scenes and running through airports. Taking the time to explain the disease to individuals will help them to understand, and perhaps they will help others. Hope isn't always easy to come by with this illness, but hope is the starting point to building a better future for anyone.

Something to Consider

The first thing I need to say to anyone reading this is that I have bipolar disorder. I've had this disease since I was a very small child (I can recall a manic episode from when I was about three years old), but without the language or comprehension to express it, I was not diagnosed until my late teen years.

Like so many with this illness, I did not take my treatment very seriously, nor my medication, for many years. I rode the highs like a carnival ride, and mired myself in the lows, disdaining proper treatment in favor of self-medication, isolation, and a slew of other bad choices. While I have not been hospitalized since the age of nineteen, I have spent a total of two to three months on inpatient wards.

I am very fortunate to have a family that is (finally) really learning about this illness so that they can offer the support I need to manage it. There are many other ways in which I'm luckier than a great many people suffering from this illness, such as an excellent therapist, but until recently I did not make use of my inner strengths or external resources to treat it.

Managing bipolar disorder requires a lot of time and effort that I simply did not want to put in during my teen years and early twenties. There are a number of aspects to managing an illness-- any chronic illness-- that are difficult and frustrating. Medication, routine, and eliminating things like alcohol and street drugs are all necessary, as is a support network of people you can trust to help you with your illness when it takes over.

Everything I've read stresses the importance of medication, which many people with bipolar struggle to take and frequently disdain. There are side effects to contend with, remembering to take the medication, and the simple irritation of swallowing a handful of pills every day. I have been lucky enough not to suffer from excessive weight gain, but I've always had trouble with dizziness and shakiness from my medications, especially when the dose increases.

Forming a routine and sticking to it is another hurdle in managing bipolar disorder. Doing the same thing every day sounds pretty boring to most people, and people with mental illness are still people, after all. I resisted forming any kind of routine for years because I didn't want to miss out on 'life,' yet throughout all that time, I wasn't living so much as barely surviving. Nowadays, I still struggle to keep to the routine I've set up, and I am trying to add to it to keep myself busy and largely stable.

Giving up alcohol was a lot easier for me than it might be for others, but I really struggled to quit smoking pot (marijuana). While getting drunk tended to set off the most manic or depressive impulses floating in my head on a given day, getting high made me feel 'normal.' When I was irritable, smoking a joint mellowed me out. When I was anxious, stressed, depressed and/or angry, smoking a joint made me feel better. And when I was manic, smoking pot helped to somewhat slow me down, at least for a little bit. Now that it's out of my system, I've started to notice that I feel my illness more thoroughly, which has the advantage of allowing me to better track my ups and downs, but the disadvantage of actually having to deal with them.

Perhaps the most difficult thing, for me, has been forming a reliable support network. My tendency to withdraw from others, hide my feelings whenever possible, and the less than savory people my excessive drug use surrounded me with made it very difficult to trust others. I would be lying if I said that it's currently easy to trust other people, but I would also be lying if I said that trusting in the right people-- the most supportive friends, my closest family members, a kindly neighbor, and the members of my support group-- hasn't proven to be very worthwhile. The truth is that if someone rejects you because you have a mental illness, they're probably not a very good person to begin with, and you shouldn't trust them anyway.

I've written out a laundry list of the various difficulties with treating and managing bipolar disorder. It's overwhelming, I know. The only way to handle all of it is to take things one at a time, one day at a time.

To leave things on a positive note, I want to draw attention to the number of times I bothered to type the extra words to specify people with mental illness. This is very important, believe it or not. I am not bipolar. No one with with this condition is their disease, no more than someone with cancer is themselves a cancer because they have it. I am a human being-- and so are you, if you have a mental illness-- and while this disease might take up a lot of time and energy, we are all much more than just a diagnosis.