This is what I know and have learned over the years... I am no one important, scholared, nor am I a professional anything or expert on much. I am a person who has a mental illness called Bipolar and have suffered and still do, with it, 24/7. It is a simple, primitive, understanding of my own mind.
Bipolar brings about issues solely on it's very own. The depression and the "feeling good" cycles in and out, on it's very own. It is the disorder, it's what it does, it cycles.
Environmental/external stress, pressure, and the inability to cope and handle those... cause the symptoms that you experience when the Bipolar disorder cycles... to be much worse. Stress on one's mind or body, causes a chemical reaction in one's brain (that which holds the Bipolar) and causes a lot of short circuiting and messing about. When stress is prolonged due to the individual's inability to find an appropriate measure of relieving it... the cycling intensifies and so does the symptoms.
Because Bipolar is a disorder of the mind and there is no blood test or brain scan to diagnose or detect it, nor is there a test to show it's progression or regression... it is in how you feel. Purely, in how you feel and how you cope and manage with those feelings.
The meds are used to counteract the chemical reactions that happen within your brain. If they help with the symptoms you feel then great... many do not - they just relieve, they do not eradicate... it's how you feel due to the chemical upheaval.. due to the stress and inability to cope and manage it.
The meds are also prone to producing side effects that are... psychiatric. Why? Because they work with the chemicals in your brain... you mess with the chemicals, you get a reaction... good or bad or just plain annoying.
So... you can be taking a med for psychosis and have psychotic side effects as a possibility (no shit). You can take a med for depression and have altered mood swings as a possibility (no crap). You can take a med for sleep and be wide awake and hallucinatory. It's all possible.
You can also find meds, given time and trial, that will provide you with just enough umpf to feel sane... even for a short period of time cause that's what we all aim for... those periods of time when we feel sane.
Why if you take the drugs the docs hand you do you still have the symptoms? Because it is a disorder of the mind that causes havoc within the brain that causes havoc within the mind that manifests in the symptoms. It has it's own agenda, it's own itenary.
It reacts and detracts and attracts all on it's own without any assistance from anything. It will cycle - up or down - the meds are just to help with the chaos the cycling causes by relieving and cushioning the jarring grind of the gears.
If you are under a great deal of stress and you've found no means to manage it or have no known means of handling it... or the ways and means you've always had to cope it with are not really and truly helpful (cause otherwise you'd not be so stressed and disheveled)... then the chemical reaction manifests the symptoms of which are what you purely feel and think (twisted as they are) and the hallucinations you may experience... even while on all the meds.
Tabby, thank you for writing this post. It is good (not for you!) that we can share our experiences, knowledge, and even pain with one another. I am so sorry that you have to deal with your bipolar disorder without the help of medication. That is like a person with daily chronic pain not being able to take pain medication to relieve it, or at least take the edge off.
This disorder is challenging enough without having to maintain our public life, or deal with the expectations of our family that often we fail to meet. Not because we didn't try, but because it was too hard, too much in the face of depression or the scatteredness of mania. We struggle with guilt and horrible feelings of failure that we were a weak mother who wasn't really there for her children. We are on edge, anxious that we are going to fail at our work responsibilities. For me, it is just this sense of doom. I can't rationalize it away, and sometimes I feel really alone, like there is an invisible balloon around me as I walk the halls of the school I work at. Every one else is connected to one another; I am unable to connect. Depression.
When I am not depressed, I have this sense of wellbeing. My circumstances haven't changed. I still don't know how I am going to pay my mortgage, my job still has the same stressors, but I don't feel the anxiety. I tell myself it will all work out. I feel strong. I am much more outgoing. I call my family. I have long conversations with them. I want sex every night. My brain is working better, I get a lot accomplished. I am much more assertive and confident. People notice and comment on the difference.THAT is the Jennie I like. She is not around very much. Hypomania. That is the Jennie my new husband met and got to know. Before I was diagnosed and before I began taking the medication. I feel like it was false advertising.
Tabby, keep writing your posts. Get some of the darkness out. Share your experiences, your thoughts, and even your pain. And... give that bag of pills to someone you trust. Get it out of the line of temptation. When I have thoughts of suicide, I think, "Well I have done pills. They didn't stay down long enough to get the job done, but long enough to endanger my liver and kidneys. Long enough that I had to get a shot of... can't remember the name..that made me feel like cold fire was going through my body from my toes to my scalp. It was awful and relentless in its mission to get the narcotics out of my system. If I am going to really end my life, I have got to do it in away that WILL get the job done. And I ask myself, Am I that committed to ending my life? Is there truly no hope or reason to hang on?
A friend of my youngest daughter killed herself on Christmas Eve. She was 20 yrs old. I can't imagine what was going on in her head the last few minutes before she hung herself. She got the job done. An only child, her parents were devastated beyond words. As validictorian of her class, she left behind scores of classmates who were shocked. Nobody'd had a clue. Many, including my daughter, felt guilty they hadn't reached out more.
