Winter solstice, shortest day of the year

It's been awhile since I've posted. Been caught up in the routine of day to day life I suppose. Today is the winter solstice - the shortest day of the year. I'm glad. Now the days will start growing longer and lighter again. I really need the light. Darkness isn't conducive to a happy mood.

I actually have been doing pretty well the last couple of weeks. Time is going quickly. I am taking Zyprexa now, I don't remember when I started...a few weeks ago I think. It makes me tired in the mornings after I wake up for awhile, and it makes me feel a little blah, but not too bad. It seems much better than Abilify. I wish I didn't have to take meds at all, but I'm not going to go off on that little rant again. :) I'll spare you all, this time.

Music making me reminisce...

So I’m sitting here, having a few drinks and listening to music. And I just had to post a little random thought. Isn’t it strange how music can conjure emotional, visceral sensations, simply pulled from a memory? It makes me marvel at the brain even more than I already do. It makes me wonder at the actual biological processes that even cause a memory to occur, let alone its linkage to a sight, smell, or tactile feeling. It never ceases to put me in a state of awe.

I’m listening to “Can Anybody Hear Me?” by Meredith Andrews. And it puts me right back to the week I came home from the hospital…wandering the dark, rainy evening streets of my neighborhood alone night after night. It brings up so many mental pictures…so many feelings…the wetness of my jeans dragging in the puddles of spring rain…the gray cloudy sky swirling above me as I walk, causing punctured rays of light to shine on me in slivers…the feeling of understanding and ease when I sat, doing puzzles with Andrew (a fellow inpatient) and just talking…the feeling of hope for better days and recovery…all of these things swirl into one giant mélange that there are no real words to describe. I just sit now, immersed in it all, experiencing it all again as I listen closely to the tune, smiling at its comforting familiarity, and the memories that it takes me to.

Going on my 6th med, lottttttttttttts of side effects

The weather here has been absolutely crazy. We went from 30 degrees and freezing rain last week (everything was closed and no one went to work for a few days because of hazardous conditions) to -30 degrees today. Oh my gosh….it’s COLD. Funny how when winter ends, we forget about how awful it was until it rolls around. I’m really hoping that this time next year, we’ll be moving to a warmer climate again.

As far as my mental state, I’m going on my 6^th, that’s right SIXTH med trial since my hospitalization. Ugh…I’m so worn out and frustrated. Not much seems to work and even if it does the side effects wind up being unbearable. My most recent med was Abilify, which I thought was working…well, then I started getting anxious, insomnia and this awful restless, jittery feeling like I could not sit still and wanted to crawl out of my skin. My counselor and psychiatrist told me it’s a phenomenon called “akathisia.” And it happens frequently on Abilify. Greeeeeeaaaat. Add to that the side effects I’ve had from Risperdal and I haven’t been doing too hot. So today at my appointment, my doc told me to go cold turkey. BYE-BYE ABILIFY! BYE-BYE RISPERDAL!

We’re going to go a week or so and then start me on a new med, Zyprexa. Risperdal, Abilify and Zyprexa are all in the “anti-psychotic” class of medication.

As a quick side note that is strange yet interesting and kind of gets me wondering, is that there are two classes of meds for bipolar “anti-psychotic” meds and “mood stabilizing” meds. The only psychiatric condition mood stabilizers treat, that I’m aware of, is bipolar. Anti-psychotics on the other hand, treat bipolar, schizophrenia, and schizoaffective disorder. I queried my counselor about why I keep taking the anti-psychotic type of meds rather than mood stabilizers, and she told me that it isn’t uncommon for people who have bipolar with “schizophrenic features” to be treated in such a way. It has made me think even more about the link between schizophrenia and bipolar, and it’s definitely an area I will be doing more research. The fact that I respond more to anti-psychotic meds than mood stabilizing meds leads me to believe that schizophrenia and bipolar do indeed lie on a continuum and that people have varying degrees of illness and can have multiple overlapping symptoms.

Anyways, Zyprexa is next. I hope that it works but deep down I’m worried that I will have negative side effects like every other med. So far, the list of what I’ve tried, in order, is as follows:

Lamictal – no side effects, but also did nothing and didn’t prevent me from becoming manic again

Risperdal – made me start lactating (ew), increased emotional blunting and feelings of ambivalence, lack of sexual desire, foggy confused sensation

Seroquel – paranoid psychotic/suicidal reaction

Lithium – nausea, vomiting, unbearable headache, shakiness, lethargy, muscle aches

Abilify – akathisia, anxiety, insomnia

As you can see, it hasn’t been a fun 7 months. But I’m trying to stay positive.

Insomnia and apathy due to meds

Well, it's almost 1 am and I can't sleep so figured I would post an update. Winter has set in and we've had crazy weather, warm with freezing rain so for a few days, no one has been able to go anywhere. It's making me even more stir crazy than I already get in winter, which is bad. I got some natural light bulbs to put in the lamps here to help my mood and energy. I think it's working a bit, however, I don't think you are supposed to use them into the night hours, which may be why I have insomnia right now!

Currently I'm dealing with ambivalence/apathy in a big way. I believe part of it is my medication. Truthfully, I haven't felt like myself in a long long time. Most days I just feel sort of "there" and this has been going on many months now. It's a crappy feeling. I think I've been confusing some of the way I've been feeling with depression when in fact some of it has been effects of the medication. I'm on Risperdal and Abilify right now, and I am going to talk to my doc about going off the Risperdal totally. As a side story, it originally made my hormone levels high...so high I started producing milk as if I were pregnant. Ewwwww. (I always seem to get the rare side effects). So I am supposed to only be on it now as a "placeholder" for something else. We did a blood test of my prolactin levels (hormone that makes you produce milk) and the normal range is between 10-40ish. My levels were 150. So yeah...that alone makes it not the greatest med for me. Add to that, it makes me foggy, confused, unable to concentrate, unmotivated and just overall "blah" and you can see why I want to go off it. I really am tired of feeling this way. I am ready to get back to myself again...the me before meds. I don't know if I can without stopping them entirely. It's something I've been contemplating a lot.

