Work vs BP

By alxv Wednesday, September 02, 2009

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I'm researching about working as a Bp. I did found out a great blog about it that really talks about important and vital issues we face in the outside world. (I can send the address to those interested).

I have trouble staying in long term jobs because of the stress most superiors seem to put in their environment just to show how "competent" they are (not).

My work has always been appreciated in every company I ever been. I'm punctual, I can work ill, I give my 100% and I'm in good mood most of the times. My only problem is dealing with the stress those creatures create. Most of them are completely insane and they are the one's who should be taking double the pills I am! LOL

I need to get my life back and I was wondering how and if it's possible to do it without having to quit a job because I can't handle stress and those stupid people who go to work thinking it's their life and they do so much damage to their coworkers it's insane... Maybe it's just because I'm living in my country's capital, I never had this kind of problems when I lived in a smaller town. But still I think we do need help and support on this issue. Not easy to live like this when we are not capable to deal with stress or when we can't leave the house (like me for the last 5 years).

I'm very concerned about some of the things I just red saying that we most likely have problems in keeping a long term job and being able to have financial independence because we have BP and as we all know can make it impossible to achieve some of our basic goals...

I want to be able to work and support myself, I'm sure it would make me very happy to leave this frozen reality. I miss having a life.

As I sometimes say: I'm ready for retirement but I'm not old enough to do so. I don't have the energy nor the space in my mind to work and to deal with the outside world yet or ever. I'm very concerned about it and I don't know how I'm going to solve this.

I love working it keeps my mind occupied but I'm to weak to do it. Yep it makes me want to scream...

A good decision I hope...

Comments (6) | Add comment

angieflowers

9/ 2/09 7:35am

I feel your pain and know exactly how you feel. Well, I really don't know exactly how you feel because no one can, and I hate telling people that. I do though know how I feel and we share the same disease and I do suffer with same symptoms of bipolar as you do. I enrolled back into school before I was diagnosed and I really think that school made it surface to the point my family could see that I had a problem. I'm guessing it was the stress, even though I loved being back in school. I had to drop for a year because I had surgery and something that I thought would maybe take me six weeks to recover took my a year. Physically, I was fine but I had not excepted the fact I was bipolar.

The school I was attending decided to no longer offer my major anymore, so I am enrolled at ITT Technical Institute. When I started my first quarter in the spring, I had been taking my meds for about five months. I still get stress and it takes everything I have to walk out the door to attend and sometimes I can't. Being honest with my instructors has helped and they work with me. So far I have a gpa of 3.70. It would be higher if I did not have bipolar and this past quarter I ended having to drop a class. I start back next Monday night. I like night classes. I've been on break for the last two weeks and I get depressed when I don't have assignments to work on and classes to attend. So going to school has been wonderful for me to have some kind of life.

If you were to ask me what I was going to do with that degree, I would look at you and tell you that I do not know. I would love to have my own business or work a job that allows me to work from home. In the technology industry, you can find situations where they will allow that. I have always worked hard and at one time was a successful mortgage broker. The money was great, the real estates agents that I would deal with, were very ugly to me if I could not get the house to a closing table. I did the best I could to get a loan done and approved, ready to close when thes, contract had a set closing table. I don't remember one loan that did not have some kind of problem that would delay the closing or during closing. Finally, the stress got so bad and after the birth of my second child, I quit! Filed for disability and have been on disability for 11 years. I wasted a lot of year doing nothing. I had a couple of part time jobs but never anything that was permanent. I get scared when I think about graduating and finding a job. I interview well, so naturally I get most jobs I apply for, but I don't want to go to work somewhere that I constantly have someone hovering over me. I do my job well, when I'm left alone.

Also, I am learning another language by going to the library and checking out books, dvd's or CD's that I can listen to in the car. Mental exercise! If you can't work, at least do something for yourself to improve how you feel about you. I also have volunteered with Habitat of Humanity and it was fun learning how to build a house from the foundation up.

Just some suggestion on what I have done in the past. At the moment, I am suffering in depression again. I guess its the upcoming seasonal change. My family is still having a hard time understanding this disease I struggle with. So they get mad at me. I print out the suggestions that I get off sites such as this one. Its not my problem that they don't read it or care to. But than again, it is my problem because it upsets me. I'm in so much pain right now and I hope by at least talking about it, I will be able to start school and stop hiding out from everyone. I have a family reunion this Saturday and I want to see some of my cousins I grew up with and we keep up with each other through facebook but have made no promises to anyone that I would be there. It all depends on how I feel when I wake up that morning and I hate that.

So thanks for sharing your struggles, because I do not feel so alone. I am so tired of being scared of the world and I do not know how to act in it. It seems everyone has a some kind problem with me. I think I sub consciously make problems to push them away.

This disease sucks! I just hope I can get back to being okay and content again.

alxv

9/ 2/09 12:23pm

Yep, this is the right place, FINALY!! LOL

Very true, you can take as much degrees you want because that pressure isn't there and you can relax between your night classes. I took 6 courses very easily and hell was getting a job and trying very hard not to feel out of place, which is impossible, I always do...

I too want to work for myself but the question is on what? Just thinking of talking to people every single day... God help me.

You know what, I love talking to people when they are nice and intelligent and never found that at work so give me one reason to be excited to talk with people who will run away from you if they know you have something like Bipolar Disorder or just depression?! LOL

Sorry, but it's too funny the way I see it, when I don't get angry, but how can we feel motivated to be in a work environment that just makes us feel worse? As you said, they don't care to look it up and get info about it; instead they ostracize and make jokes if you let them know that your life can be hell in just minutes or wake up in a completely different mood from the day before?

