So you think you know Bi-polar Disorder?!? do you really?

So you think you know Bi-polar Disorder?!? do you really?

As a long time victim of this illness going back to ten years ago, when I first became sick.  Sick meaning depressed. No ability to smile, clean, pay bills, talk, stop crying, and after about four months of my literal closet depression (as I would hide myself there with a pillow trying to muffle the sounds of my cries to my neighbors).  Finally, I did the worst thing I could have done, I took a bottle full of pills then curled up on my bed and cried.  I knew death wasn't what I was seeking, nor attention, though it was a desperate cry for help, the pain just became too much to deal with, and I no longer felt that anyone would understand what was happening to me, as I didn't, so how could I explain my radical behaivor change to anyone?

It was then that I learned of the problem I am aiming this article at, which is the misdiagnosis.  In 98 I was diagnosed Depressed with PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder).  They put me on an anti depressant, one of many this time, the evil Zoloft.  I continued getting worse, until in 2000 at Loma Linda where I had checked myself in, I felt I was losing my mind (I was, the docs had me on eleven different drugs, my mind could no longer function for itself). But it was there where a social worker diagnosed me correctly for the first time.  She looked directly at me and stated, Didn't anyone ever tell you you were bipolar?" she asked. No, they hadn't, and they started me on a treatment of first Nuerontin (an anti psychotic) then when I said no to that, it was Depakote, that too didn't help and made me feel far worse.  I eventually got off of everything,  By 2001 I was totally clean, of course sadly I was drinking, too often and too much, as the group I was running with lived their lives this way, work, get together, drink, sleep and do it all over again.  After a DUI  I received after hitting the front porch of a house on our way back home from the last day of the Long Beach Grand Prix, though I'd been cut off, I also had three beers in me, and I blew the legal limit.  They arrested me.
That experience, the court apearances, the MONEY, the AA classes (none of which I attended I simply signed the card myself I must admit, nor did I do my 3 days of Community Service which is 72 hours and you can only do four I believe, maybe six in a day.  That nor graffiti removal was I going to be engaging in.  I'd go to the Enforced Alcohol Education courses that were mandatary for three months, but I got a girl on the phone at the Court who took pity on me and entered into the Court System Computer that I had completed both my AA and my CalTrans Graffiti Removal and Community Service. She also saved me about 600.00 as it just disappeared, clearing everything on my file, and putting it to bed.  It's always amazing to see the power of Universal Law that when  you decided something, and visualize yourself doing or not doing whatever the thing may be, and the Universe just kind of folds to your will.  BUT, what all of that did was get me to stop drinking.  In order to do so, I thought moving inland where at the time my mom and sister both were, I got a new broker to work for, and eventually made my move.