Need to address buried issues

So I’ve been charting my moods again. I started doing this after I got out of the hospital but fell off the wagon because it’s one of those things you just forget to do. Well I’m back at it again at the suggestion of my psychiatrist and I’ve noticed that in general, over the past 2 weeks my mood has improved from severe depression to mild depression and even up to normal on some days. So I was thinking “Wow, this just keeps getting better!” And then I go and have a day like today. Ugh.

I’m feeling down today for personal reasons I don’t really want to get into. But all  of this has brought a lot of things to mind that I think I need to discuss with my counselor. As you know from my sidebar, I vlog on YouTube about living with bipolar, and I also watch others vids on bipolar and other issues that are pertinent to me, mainly other mental health topics. Anyhow, I was watching tonight and some videos really hit home to me and made me realize there is still a lot that is buried that I have not discussed with anyone. There are some things that I have basically kept to myself and tried to deal with, thinking it was something I could change or that I was just being weak. But now, I’m beginning to wonder if some of these issues stem from other emotional issues/areas and not from environmental factors like I’ve been believing. If that is indeed the case, there may be ways I can work on these issues instead of trying to muddle through with all these feelings and live with them by changing all the physical things around me.

Weather affecting my depression, and new meds

I’m on yet another new medication, for about the last week or so. This time it’s Abilify. I’m still on Risperdal as well, and I think the Abilify may actually be helping somewhat. Since I started it my depression has not seemed as bad. I don’t know if it’s actually doing something or I’m reading into things, (aka placebo effect), but I have felt pretty decent the past couple of days and I’m glad for that. We’ll see how long it lasts or if it continues.


Right now I am dealing with the onset of winter, and that is hard. It is cold, snowy and just generally bleary outside a lot. It hasn’t hit the bad part of winter…that won’t be for another month and a half when the temperatures hit -40 degrees F. UGH. I don’t think I’m going to handle it very well this year with all that I’m already dealing with. The cabin fever tends to overwhelm me and make me freak out, regardless of my mood, after awhile. I’m trying to be more active this winter though (as much as possible) by going out to concerts, sporting events, plays, movies, etc. at least once a week so that I get out among the human population and feel like I am a part of civilization. Truthfully, my husband and I are talking about moving next summer, if possible, back to Florida where we lived for the last few years. My moods were not drastic like they have been since I came back and I really believe the weather is having an impact on my moods, both manic and depressed. This may just be too extreme of a place for me to live anymore. Though I grew up here, since moving away and coming back, it seems much worse than it ever did before. So, we have the winter and spring to sit and decide what we would like to do, or try to do.


As for now I heard about this thing called the Happy Light, which is used for people with SAD (seasonal affective disorder). It supposedly really works to help improve mood and energy and I’ve seen a lot of reviews of people who have used it, so, I figure it can’t hurt. This weekend I’m headed out to get my own and see how it goes.

Sinking into depression for the first time in years

I’ve been feeling for awhile now that I’m probably going into a depression. It’s been pretty confusing because for the past 6 months I have been up and down so frequently and sometimes “mixed” so that the up and down can’t totally be distinguished. But after my most recent episode where I had intervention from my doctors to keep me from being hospitalized (I wasn’t feeling depressed at all) my meds have gotten switched up a lot and I do think my current meds are keeping the manic portion of my illness at bay. I  haven’t had any weird thoughts or actions in a few weeks. However, my doctors warned me that depressed often follows mania, and so they are on the guard and want me to be aware too. And I can safely say that they are right, and in my case, depression is definitely following this manic or mixed period.

It’s weird, because the term depression gets thrown around so much now that it has no real meaning anymore. Anyone who has a bad day says “I’m depressed.” Those who actually suffer from depression as a mental/medical illness know that it can be unbearable. I hate the way that I feel right now for a lot of reasons. I hate it because I thought it was gone. I haven’t felt this way in many years which in itself, confounds me. In the past few years I’ve gone through a lot of rough times, situations that 95% of people never have to deal with. And through all of that, I was able to somehow stay strong, despite the fact that I had no real support system and I have been living with this illness all my life. I guess it was just in remission at the time. I remember even thinking to myself then, how every day was kind of the same…one went into the next…no real super highs or super lows. And it basically stayed that way for the bulk of two years. It was great, looking back in retrospect. Not the horrible things I went through of course, but having the stability to be ABLE to make it through and be no worse for wear, essentially.

Now, I’m here in this situation and I don’t know what to do. And I keep telling myself, I need to change something. I need to be proactive, I need, SOMEHOW, to thwart this depression, to quell these feelings. Yet I can’t. And I realize now, that is the worst thing at all in life. To have these feelings…for no reason at all…at to be unable to stop them from happening. The sense of helplessness and hopelessness only contributes to the feelings of despair. I want to sleep all day because I cannot bear the thought of muddling through the 12 hours until it’s time to go to sleep again. There is no joy in my life now. And I don’t know why. That’s the worst thing. I don’t know why. There is no reason. It is a feeling…it exists…no matter what I do, what I change, it persists. And I feel so sad…I feel sad just because that is the way of this illness. But I feel even sadder because I cannot do anything about it. It is my lot in life. It’s endless; cyclical; repetitive. It makes me want to give up completely. Because who wants to life a life so completely out control? A life where you are blown to and fro, and the actions you take are dictated by a cruel puppeteer that rules your mind totally? There is no out; no escape. At times the life I live seems worse than death. I admit that over the course of my life I have contemplated suicide countless times. After my one and only actual attempt, 5 years ago, I thought I would never think or feel that way again. Yet here I am, and the thoughts recur. I want to blot them out. I want to stop everything from happening. I don’t want to die…I’m not suicidal. I just want to go back to the time when I was happy…when I had stability. I want to go back to the time when I was satisfied…when I had control over my mind, my life, the things around me. I want to know a life that is different from this…this constant torturous merry-go-round that I ride.