I miss working and sometimes just to put a smile on my face I think; hey it would be great to be able to work in a library! (Oh god, all that silence and no stress... Heaven...)

I wish for a perfect world, where we all can work in peace, and without noise so we wouldn't waist precious energy dealing with ignorance and stress from the outside world.

By the way, you feel my pain hehehehhehehehhe, ok today I'm mood swinging and I was depressed minutes ago... Still this belongs to me I love being in good mood, no better way to live.

One more thing though, about family and they getting angry about the way we "function" and the routines we make that for them don't make any sense... Well, yep that's the story of my life. I just stopped caring if they get it or not, call me crazy I say!! Less worries for me when it comes to explaining what they should know by now but I guess we speak different languages...

I'm in heaven here, thank you for commenting on my post. We can all talk BP language and no one will find it weird LOL just perfect! (Not that I like this... Illness)

I'm here for you.

u won't like me when i'm angry

9/ 4/09 5:24am

I have been in a steady job for 23 years and have perservered despite my reduced ability to handle stress effectively at times, so I think it is up to you to prove them wrong...as Oprah would say - "You go girl"

alxv

9/ 4/09 6:18am

Thank you for your support, I'm a big fan of Oprah as well, very wise woman.

I wish there were still jobs like that, that we could count on for so long, but nope, you are very lucky to keep it for so long, I'm happy for you.

I always feel like I'm walking in a thin rope up in the air and bad working environment is the strong wind that makes my legs go week to stay up there so I keep falling to the ground and for 20 years I got back up again and give all my energy to stay up there and get a new job.

Now that's what I'm doing, again... My goal is to be stable as Bp is concern and giving my 100% to stay in my next job and move forward because I have had enough of falling down with no control over my symptoms.

One day at the time...

I have to say WOW, to you and your strength!

tabby

9/ 4/09 9:24am

I work

Or, I did before I was laid off at New Year's

and... I'm looking for work but, with very few opportunities

this depression...oooppsss, recession is very hard on so many people

I worked, with all me symptoms and madness raging, prior to my correct diagnosis (I was mis-diagnosed since I was a wee one) and I've been working, with me symptoms and madness raging ever since the correct diagnosis. Nothing changed when I was diagnosed except the diagnosis and well... a different set of meds and even then, it was 1 set which are mood stabilizers. The others are ones I've taken since I was... well, a wee one.

See... I am what I was before. Only when I had the correct diagnosis, I then understood why I had the difficulties and symptoms I had prior. In now having the correct diagnosis... I then had the knowledge of what needed to be done to manage or try to manage the difficulties and symptoms I had prior and still do to some degree. I MYSELF didn't change.

I have undergone therapy for so many years now and yet, in doing so... I've come to recognize triggers and I've gathered some coping strategies to help me deal with them. You can't always avoid triggers but you can learn coping/de-esclating strategies to deal with them. Even then, sometimes those little bugger triggers can still overtake you... still, it's best to have some tools in the toolbox than to open the box and find little to nothing when it's most crucial.

I know so many folks, that once diagnosed with Bipolar and given the full baggie of multiple colored pills to ingest.. then sit and contemplate as to whether they should return to work. Many many folks then run, do not walk, run - to their nearest disability office and apply for governmental disability without really attempting to return to work.

Then there are those, that do attempt but find the meds interfere with their ability to work AND if returning to a previous position, feeling like "everyone knows". The stress and pressure, along with the meds that interfere and make them zombified or drugged out (not to mention sick), along with the stress of life and work... then leave and head for the local governmental disability office.

Then there are those, like myself, who work. We bounce from job to job, endure the stresses and pressure, endure the sickness, endure the crap from all over the place and become more and more symptomatic and episodic... but work. We see things that aren't really there, hear things that aren't really audible, feel like tearing folks limb from limb but we sit there and smile... and work. We might be suicidal, every moment that ticks by is a accomplishment of staying alive and now we wait for the next tick... and we force a smile... and work.

Bipolar is a highly customized form of mental illness. It customizes itself to the one it inhabits. Each person's form of the disorder is different than the next person's and each person's symptoms are uniquely their own. Each person's tolerance level is also each person's uniquely own and where one can and one can not does not make one better than the one who can not... it only makes each different from the other.

It is your decision to decide as to whether you should pursue working. You have the knowledge of what is ailing you and why. You also have the treatment options to possibly assist you in managing it day by day. It is up to you to decide what you, uniquely, can tolerate and what you can not.

Whatever that is, you are supported.

alxv

9/ 4/09 1:08pm

Hi tabby and thank you for your support.

I was only diagnost with bipolar disorder 5 months ago. I would never want to retire at 41 years old. I do love to work because I find it therapeutic no matter how hard it can be to leave the house some days.

I handled some pretty insane people at work starting with some superiors and in my personal life at the same time who was another living hell, but after so many years fighting it all I broke down one day and one year after I started to work on myself in order to know myself better and to see what were my weaknesses. And although I have my own, I knew I suffered from depression since my teens but never thought I had is bipolar disorder. I did some research and I had all the symptoms of BP but I never took it serious.

I'm a survivor and I would never give up on me or life outside without a big fight.

I'm having a good treatment and I only need some therapy to deal with work issues and get some tools to deal with the stress of, if I get that same" lucky" star at work, having to work with superiors that should be locked up and throw way the key.

My concern is that I'm too burned out from too much hell for too long. And although I survived it alone without any help or meds, I need support and strong tools to keep me stable enough to handle it all, all I ask... I'm not easy to beat, just concerned.

Work vs BP

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