| It's really hard to describe what it is like having a mood/personality disorder. Even among sufferers, symptoms greatly differ. And symptoms, for some (in extreme cases), can sometimes change weekly, daily, or even hourly. |
| When I am encountering depression, my body, mind and spirituality are each weighed down, sufficated, strangled. My thoughts are all on gloom and doom. I think of suicide but I am too... ??? ... numb to actually do anything. But boy do I come up with the "grandest" of gruesome plans. |
| When I am hypomanic a whole different "person" emerges. I am outgoing, talkative, energetic. I accomplish many things and my mind is filled with wonderful ideas and much creativity. Very little slows me down or gets me down. I tend to look to this state as my "true self"... |
| When I am manic, yet another side shows up. This time I am energetic to an extreme. I'll start MANY things, but finish very little or nothing at all. During these times, I will push the speed limit to the extreme, but mostly because I simply don't notice how fast I'm going... And if anyone would tell me, chances are very high that I'd "bite their head off" so to speak. Often-times I see many people as being slow in mind and body and my best of friends become as if strangers as I wonder what I did wrong to offend someone or if someone has some (much too imagined) grievance against me. I am usually pretty good at recognizing my mood shifts, so I usually keep my tongue in check-- but my mind is very uncertain and I see "danger" and uncertainty everywhere. But when I don't keep my tongue in check, I lash out at everyone closest and most loved by me-- which then throws me into a depression or mixed state. According to the "experts", the chance of a person commiting suicide are higher while in a manic state than a depressed one. During such times I, for one, tend to be way too disorganized to follow through. Most likely, I would kill myself accidentally through injury or through "cutting". I know it must pain Jehovah's heart when his creation hurt themselves so, so I try very hard to restrain myself. But it's not easy. Especially when such heinous habits help sustain my existence (but more on that a bit later).... |
| I am most often "mixed" (or perhaps it's just a really bad mania). And what that means, to me, is that my thoughts are filled with doom and gloom to an extreme worse than my depressed states, but I'm OVERFLOWING with the energy I associate with being hypomanic or manic. I want to conquer the world but I view myself as being a creature more vile than Satan himself. I feel I am unfit for association and I do almost anything to isolate myself to an extreme. And often, with these mixed up states, a great anger or rage comes with it... Now add to all of that, that I no longer make sense. I can't keep my thoughts or feelings straight and one minute I'll be happy, the next minute I'll be sad, and yet another minute I'll be almost ready to kill myself or someone else. I feel everyone is out to make my life difficult and/or that I'm the greatest burden imaginable and that I should rid the world of the headaches and heartachs I cause. Statistically speaking, it is during the worst of these moments that I am most likely to kill myself. I have just enough negativity and more than enough energy to actually carry though with my horrible thoughts. It is during these times, too, that I am most prone to give in to "self-injury". So far Jehovah has carried me through... but I am often in dread of the next fall and the next climb in the roller coaster ride I call my life. |
| On being Bipolar...... |