House hunting and other stressors

Right now my husband and I are in the process of house hunting. We are currently staying with my dad and have been for awhile to help save up more for our down payment. Housing costs here are pretty steep so we are needing more than most of our family/friends who live in other parts of the country.

Anyhow, we found a beautiful house that we are in the process of negotiating for. We are hoping that things will work out with this house, because we have been looking for a long time and are ready to be in something of our own. I've personally been dreaming of my own house since I was a teenager so this is a big big deal to me. I can't wait to see what happens.

So, that is the beginning of my stress,it's been fun looking but also brings up tension as well an being the biggest purchase a person will ever make tends to make emotions run high. So I'm a little nervous about this situation because I'm not exactly stable at the moment and this type of intense stress could certainly trigger episodes for me.

On top of that, my dad was injured this week and will not be able to get around much for probably a couple of months, and he is currently in the hospital. So, I am going to have to help care for him which again, is a big stress, of course not something I mind doing because God knows he has done far more for me than I have ever done in return so this is but a small thing in the scheme of the world, but just compounding with the house stress, and the fact that my husband is gone several days in a row each week leaves me with a lot on my plate. I'm a bit worried as to how I will hold up under all of this (plus there are a bunch of other small stressors plaguing me at the moment as well). It's just a lot, both good and bad, but the pressure hopefully will not cause me to start cracking. I'm going to have to be super vigilant the upcoming months.

In medication limbo (thankful for insurance)

I guess I'll post a little update here before I hit the hay. I'm pretty much caught up now on all the poetry I wanted to list, so there it is. I'm up to my current time frame. I tend to only write when something emotional (usually negative) is going on that I have to purge. I've been writing more lately because of that but I don't want to post all my stuff here, just some. Plus if I posted everything this page would be a mile long.

Nothing much new to report, still in limbo with the meds. I went on lithium and went off it just as quickly. It made me feel like I had the worst hangover ever, except it was 24/7. It was HORRIBLE. I couldn't eat or drink because I'd puke, my head was throbbing, I was confused and dizzy and shaky. UGH!!!  Then reading up on lithium really freaked me out because it is basically a naturally ocurring element that can be toxic to people. GREAAAAAAT!!! If your dosing isn't exactly right, and you take too much it can essentially be poisoning you. So I talked to my doc and we dropped the lithium off the list. I go in next week and I'm sure the meds will change up again. Ahhhhhh, fun times. Ok, not really.

In fact I am so frustrated I am ready to just chuck everything and go back to the way I was. I feel like I live solely to go to my doctor appts. I see both my counselor and psychiatrist weekly, lately, since I've been all over the place. Thank God I have good insurance. I've only had to pay $125 total out of all my 30 or 40 visits over the last few months, plus a very very pricey inpatient stay. People talk crap about the military but the insurance has saved me. For anyone who doesn't know how military healthcare works, you see your military provider for everything, but if you need specialized care that is not available on your base (and most stuff isn't available here, because it's a very small base) then you get referred to see civilian docs. That's my situation now. I was an inpatient at a civilian hospital, both my docs now are civilians. I don't go to the base for anything. I think my counselor charges about $125 per session and my psych. is about $225 or $250 a visit. But since I was referred, I pay nothing, it is treated the same as if I were being seen by a military doc. It really works out very well, and again, I am very thankful. I went through a similiar situation when my kids were born because they were twins (high risk pregnancy) and although I lived in a semi-big city, the base could not provide for my needs. All my extensive care was provided at a civilian hospital, and my kids were in the NICU for months. When we totalled up the cost of everything related to the pregnancy and their health issues it wound up being about $1 mil. We didn't have to pay any of it. I will forever be grateful for the way the Air Force has taken care of me as far as my health and the health of my family is concerned.

That's all for now. Not much going on. Just chugging along, not too up, not too down, not too normal either...just sorta there I suppose.

Crazy manic episodes - no way I'm going back to the hospital!

I’m going to try to post a few videos to update what’s been going on with me. I’m starting to like video blogging more than regular blogging, just for the sole fact that it’s more “real.” Anyways, for those who don’t want to watch the vids, I’ve been all over the place. My psychiatrist thinks I’m rapid cycling which is kinda what I have thought all along. She thinks I’m having a manic episode that has been coming on for awhile and is basically coming to a head now to the point of near hospitalization (greaaaaat). She told me today she wanted to switch my meds, preferably in the hospital setting. She said “You probably wouldn’t have to stay more than a few days.” Haha! Oh man. Last time it was 5 days. It would probably be the same this time. I told her there was no way I was going to the hospital unless someone tied me up and physically forced me to go. So she agreed to let me try to keep managing as an outpatient, with close monitoring. Both my counselor and my psychiatrist are checking with me daily to make sure I don’t completely float off  into space. My meds are getting switched up quite a bit so hopefully that doesn’t throw me off completely, god knows I’m already unbalanced. Ha.

"I'm not bulimic, I'm depressed!"

I’m having a really shitty day so I figured I’d write something. I think it’s been awhile since I actually wrote.

The Risperdal has seemed to help me although I’m on a small dose. I have noticed, in general, that I tend to be very sensitive to medication (all meds, not just psychoactive meds). I tend to get all the weird or “rare” side effects too. Anyway I felt fine, I actually felt that in the last week or so that it has evened me out somewhat, at least moreso than before.

However today I just woke up feeling blah and shitty and depressed. It was one of those instances where you start off blah, then a bunch of stuff just happens and it becomes like the snowball effect. I wound up sitting around for awhile, being sad and teary and emotional, wanting to just sleep and having no motivation to do anything besides sit on the couch and rest. I had an appt. with my psychiatrist though, so I had to go to that. It turned out to be a good thing, just getting me out of the house, although I pretty much sat in her office and cried for an hour. I normally do not cry, in front of anyone and I’d say I don’t really cry much when I’m alone either. I’m more on the defensive side, at least when it comes to people (“They said what about me? Fuck them, they’re worthless anyway”). I’d rather be mad than sad I guess.

