When they started talking about him, I felt defensive.  I wanted them to know that all was not because of any defect in him. It was merely an illness, a mental illness, a mind thing, a manic-depression, a bipolar unwellness, and it was obviously something they knew little about.  I worried about how they would stigmatize him and how they perceived him while they shuttered at his behavior.  Once I learned more about his behavior and his abuses I got to thinking, what about me? 

I once flew below the radar.  If you can be a type A personality or moderately hypomanic and/or depressed, I was. But once stress and circumstance emerged, I became despondent, and euphoric, and abusive.  I was sarcastic, began drinking, and was demeaning to my husband in front of our young children. Filled with rage with heart pounding, I was curt to our friends, I said many things embarrassing, I swore to excess, was a flirtatious mess who desired for affairs and perhaps worse, I hated myself, hated.  So when they spilled the beans about his life, I was stricken by the similarities they had already forgiven in me. But in my mind, it was all too familiar, and all too ordinary, he was all too we. 

So, how does one recognize the characteristics of mental unwellness that lies within?  What is personality verses  illness? and how much ego will manifest itself before it destroys a family?  Invariably, it is a complex battle between the unconscious and conscious mind and the madness that screams “life is like line.” For within this illness, one is changing with entanglements;  it is defining.

Within my illness, my gut told me the truth when everyone else was silent. And when I choose felo de se (suicide) to restart my journey, there could be no more rage and resistance, I felt too much alarm.

For More About Cynthia and Her Bipolar Journey, Please Visit: www.LifeIsLikeALine.com