I thought things were going well.  I knew that at times I could talk so fast, I would watch people actually backing out of the room, terrified that this energy sucking vampire was never going to shut up.  Of course that really only happens when first, I've been drinking (sober two years) or am meeting new people in which case I get this nervous talking thing.  Although, that was before.  Before my best friend, D., who's always been there for me as I have for her, but one night she called me over to talk.  She offered me a glass of wine, which I took, and we sat close in her charming living room, decorated as if it were an Italian Villa.  She told me how much she loved me, how everybody did, that everyone though I was hysterical, and made everyone laugh, but that she (unlike almost anyone else,) had seen me crash.  Bipolar is not a person that is going to go crazy and shoot everyone and then himself, not unless he's unmedicated and is self medicating, mostly its' either a Manic state, where you have racing thoughts, thinking you're having  an epiphamy every single minute.  If you do start to talk, the speed with which I spoke not to mention the seque's that make a listener have to jump all over the place in order to know what you're talking about, though you know you've closed all the loose ends by the time you finish, the people around you usually are all just dumbstruck.  Silently trying to figure out what it is they're supposed to say in response except what they want to say which of course is, Goodbye.
The down side is that while my up side can work always multitasking a ton of different things, always finishing early, Creativity moments that can go for weeks, where sleep isn't required, only whatever I may require for whatever burst of talent I'm suddenly pouring myself into, and you never know when this phase will stop, could be any minute, but your manic, and it feels great, I mean really great!  Bi polars and this is true, feel and live everyday feeling 150% more than other people, so often getting through something particularly stressful may bring a successful bipolar down, and into the dark side, which may or may not come with an episode of incredible rage.  That dark side, it is an illness, as is the manic. And though thousands of artistic endeavors were created while the maker was manic.  After you've spent your wod, as it were, it becomes bed rest time, and deep depression can, and for me usually does, settle in, and always catching me off guard, it's at those times when the frustration of living with this illness almost becomes too unbelievably painful to continue, it's why, like the end result of  a battle against Cancer, Bipolar too, will take your life, if you don't get treatment or hopefully better yet, someone else helps you, makes you feel taken care of, because that is what you so feel you are missing.  Love. Encouragement, being told.."It's not your fault".  This disease is as important as any other. Leukemia, Cancer, Diabetes, MS, Aids.  You may be able to live a long and full life, but for a Mental Illness, it's even more difficult to get treatment than most other illnesses.
A disease of them mind, is far more difficult to understand.  It is natural for people who see someone who they think is totally capable of doing anything they want to with their lives, but have been given this horrible label to describe what you have and that to live in normal society, medication would have to be initiated.  That's what D basically told me.
Oddly, the next day, out of nowhere I decided to stop to see my mom.  She brought me into the kitchen, sat me down, and for the first time ever, My mom apologized to me.  She started crying, saying she didn't have any idea.  That they thought I had just gotten lazy and didn't really want to try to do anything. That I hadn't been wasting my life, I was trying to survive, and she finally understood as she, the day before, had met a man whos wife had BP for thirty years.  The first fifteen years of their marriage was almost a nightmare, as the older she got, the worse the illness becomes and quite often she would just disappear, leaving for weeks, no note of where she would be, leaving her husband and children behind. But then she would return, and he had confessed he knew many times he should have left, not been there this time when she came back, but his love for her alllowed him to go through it.  Then, after a doc appt, she was asked to talk to another clinician. Twenty minutes later she and her husband walked out of the doctors office to a new and completely different life.  She began on the proper medication, and it had been fifteen years, and they were great, but he'd told my mother horror stories as well, I guess it jarred her into finally realizing that even though I say I can, I can't do everything always all by myself.
And I'm not alone now, though I never really was.  I have an incredible husband, loving family and friends.  My dog and two cats I adore, and saving the best for last, a sweet beautiful daugther who is the light of our life.
I've been on meds since 2003 after a two year clean out.  I've stayed on them since, making changes on some every so often as is necessary.  I still have a problem with Depression. Some people with bipolar, you would never know, and never will know, then there are those that are more manic, some, like me, more depressive.  Am I as creative as I was before?  No, perhaps not.  I'm still working, still writing, but I remember what it felt like before.  Before I got sick. My sense of humor. Ability to be happy in the face of almost anything, my imagination often like swimming in a pond, the kind where you can't see your feet.  Just blurred.  But going back the other way?  It scares me too.  I don't want to be late for everything because I see signs in everthing and it used to dictate what I would or  would not do. It was getting to be too much. Laying on the couch became my new hobby when I was like that, and I didn't want to utter a word until the spell had passed.
Now? Yes, I still get depressed. Everyone does. maybe. And mine probably lasts longer than most, but I find if I see a therapist and pdoc, that the talking with the therapist keeps me from slipping into the dark hole of depression.
Manic?  Sadly, almost never. I say sadly, because the part of being Bipolar, the reason so many won't take their meds????  It comes with this feeling. It's in your chest.  You're wired, excited, it's like a great big overdose of Seratonin, or for those who have done drugs, that first line of cocaine.  I found that when I had an overflow of money, I would get far more manic more often.  But once on Medication?  Your just like everybody else. You try to alternate your meds, lower them, find that hopeful, line, that you pray for to be in. The one where you're truly balanced out again. Where you find joy in your achievements, and the ability to achieve at all.
A battle of the mind........ it's scary for most people. They fear that which they don't understand.  And if you have seemingly many personalities, not a multiple, but so many moods, others see you as having different personalities.  And people are really scared of that.  They've been lead to believe through television and movies/books, that a bp person is a dangerous person, somehow different now than they were before thier suposed sickness.  So they, usually, bail out.  At least there at the beginning of the illness, I lost a lot of people I loved back then, as they just couldn't be my friend anymore because they were scared, I was so different from the way I had been, and since people don't understand mental illness, instead of having love and encouragement which is what you need the most, instead you are given/shown isolation.  Friends for most your life..... disappear. not taking your calls.  And of course you have to remind yourself what you're made of, and that true friends, the kind of friend I have always tried to be, loyal, stay by your side when your sick, they don't leave you alone to die.  But sadly, I found that is the way it is.  As long as you keep your, "everythings going great" attitude on, all is well.  But God forbid they see a Rage/Depression, it can be really scary for a first timer.
I've worked on it myself. With my husbands help of course.  Kickboxing helps, writing, crying, ... releasing the cup as it were that had reached it's limit and needed pouring out, so I can start all over, and do it again.
Bipolar, IS NOT CRAZY.  Not Insane.  Usually Brilliant, and usually quite funny and successful.  Just because someone has an illness in their mind that requires medication, does not make them any different from anyone else.  Everybody has something. Everyone.
My point ?  After this horrifically long rambling.  Dont Judge what you don't understand. IF you know someone who has a mental illness, or perhaps you think they may?  Help them. There are plenty of resources, if you need some, let me know, I'm happy to help.
I'm now functioning almost as I was before I got sick.  I've got the right doctors, and for now, I guess the right meds... its the part I dislike the most.... Meds.   You tell me I'm sick, that I'd be better... this way or that.  But I often wonder, what if it's just me, the way I am and the meds only make me more acceptable for societys comfort.  I mean, what do I care what others think. There are plenty of "crazy" people who have created some of the most amazing art works of our time, and invented things that others would have never seen.  Would Einstein invented all he did if he were given meds, or a lobotomy?  I kind of doubt it.  Would Emily Bronte?  Rodney Dangerfield lived his whole life with depression, many comedians have that or BP as well.
Yoga is a great help, and eating right, but remember, your only human, you can do what you can, and get through the setbacks though it may feel it's taken forever to reach, but it's all reachable. For each and every one of us. Me included.
Try and find understanding for mental illness.  It affects a lot more people than you truly know.  And the thing we need the most?  Are real Love, real Friends.

As much as I have written here, I know there was far more I meant to say. One of those is the following.... don't judge what you don't understand or what scares you, try instead to show empathy.  Thank you.

GoD Bless

peace and love

Melissa Marie Morgan-Creton