Anyhow, it was somewhat embarrassing to me to sit in a doctors office and cry, I think I’ve only done that once before and that’s when I was in the middle of my worst depression ever, 5 years back, and I was going through such turmoil that I just went to a local clinic to see about getting some anxiety meds so I could calm down enough to eat. I tend not to eat when I get depressed because a lot of times it comes along with anxiety, and my stomach just gets so churned up it literally hurts to eat. Which is bad because I’m already slender to begin with so when I lose weight, well, it’s just bad.

During that depression (which lasted probably 8 months), I lost about 20 lbs., and on my frame, a mere 5 lbs is enough to drop me one clothing size. I hate looking at pictures from back then, because I know I look ill, although I tried to mask it as much as possible and go about being “normal”. I remember being in the store once and this 70 year old woman in a gaudy faux leopard coat & hooker makeup said “How did you get so skinny?” I said “It runs in my family” and she said “I mean, what’s wrong with you?” I was sooo furious and so hurt at the same time. WHO DOES THAT?!?! Here I was, minding my own business, and some old hag has to try to push me down, for what reason? I don’t know. Obviously it bothered me enough to remember it to this day. A few months later, I was dating this guy and after a few weeks he basically told me he thought I was bulimic (“You don’t like to eat in front of people, and you always go to the bathroom after you do eat”). Well, I had braces at the time, so that explains that one. But WOW, talk about hurtful…just what a depressed person wants to hear!!!

Strangely enough, my doctor asked me today, “Have you lost weight?” and I said I didn’t know. I don’t think so though. I was wearing baggy clothes, so maybe that’s why she thought it, or who knows, maybe I look skinnier.

We talked about a lot of stuff…stuff I really don’t feel like talking about right now. Maybe another time. But she said she wanted me to come back next week because even though I thought the meds were helping, she still thought my moods were fluctuating too much, too often. Thinking back, 3 weeks ago I went in manic, 2 weeks ago I went in OK, and today I came in depressed. Yeah I guess that’s a bit of fluctuation. Ha.

I’ve been doing some writing, but don’t want to post it until I post the poems from my hospitalization, and go from there. I did make a couple videos about it, not sure if I will upload them or not yet.

 

Still trying to make sense of bipolar diagnosis - want to go back to life as it was

A brief update – went to see my psychiatrist yesterday. I told her what was going on and she said she wasn’t sure if I was rapid cycling or not. I guess only time will tell. She didn’t really agree with my counselor about the mixed state, she said that she thought it was a part of the mania I’ve recently been experiencing. Ugh. Who knows! Just one more confusing thing. It’s like, where does one thing stop and another begin? There is no line of demarcation. It’s all miscellaneous criteria that is written down in a manual by people who do not experience these things and therefore, how much could they really know? Maybe it really doesn’t mean anything at all. Again, who knows. I could go back and forth all day.

She agreed that my meds probably were not working well and that I should go back on the anti-psychotic meds…I can’t go back to Risperdal, although it worked well, because of side effects. So now, starting today I am trying Seroquel. It’s supposed to be sedating, just like Risperdal. We’ll see if I can handle it or if it makes a difference.

As you can tell I’ve started video blogging too, I’m digging watching other people’s stuff on YouTube also. It’s so helpful to know others are out there experiencing the same stuff. And knowing others can relate to my situation also feels good…I know I’m not totally alone.

I’m not sure when the next time I’ll post will be. In a way all this talking is helping me but in other ways I feel like I’m going around in a circle. I talk to my psychiatrist, my counselor, people around me, then there are my own thoughts to contend with…it tends to add to the confusion rather than simplify. I’ve been having a lot of conflicting thoughts today, one being that I feel the diagnosis of bipolar is really starting to define me, and I don’t want that. I had a lot of “normalcy” in my life before about a year ago…it wasn’t like I was in a perpetual state of confusion and flux. I want to go back to that. I wouldn’t have even gotten treatment had it not been for my spiral out of control. I always dealt with things myself, and that’s pretty much what I want to do again, just take things out of other peoples hands and put them back into my own.

I get so caught up in going to doctors every week or two that it doesn’t help much…in fact I feel like I’m talking so much I’m only making myself worse! Everyone tells you “monitor your moods” and “pay attention to warning signs” and all this other stuff, and it’s sort of like, you have to be on constant guard and I don’t like it. I mean really, what’s the deal with being a little “up” or a little “down”? I think that unless I’m so up that I’m literally “off the map” as my psychiatrist says, or so depressed I want to kill myself, that I should just forget about everything else and go about my life. A part of me doesn’t even want to keep taking meds. I want to just remove this label of bipolar and return to the time when I was contently ignorant. I want to return to my life as I knew it. Ahhhhh…I could go on forever. But I won’t :)

NORMAL day, random junk, and IE SUX!

I wasn’t planning on blogging tonight but I’m up so what the heck. I’ve been up working on school work, and dang…I am so ready for this class to be over. Right now this lesson is over drug prevention programs which I personally think are a crock. No offense if anyone believes in them. I just personally feel if someone is going to drink/smoke/do drugs, for the most part nothing is going to stop them. And from what my textbook says, most prevention programs don’t work. LOL…seems like a lost cause…

Anyways here’s some random junk on my brain. For those viewing this blog on Internet Explorer, sorry if it looks fudged up, from what I hear, it’s a problem with both IE and youtube as far as blogger, so dunno, but use Firefox and you shouldn’t have the problem. :)

I’m actually having a pretty NORMAL day today, wow!!! Pretty crazy how it fluctuates so quickly. It’s almost like being in a normal state isn’t even “normal” for me anymore since it does not last long…it’s almost just like one of three states that are in constant flux. I went out walking, which I enjoy doing at night sometimes. I live in a small town so it’s no biggie. It was weird though because it was like a total ghost town when I went out tonight. It’s getting darker and colder and the sky was almost black. The streetlights kept the sidewalks somewhat lit but on the sideroads there was no light…it was total darkness except for flickering of the lights of the oil refinery in the distance. It was a little surreal…there was literally not a soul walking but me. Very rarely a car would go by. Most people’s lights were off in their houses. Kinda made me think about how really, I feel most comfortable when I’m alone. A little sad maybe, but true. And I’m ok with that.