Tabby, you want to know what my first thought was? This girl was braver than I was. Isn't that a terrible, horrible, irrational, selfish thought!
First, I am sorry for the loss of the young woman at Christmas and yet... I do know, and so do many others that struggle with Bipolar and other mind knarling disorders.. what it is like to get to those last few minutes.
Many "others" feel it's the coward's way and that the person is selfish and ungrateful. That if they just held on for one more day, one more hour, one more minute... reached out and grabbed someone... they'd see that the next day, the next hour, the next minute might be so much better than the one they are experiencing right then and there.
Thing is... many, like me, have no one to grab that is willing to hold on while I cling desparately to them in those last few moments that come quite often actually.
Still... I don't and yeah sometimes I berate myself unmercifully because I am such a coward and failure at even that.
See but that alone tells me my mind is not well. Cause normally, I'd never give it a thought. I was supposed to die in that car wreck in 2007 and I didn't and so, I know that when my mind turns upon me so viciously... it's the illness and still, I can get so lost within it.
It's not that I actually want to be dead and surely that is not how that girl felt. It's just that I want the pain, the suffocation, the agonizing state of being to just be done and to feel relief. Some sweet merciful relief... some air... some light upon my face.
It's really really hard to not just give in and it's really really hard to not allow the hole I've inadvertantly fell into to swallow me whole. Yet, I'm still scratching the dirt in hopes of finding a solid rock to pull myself up out of it before it completely takes me in.
Always scratching and clawing at the dirt.
Tabby,
I know those thoughts. It can be like you are in the deepest, darkest part of a jail cell. Your cell mates are contempt, self-pity, despair, and hopelessness. You know that the jail cell isn't locked, you can get out, but they have you backed in a corner and they are holding onto your hands and legs. You are too weak to shake them off. Listening to them speak to you only makes you weaker and their grip stronger. If you keep listening, you know you will give in to the solution they offer.
Your back is against the wall. It would be wonderful if someone, something would come and help you..bring a little light and help you see that the door is not as far away as you thought. Or, that someone would come with earplugs to stop up your ears so you can't hear their voices. Or better yet, someone would come with a big gun and shoot them dead so their hands will let you go.
Tabby, are there any light bearers in your life? Is there something, someone who can speak life to you? Words that are stronger, that quiet the words of your cell mates. Is there someone strong who can come along side you to support you and help you get to that door?
Dark, destructive thoughts begin to lose their power the closer you get to the light of sane and sound thinking. Standing in that light you see them for what they really are: shadows. They have no real substance. In the dark they feel so strong, but like a dog who is all bark and no bite, all they can do is deceive you into believing that their grip on you is stronger than it really is.
If you get nothing else from this post, visualize those dark, destructive thought patterns as shadows, or a black fog bank that trys to hide things from you, like the truth about the way things really are in your life.
Keep writing Tabby.
Jennifer
Hi Tabby,
I just wanted to check in and see how you are doing. Are you functioning well enough that you've been able to go to work? How was your weekend? On a scale of 1 to 10 how is your depression right now? Is there anyone in your circle of friends/family/coworkers/therapist who is aware of the mood cycle your in?
Please keep writing. There are people here that care about you.
Jennifer
I have gone to work but left at lunch today. Partly due to the depression and partly due to unexpected abdominal pain (will see doctor for that this afternoon).
Depression from 0 (worse) to 10 (minor) is about a 1 right now, truthfully.
I did take a deep breath at the analogy of the prison cell where the doors are opened, the light is shining, but I can't seem to make it to the doorway to go out cause something seems to be holding me... paralyzing me... pinning me down and keeping me against the farthest darkened damp wall. That really did speak quite a bit to me.
I made a call to an agency in a neighboring town yesterday. I decided to try again and see if anyone else could possibly assist me in some fashion. Yet, they have to pre-screen me, check out my information, and the nice lady said she'd get back to me about setting up an initial evaluation. I've not heard back yet but in general, it can take a day or so.
This agency also has a speciality with head trauma/injury and subsequent mood and psychiatric issues stemming from... in that i suffered a closed head injury during my car wreck 4 years ago... thought if I qualified for that program, within their agency, maybe I could at minimum be screened for whatever that offered.
I'm clawing and scratching... I get so exhausted from clawing and scratching... but, clawing and scratching, I am.
thanks for your kind words by the way.... no, i have no family or friends that really put much effort in assisting or supporting. One reason why I have very little help psychiatrically as it is.
Having a supportive and encouraging family, or friends, or network of folks does make a considerable amount of difference in the daily goings on.
Dear Tabby, you should give yourself a big pat on the back for getting out there and trying to help yourself. I know how hard it is to deal with this illness, especially the depressive side, alone with no friends or family to support you. I totally get the jail cell analogy too. The paralysis is fear. In my case, fear of having to accept my aloneness, my illness and where I live. It's easier to stay stuck in depression than to risk actively trying to change your life and failing. We've all fallen over and over again and are tired of the struggle. So the fact that you are scratching at the dirt is an inspiration. Keep scratching, and keep writing. We care about you and need your support too.