Helping to Understand

I know I seem a big obsessed with bipolar disorder lately and there is a reason. For most ot my time with this, I would have a cycle or crisis, it would last for awhile and then it would go away, for years. At one point it was in relapse so long I thought I might not really have it.


But this one is the illness that keeps on giving, and it's changed, and I'm rapid cycling which is apparently sometbing many bipolar women experience, and I might even get to try some mixed state (that is boing manic and depressed at the same time a bipolar swirl). This can last for year or two, it can be permaent, and this change can sometimes be reistant to medication, and frankly I'm pretending I didn't read the other msgic options.


What has happened in the last year is baffling to me, and it alternatly scares, and angers me. In that past I had a depressive episode, now I have 3 great days and a depressed day, 2 good days and a maniac day. Nothing predictable, further in the past my meds kept me even, now they keep my from bottoming me out, but I can feel cycling like I haven't before. So I need to go the doctor but I admit that if it's bad news, I'm not sure I'm ready.

That said, I think I can explain things a little better than I have before, because I'm aware of the cycling it's neve felt like that. Mania is self destructive, but not deadly, you feel fabulous, but have on impluse control, and inflaated sense of brilliance, an an inability to see through to a consequence.
The problem there are pretty obvious, it's like waking up one day with the mind of a a two year old but the resources and responsibilities of an adult, so remember when your child was two? What would have happpened if you gave them a car and control the family resources? Not pretty of course not, but you wouldn't be angry, you know a 2 year old can't handle that. Give this a few weeks, and said adult to year old can do some major damage to their life this is an imaginative little imp, 60 batches of cookies not a big deal, spending every penny you have on impulse power shops, big deal but mania doesn't care, that stupid Michlle chick can deal with it I'm naving the time of my life. There is a reason that two is hard, and at 40 you can't get off on cute.

And generally you wake up and you are 40 again and you get a couple days to try to access what damage has been done by the big 2 year old that has been controlling your life anywhere from weeks to month. And then depression comes.

I know how hard it is to understand "having a shower was a major accomplishment today" so the best analogy I've come up with it think about the absolute worst flu you've had, the one when you put off going to the bathroom because you are too sick to move, the one where you rest 2 times to get to the kitchen. That is pretty close to how you feel physcially, but then you get the mental part. So now you have a bad flu and an annoying drill sergeant standing the room telling you that you are looser, you will never succeed, you are a waste of space, etc. And then the messages get worse, and darker, and scarier. You know how when you love someone you know exactly what you could say to hurt them the most, imagine how effective your own brain is at finding fears, and insecurities you didn't even know you had, thought you knew your worst fearl nope look what your brain just found isn't that the most horrifying thought ever? Nope wait for rhia one. The brain is amazing, and I can do cognitive stuff to argue with the little depresson demon for quite a long time now, but the worst is when it gets to terrifing. This is where it gets most dangerous, because no only do you have horror running through your head 24/7 but you also get "this will never stop, this will never stop, there is only one way out there is only one way out". I've only gotten there once but the fear of it ever happening again is sometimes overwhelming because I fear I would be no better at fighting it than last time. I know no one will ever say to me the things I say to myself but in that state, even the smallest external negative message can be overwhelming. You say "how are you" I hear "not that I actually care. If you actually get mad at me I will fall apart, but probably not before saying thins I wouldn't otherwise, and remember of had days of really mean stuff running through my head. So yeah doing all that and showering is pretty big (and sometimes showering is overwhelming), and it takes a lot of energy to ignore those voices for days or weeks. It's debilitating because even if you get past the physical stuff it's pretty hard to think of much when all that is going on in your head. And yes, you should spend some time with other, but it's obvious why that would be hard. Trying to talk while you are insulting yourself in your head it a trick.

Meds stop that worst level, when they are really effective you never cycle at all, they treat different symptoms, and for fun they cause a few unpleaaant side effect some worse than others (depakote my me comatose I lost some weeks there) Now I'm getting a jumble, so it's probaly a med change time. Sigh

So I'm scared because it could get worse, and I don't want to know what that means, and I'm angry because it's been enough already, I've lost or not been able to have enough already. I don't want to give up one more thing, my brain has liked "weren't as good at that job as you thought were you, did you really think you would get to keep that accomplishment, stupid as always" that was January. A couple of days it started on my fear of being too sick to be a mom. I can't wait to see what I come up with next, and with a normal cycle it's many days. Now the meds are making me weirdly aware of he process.

I'm not worried about loosing my house, car, or anything else. I like to work, and I don't want to give that up but I will deal with disability. But I am scared I'm loosing myself, and bigger than that what if I loose being Jake moms mom in the fog of this disease. I know Jake will be loved and cared for but I want to do it, I don't want to share it and an illness shouldn't be able to take the most important thing from, and give it to someone else. And I really don't want to inspire a memoir.

With the meds I'm able to actually fight this and look at the bright side, but the dark sneaks up sometimes punches me in the stomach with fear and sneaks way.

I try to get that shower, and take a walk, if I add in loading the dishwasher, I'm superwoman. And tomorrow I could wake up my normal a bit stressed become she's moving self or 2 year old could wake up (not much trouble I can get in an this point luckily I've remove anything possible fun from myself).

So the bright side is that you all only get to wake up with a new day, I might get to wake up as a new person. Oh, and I've been watching a lot of BBC because today I called myself a cow in my head. My all time favorite bipolar fact was a doctor teling he knew immediately that I was bipolar because can sometimes joke during depression, in fact the voice in my head can be pretty funny sometimes.

So that is how the world turns in the worlds of Michelle.