Anyhoo, I had written down the other day a bunch of things I wanted to write in my journal, which I still need to…it’s kinda funny, here is what my list says: organizing, shells, IE, my own house, poems, scatterbrained, crushes. HAH! I have no idea why I wrote half that down or what I was even thinking about it!!! I guess I really was “scatterbrained”!!! Today, I’m quite clear headed. The perpetual voice inside is quiet. I have a little bit of peace…for now. :)

Let’s see what other random things…I’m pretty sure we live next door to swingers, which is hilarious. They are a married couple with two small kids close to my kids age. Well since I moved in with my dad (about 9 months ago) the guy is always looking over/through the fence at me and I’ve had several odd incidents with him (once I just turned to find him standing behind me in our backyard, totally just walked in uninvited and scared the crap out of me…a lot of times he’ll come over to talk to my dad when he knows I’m outside too…just weird.) Now his wife is starting to do the same stuff with Tim…haha…finding little excuses to talk to him, come over and give him this, ask for help with that…she never did that with my dad, now she is all over Tim. It is frickin’ hilarious. So we’ve come to the conclusion that they are swingers trying to get with us. Who knows, maybe it’s true!!! Either way, they are an odd couple. I’ll be glad when spring comes and we’re out of here into our own house.

Oh, I guess that’s the other thing. We went to the bank to do a mortgage application to look at houses a bit before snow falls. We planned on buying in the spring but wanted to get our feet wet now. So we did that and somewhat have a realtor now, it’s totally exciting, I’ve been fantzsizing about my own house since I was 18…only taken me 10 years! It’s slowly becoming a reality…

So that’s it I suppose for now…always something going on around here, whether it’s around me or in my brain…haha. Oh yes, I am still totally digging my whole new persona…when I went to the liquor store the other day the cashier looked at my license forever and then said “That’s not you!” it was so funny because I had literally said to Tim earlier in the day that if anyone saw my ID they probably wouldn’t think it was me, guess I’m right. Ha. Point being, I’m digging it all big time, I’m loving this phase…not sure how long it will last til I’m onto the next thing.

I have to post a pic of my new trend, I’m totally into falsies right now, there are so many sweet ones now that it’s Halloween almost. Here are my faves…silver…allllllrighhhhhht *Quagmire voice*

Strange thoughts and behavior...is bipolar real?

Blah, where do I begin this…hmmm…I’ve been contemplating a lot recently and so much is on my mind I feel like it is going to implode. This may be long cause I’m just going to start writing and see when it all stops coming out.

So we’ve already established that I don’t really talk to anyone about my personal thoughts or feelings. That’s changing a little more with my counselor and psychiatrist, and Tim a little bit also. Well all this talking has me so confused. On the one hand there are professionals telling you “This is a legitimate problem, medication can help you,” and on the other hand you have people you know tell you, or act toward you, that there is nothing wrong, that it’s no big deal and everyone feels that way sometimes. So I am so confused, well moreso than usual lately. I don’t know who to believe or what to think. Are the doctors exaggerating what is going on? Or are the people I know minimizing it? It’s torturing me trying to figure it all out, reconcile who to believe with all my convoluted feelings.

So that has me thinking all about my thoughts and feelings in general. Ha that sounded kinda funny. I’m thinking about bipolar…about my diagnosis…what it means to me. In the past before I was hospitalized, I managed, somewhat, to keep my thoughts and feelings under control. Every once in awhile I’d have thoughts like “What would dirt taste like?” or “What if I just walked all night and didn’t come home tonight?” They may have been there but just a fleeting what if? The gone again. I told Tim about this and he said “Everyone thinks that way,” so I thought hmmm ok, I guess it’s not that weird at all.

So then it got me to thinking, ok, if it’s not so weird, why shouldn’t I just do them? Then Tim says “Well, not everyone feels things to the point where they feel they have to act on them.” And that is how I feel a lot lately, especially the last year. They aren’t just thoughts…well, they are, but instead of just dispearring, they sort of sit there and marinate in my mind to the point of really wanting to do them. Still, I manage to hold back most of the time. But it can be very, very hard. Like, right now I want a cigarette so so badly. I’ve been fighting it extremely. If it wasn’t for the bet Tim and I have I already would have given in. In ways I know it’s wrong. It’s unhealthy…it’s a really bad example for my kids…it’s an addiction…but even those rationales don’t curb the thought from my mind or the craving for it. I’ve been thinking about drugs so much lately, wanting it so badly, again a craving that is hard to fight. Or sometimes I see people and I just to talk to them, I just want to touch them. I’m managing to hold back but again it ruminates in my mind. I have no idea if this stuff is related to bipolar or if I am just strange, “eccentric” if you will, that my thoughts or behaviors fall outside of the socially condoned set of norms and therefore they are classified as a “disorder.”

And then after talking to Tim I got to thinking, why do I do some things and not others? Why is it when it do the majority of things I’m alone, yet when I’m with other people for the most part, I don’t? It has me wondering, do I do things for attention? Is it because I want to be noticed? Is it because, being diagnosed with bipolar, it now gives me a “license” to do things, if you will? Then I think, well I did these things and thought these things before I had a diagnosis so maybe not. Then I also think, well if I wanted attention wouldn’t that mean I would do it around people and not when I’m alone? Does this mean that I’m just holding things at bay when I am around others, or at least, others I know, so I am not viewed as strange, odd, or different, or that I’m not treated in a negative way? I don’t know. I am confused as to my own thoughts and motives.

In a way I definitely feel that societal rules hold me back from doing a lot of things…I may WANT to go home with that stranger…I may want to eat things off the ground…I may want to disappear and not return again. And then there are the rational thoughts afterward such as “If I go home with that stranger, I could get raped,” “If I eat that food, I could get sick,” “if I disappear it would hurt people that are close to me.” So all of that is not strange. That is how a normal person thinks. They may have thoughts of doing things, but rules, or their conscience, hold them back. And that is the way it should be. 

