Mania

After reading through Manic Mother it occured to me that despite my original intentions, I never really touched upon the topic of bipolar and how it has effected my life. I think that that is partly because so many of the decisions I have made while in a manic state have been, well, embarrassing. Many people have the idea that those of us in the bipolar community are these crazy balls of spontanious anger and that, for me, is entirely untrue. As a matter of fact I find it difficult to become angry. Instead in my most manic of phases I feel the need to do. I start projects, sometimes silly, sometimes huge, sometimes completely out of my leaugue. I've made 55 pieces of felt fruit by hand, baked an entire freezer full of breads, muffins and cookies, created web sites that I've never touched again, made huge elaborate meals for only 2 people, you get the idea. This is the lighter side of my mania. It gets darker, much darker.

When in these phases its not uncommon to be caught up and carried along doing things you would never otherwise do. I've done some things I look back on now and absolutely cannot understand. Getting a tattoo on my forearm for example. Not a big deal but wow, it's terrible work! WHY did I do that? At the time, it was a fantastic idea. At the time there were no alarm bells going off for me. That's the thing, when we do these things without batting an eyelash it's because we truly feel they are super good ideas. Later, when you come back down, reality comes crashing back down around you and you're left thinking, "What the hell have I done?".

When my bipolar started to get bad, the worst it's ever been, I began to hear things. Yes, I know how crazy that is. In my manic state I heard whispers, I was suicidal, I was terrified and completely off my rocker. Convinced that evil things were about trying to hurt me. This was when I decided to turn to medication and you know what? It worked. That was a mercifully short period of my life, these things happened because other factors aggravated my existing problem. I've since learned the value of seeing the triggers as they happen and taking steps to stop the snowball effect. I've learned maintenance for my life to keep myself emotionally, thus mentally, happy. Healthy foods, moderate exercise, the permission to myself to talk about the things troubling me; these simple things have allowed me to live a med-free and thankfully event-free life (bipolar-wise) for years now.

I think people like Beth over at Manic Mother are doing us all a great service by talking about their illness and thusly educating others so that people like myself can reap the benefits. I hope my posts does the same.