But then it still doesn’t curb my desire to do them. They still sit there, ruminating in my head to the point where I honestly feel one day I am GOING to do them. Like even thoughts of my kids or danger won't stop me at all. Like the other night, I went walking and thought “What would happen if walked down the middle of the road?” afterward there was the thought, “Maybe the person would honk…maybe they would go around…maybe they would hit me and I’d go to the hospital.”  This normally would deter a person from doing it. Yet I did it anyways. I thought “Well, who really cares what happens?” Incidentally, the person went around me and that was that.

I’m not sure if this falls under the category of “impulsiveness” which is a big criteria of bipolar. I always think of impulsiveness as someone just wildly and crazily does stuff without thinking and later goes “Uh oh, what did I do?” In that sense, no I don’t just run off down the street. It’s somewhat deliberate yet on the other hand I just don’t care what happens. I have no idea what to describe that as. Maybe I am just weak and I need to try harder to keep myself at bay. Maybe I am using bipolar as an excuse to get away with things that are unacceptable to others. Who knows.

Then, of course, my moods are all over. As I’ve been writing lately. At first I thought the Lamictal was working…for the first two months things seemed fine. The doctors said “You stabilized pretty quickly after your hospital stay.” Yet, I wasn’t thinking but I was also on Risperdal at the time, so that may very well have been the reason I did well. since going off  it seems my moods are a lot more variable and much more on extreme ends of the spectrum. A couple months ago I had a few rough days and that just spurred me into a depression so bad that I could barely face getting out of bed…I was drinking in the middle of the day…I was sitting around crying and cutting up my clothes and thinking about death. Because of just a couple rough days!!!

Then it went from that into this irritable, grouchy, hating everyone and everything mood, which I wasn’t depressed but just ambivalent. The last few days I’ve been feeling “up” and manic. Talking to people, dressing extremely, seeking a lot of attention, being flirty with people, which Tim got angry at me about. He seemed like “why are you acting this way?” But I really couldn’t help it. I didn’t go anywhere near doing all the things I felt like. I was so happy and excited, just out of the blue. I was so distracted but my own thoughts that I backed our Jeep into a telephone pole and scraped up the side of it bad. We had an argument last night and I thought “God my life sucks.” Now I am just sort of “there” today. I have barely spoken at all. I went walking but didn’t want to interact with a soul. My mind is plaguing me with all these thoughts. I hate it. I wish it would go away. I wish other people understood more, I wish I myself understood more. It is tiring being in a constant state of flux and confusion.

Recollections, personalities & rapid cycling

I’m feeling pretty alert considering I didn’t go to bed until about 3:30. I didn’t mean to stay up that late but I had to write in my journal. I’ve really been slacking the last few years. I tend to just write about tangible stuff…what we’ve been doing, how the girls are, what so-and-so is up to. I haven’t written about my thoughts or feelings much in a long long time, which is mainly why I kept journaling all those years. So I need to start writing in it more regularly than every 2 or 3 weeks. It really helps me to purge things, much like I hope to do with this blog. It’s weird because I never really realized it until I started counseling that I really don’t talk to people about my feelings at all. I have a few close friends and of course my family and my husband. But I really don’t talk to any of them about those really crazy, deep things. I don’t really know why. In some ways it is easier to talk to strangers about it, because they don’t know me and a certain level of anonymity helps one be able to share. But talking to someone very close about it is extremely difficult. Partly because they don’t understand and partly because…I dunno…The only person I ever really did talk about those things with was my first boyfriend, a relationship that continued for 5 years and started when I was a teenager. It wasn’t just that he listened to things but he understood on some innate level how I felt and what I was going through, with everything. We were extremely close. Even when I’d say things like “I hate my life” or “I want to kill myself” he never judged me or made me feel like a weakling, or less of a person. He always had a way of making me feel loved and wanted and secure. In a way he has been the standard that I have held everything else up against, sort of trying to recreate that feeling with others. But I have learned every relationship, whether romantic, friendly, or family, is always different, the nuances and dynamics of it, and there will never be any two that are alike. So I’ve learned I need to appreciate people for who they are and accept their strengths and weaknesses, much as I want to be accepted with all my own flaws.

So anyway I dunno what is up with me today. I’ve been reading a little on other people’s blogs and it kinda makes me feel worse, because it seems so many people are doing so much better than I am. They’re writing about all this great stuff that’s happening and here I am, complaining and trying to figure out all my issues. I just really don’t know what the heck is going on with me from day to day. Although bipolar isn’t “multiple personalities”, in ways sometimes it does feel that way. There is the sexy me, the depressed me, the childish me, the preppy me. They all exist simultaneously in most people, and in my “normal” state I would say for the most part that’s true. But it’s also true that a lot of the time, one part of me comes to the forefront and overtakes everything else while the rest regresses. In many ways this makes me feel like I don’t know who I am, that there are all these distinct, individual parts of me that do not combine, they are contradictory and cannot make a harmonious whole.

I feel different from day to day and I’m not sure what the reason for that is. There are two possiblities, one is that I’m rapid cycling, or even ultradian cycling, which is a form of bipolar where a person’s mood fluctuates extremely within either weeks, days, or even within the same day. Another possibility is that it’s mood lability, which, for the most part just means extreme mood swings. It sounds like the same thing but from what I understand, professionals believe that rapid cycling is a definite part of bipolar disorder while mood lability can at times occur in anyone. I’m starting to think that I’m rapid cycling, because obviously I have bipolar so my extreme mood swings wouldn’t fall under the “regular” category. I need to talk to my counselor and psychiatrist about this. From what I understand, rapid cycling bipolar is a difficult form to treat and may be genetically different from “traditional” bipolar. Supposedly even bipolar I and bipolar II may not be caused by the same thing and therefore not treated the same (bipolar I is “classic” bipolar which includes full mania and psychosis, bipolar II includes only hypomanic episodes). There’s a lot of research being done about bipolar now and in ways it’s helpful but it also sometimes raises more questions than it answers.

So today I am just feeling, again, all over the place. I was in a very good mood this morning which just progressed from there, I was feeling hypomanic after that, running and dancing around with my kids, having random conversations with people in the store, in the park, even across a parking lot, being flirty, etc. I was really giddy and sort of talking to myself all loudly and happily. Then a few hours ago I just started feeling blah and sort of depressed. It was almost like instantaneous change. Now I just feel quiet, maybe even a little sad and sullen. I don’t feel like doing much of anything, just hiding out from everyone for the rest of the night.

I am so tired of all of this. This constant switch is wreaking havoc on my life. I want some sort of stability, I want to know that I have some sort of control over myself, which I don’t and I feel very angry and at the same time helpless. I really feel like I’m destined to just spiral down until eventually I am completely loony and locked in some asylum or I just wind up killing myself. I feel like I have no idea what’s happening or where I’m going or even who the fuck I am.

My current "Mixed state"

So I noticed every time I post in this blog it formats differently. I’m not sure why but it’s bugging me. Plus I really don’t want to put the effort into fixing it. Oh well, I’m sure the like, 2 or 3 people reading this blog can deal with it for now, LOL.

I’m still in my funk. When I went to see my counselor she could tell I was feeling weird because the way I looked and my demeanor was different than usual. We talked about a lot of stuff, and she said she thought maybe I was in a mixed state. I knew a little about mixed states but not that much. Basically a mixed state is a combination of mania and depression. Sounds like a contradiction I know, but after doing some research on it, it makes sense to me, and I think she is right. In fact looking at my past several years I think I’ve been in this state a lot without realizing it, maybe not to this degree but still.

It’s weird because when you’re depressed obviously you feel like crap. And when you’re manic you feel great. But in a mixed state you’re mood is basically irritable. My counselor said most people who experience a mixed state say there is nothing good about it and that it is the worst state to be in.

So here is what the book “Decoding Bipolar Bisorder” by Dr’s. Suppes, Manning and Keck says about mixed states. The symptoms include:

*Racing thoughts that often inhibit the initiation of sleep

*Noticeably increased activity usually present well into the early morning hours

*Dismally low spirits or an emotional state characterized by anxiety, depression, or unease while having a “short-fuse” temper

*Genuine expressions of suffering while maintaining a melodramic demeanor

*Grandiose mood, often manifested toward others in demanding tones with insistence that others serve the agenda of the patient

*Severe agitation

*Sexual excitement

*Suicidal thoughts

As you can see this is quite a mixed bag of symptoms, some seemingly contradictory but existing simultaneously. I’d say I’m experiencing the majority of that, I’m not suicidal though. So this is a really weird funk to be in.

Anyhow, even within all of this it kinda fluctuates from day to day. My counselor said a lot of people in mixed states say they feel depressed or anxious but at the same time have tons of energy to do things. I do kinda feel like I am bouncing all over that place or just want to do everything right now. It’s just like a nervous sort of energy, like when you absently tap your foot over and over and over.

Then, yesterday I had so many thoughts I literally wanted to shoot myself in the head to make it go away. It’s an icky feeling, and it became so bad it actually gave me a headache and made me sick to my stomach. I don’t know how that’s possible, but it is. I wanted a woodpecker to just peck a hole in the side of my skull and let all the pressure out. I felt like I was dying. Also I feel so anxious all the time, and agitated just like the description of mixed states. My heart is racing constantly and it’s like I’m gonna have a heart attack or something. I just want to pace around and move and do something to release this all. I kinda want a cigarette but I quit about a month ago. Tim and I have this bet going that if I can stay off them til the new year he is going to buy me a professional camera to start taking pics. Right now I just do it as a hobby with my crappy digital. But I’m always taking pics of stuff. Anyways I’m determined to win and not give in this time.

So yeah, that’s me right now, I dunno how long this will last. Today my husband walked by me and said “Scrub.” Haha. I don’t think he’s digging my current fashion statement. I know he was quasi-joking. Normally I’d get pissed about something like that but today it made me laugh.

We’ve been busy all morning which is good. I think I’d go crazy if I just had to sit around here all afternoon.

Awful & ugh

I’m feeling pretty sucky today. I woke up and it was cold and bleary so that started everything off badly. Add to that the fact that I didn’t go to sleep until past 4 am. It was awful. I actually got in bed around 2 but tossed and turned forever. Now today I am feeling super grouchy, I’ve been taking it out on my kids and I feel like shit, just in general but also for being a bitch to them. I was actually crying earlier because when I put my daughter in time out I accidentally hurt her and I would never ever purposely hurt my child. I wanted to just shoot myself right then.

I have so much I need to be doing right now, I only have a short hour while they are napping but I guess I just need to purge this to feel a little better, maybe. I’ve kinda been in a weird funk lately. I guess longer than I realized because today I was thinking that the last time I saw Kristen I told her I was feeling down and that was a month ago. I don’t know if I’ve been “depressed” but I don’t really feel happy a lot lately. I told Kristen that I was just sort of “there”. I think part of it may be the meds I’m on. I’m taking Lamictal which I’ve tolerated well thus far. But when I told my counselor about it, she suggested I talk to my psychiatrist. She wanted to try upping my dosage to see if that helped by down mood. I don’t really know if it is though.

In fact I sort of feel all over the place at the moment. Yesterday I was great…I had an awesome day with the girls, was really happy and today I’m in the crapper. I’m sure some of it is personal stuff going on in my life right now but I don’t really know how much to attribute to that. I hate it when this crap comes on out of the blue and most of the time, that’s how it goes.

I’m a little overwhelmed with all the stuff I have to get done on a regular basis and today I’m really feeling the stress for some reason. It’s all these stupid tiny things piling up and I literally have like two hours of each day to accomplish things which  of course is not much. Just writing this blog is going to take up like 15 minutes of my precious time. I need to email my sister-in-law back and thank her for the gifts she sent my girls…I need to write in my journal which I’ve been putting off. I need to shop for a cord for my camera that was lost somehow and seat covers for my car. I need to get the chip in the windshield fixed and get an autostart put in before the snow falls. I need to do some research for my class, which is on drugs and dependence. It’s interesting but time consuming. I have like two lessons until I’m done, thankfully. Then I have one class left until I have my associates degree. Thank God. I’ve been in school for nearly 4 years and it has taken me this long because I have had so much crap happen along the way and all these obstacles and detours. After this is done I am taking a break from school for awhile. Oh yeah, I also need to go shopping for a bunch of little miscellaneous junk (not usually an easy task when you are toting 2 year twins around who run wild in the store) and I need to finish this scrapbook for my daughter and get started on the one for my other daughter. I’m really into scrapbooks and photo albums because it’s so easy to forget things, putting all the pics and stories together helps remind me. I do a scrapbook for everything important, like each time the girls turn one year older, and all the trips and vacations I take and stuff like that. I’m way behind and the events keep piling up faster than I can do them. It’s a fun hobby but again, time consuming.

On top of it all I’m sorta going through a weird phase right now. I guess you could call it cliché pseudo punk/thrift store trash. I’m into the ugliest most disgusting clothes I can find, anything holey or stained, fishnet stockings, combat boots, ratty beanies and hoodies black fingernails and eyeliner, disheveled hair etc. I get into these stages once in awhile. I like to change my appearance quite often, especially my hair. It all sort of reflects my mood I suppose. In fact I’m cutting my hair next week. I’ve been dying it darker and darker the last year. I’m thinking of going black this time – I look good with dark hair (naturally, my hair is dark blonde). I don’t know how I want it cut yet…probably short, and shaggy.

Ok so I’m done ranting now. My phone keeps beeping, I need to check it and get busy on my school work. I have about 45 minutes until I have to get the girls up and go shopping. At least the sun is starting to come out a little bit. That’s always a good thing.

Date with my counselor

So, I'm super tired right now but I have to stay up and watch this movie I got from netflix so I can return it in the morning. Haha...it's been quite awhile since I've stayed up past midnight. I used to stay up til 2 or 3 every night. I've always been a night person, I'm guessing a lot of bipolar people are. Although that's not really a good thing considering lack of sleep tends to precipitate mania, or so I've been told by the professionals, and read in some books. So I  know it's better for me to sleep at a decent hour now. For awhile I was on Risperdal and it totally knocked me out like an hour after taking it, so I couldn't even stay up if I wanted to. It's funny how in a way I know a lot about bipolar, but now it's so much more personal so I'm definately learning all there is to know about it. I do think there is a lot of conflicting information out there though, which makes it a little tough.

Tomorrow I have an appointment with my counselor. She is great. I like her very much. Growing up I used to want to be a counselor, because I always had an intuitive way of knowing what people were experiencing and being able to sympathize and give advice to people. I figured I'd be a good counselor. Sometimes I still think about it. I'm a bit late in the game now though, at 28, and only 1/2 way through college...we'll see...I change my mind a lot on things like this :)

Anyhow, it's hard to believe I've been seeing her for about half a year now...time flies. Although I'm only seeing her once a month now so that's probably why it seems that way. The last visit she brought up a bipolar support group, which we don't have in my community. She had mentioned it at several visits, saying she had thought of starting one. So she asked if I'd seriously be interested in going if she headed one and I said yes, Then it got her brain rolling and she started talking about other patients and seeing if she could work it all out to make it a reality. It was pretty exciting. I really would like for this to happen, to be able to meet others like me. Truthfully, I've never met anyone else with bipolar, though when I was in the hospital I did meet a lot of other interesting people. Most of them were there with depression or suicidal thoughts though. The man I connected with most, let's call him Aaron (not his real name) had schizophrenia and at first I admit I was freaked out by him. But by the time I left I had this weird bond with him that I will always carry with me. That's a story for another time though. It's just strange how in my whole life, I've never really felt that sort of connection with anyone, and over a mere 5 days he impacted my life forever.

I think it's going to be a short week. Tomorrow is already Thursday. Winter is coming...ugh. I'm not looking forward to it...LOL...this summer has gone by entirely too fast.

Actually blogging now...

Well I suppose it's time I actually start writing on this blog..haha. I have way too much poetry to add, it's going to take me quite awhile, considering I only use this blog once every few days. I'm pretty busy most of the time. My twins are 2.5 years old and trust me, they are a handful. Having twins is a totally crazy experience but as they say, it's twice as hard but you have twice as much love. My husband works out of town 4 days of the week so it's just me taking care of them and occasionally my dad in the evenings. So it can get tiring.

Today actually happens to be my 4th wedding anniversary with my husband Tim. Hard to believe how time flies. It will be almost 5 years since we have been together. He's been there through all my weirdness although truthfully he doesn't really understand at all. I remember when we first got together I asked, "Have you ever thought about killing yourself?" Just hypothetically of course. He just said, "No..." like it was an odd question so I left it at that and realized, hmmm, maybe not all people feel depressed at times and want to die. LOL...I guess til then I figured everyone had those feelings at some point. Guess I was wrong!

I intend on writing more than just poetry in this blog, it's a little disconcerting at first to start sharing my feelings with the public although I'm sure no one is even reading this right now. Haha...I guess that means I can be brutally honest and say whatever the hell comes to my mind!

I'm off to enjoy my few minutes of freedom while the girls are napping. Oh, the busy life...

Only the beginning...

Well here I go...my first official post to my blog. Truthfully, it was my counselor who gave me the idea. We were talking one day about how, although I have supportive people in my life, they just don't seem to understand what I really go through, and so I turn to writing to purge myself of my complicated thoughts and feelings about it all. She suggested I blog about my experiences; about bipolar in general. She thought I'd be a good advocate for others like myself. I don't know about that much, but I do know that starting this blog was a good idea, and it should be interesting to see how it progresses over time.