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Controlled High Flying

Am now definitely into being manic. I seem to have gotten the arguing with people under control, but I have also warned everyone that I am hyperactive and more likely to flare up than usual.

And then I don't actually quarrel with anyone. It's as if my broadcasting that I am argumentative actually works to prevent me from being so.

I still have the compulsion to do the little things. So far I am happy with it because, well because I am getting an awful lot done immediately. But it still feels as if it doesn't belong to me, more as if I am being gently nudged into doing all the correct things.

However, I can see where this can become a problem. If I get so overwhelmed with doing the little things I am not going to have time to actually do my real work. Something to keep an eye out for. I also wonder if I will burn out if I stay like this.

Either my ability to focus has not been impaired yet, or I still have sufficient control to focus if I concentrate. That's good.

I am also reaching the point were I am so efficient that it is irritating to the people around me. That coupled to the fact that I am in a pretty talkative mood can probably make being in my presence tiring.

And worse yet, although I know, absolutely know, that I will be depressed in a few weeks or a few months from now and not be able to do anything at all, I have to keep on fighting the urge to criticise my family and the people at work for not working faster.

Usual physical manic signs are present. Coordination is out of whack so movements can be jerky and fine detail work like handwriting or holding a cup steady in my hand is harder to do. Doesn't seem to affect large movements like walking. Partially affects driving.

Also all the muscles are pretty tense - I am probably not going to really relax until I stop being manic. My jaw is so tense that by lunch time or early afternoon I will have a whopping headache (which I will ignore).

Even with all the problems, I like the condition I am in. I am sufficiently aware that I can monitor how I am feeling and actively adjust it. But this area of being manic but not too manic isn't very large - a little wider than a knife edge, but not too much. It takes a lot of effort to be aware of how I am feeling and what I am doing all the time.

In this situation, I cannot for a moment forget that I am manic, and I have to keep on adjusting what I do and how I act. Luckily, the manic energy provides me with sufficient oomph that I have the ability to do that and still be highly productive.

It takes a lot of experience to be able to be so self aware and to refrain from going along with manic impulses. And I have a backup - Tegretol can get me off my manic high in about twenty minutes. And enough people are keeping an eye on me that I am unlikely to get a chance to do anything really stupid. And they know where I keep my medication.

I wouldn't recommend this to someone to do. I am also well aware that this is, at best, risky and is probably just stupid. But I am so fed up of depression and all the ancillary problems that it causes that I am willing to try this experiment.

Brought my medication back down to 300mg Wellbutrin daily. In this state, the last thing I need is more of an antidepressant.

Forcing Depression to Mania

Started to feel depressed yesterday, as well as when I awoke this morning. Apparently if you are looking out for it, it is possible to feel the onset of depression.

Before even the first real signs of depression start up, you can feel a pending heaviness. It feels a bit like the earliest signs of a flu - the point when you feel just off enough so that although you haven't come down with the flu yet, you know you will within the next day or so.

As Cap'n Jack Sparrow would say - "Interesting."

Upped my medication to 450mg Wellbutrin this morning. Am back into mild mania.

Will see what happens next.

Stabilising in a Hypomanic Mode

Having come of a three week depression mostly annoyed that I missed three weeks of work, I have decided that instead of trying to get my moods to normal, I am going to try to stabilise my moods in a slightly manic mode.

There is a bit of logic to this. No matter how stable the meds are supposed to keep us, our moods still fluctuate a bit. If I am normal, there is a good chance that I will slip into mild depression. However, since I am helpless once I am even a bit depressed, mild depression will almost inevitably turn into full depression.

If I try to remain a bit manic, it will take a wider mood swing to become depressed. However, since I am alert and functional while manic, it is easier for me to catch even mild variations in how I feel and act immediately to stop cycling downward.

Or that's the hypothesis.

This past week I went through my typical manic cycle. Was pretty much under control - except for managing to have a disagreement / argument with just about everyone I deal with daily, except my father.

But mild stuff and I apologised. I shouted at only one of the persons. And all the arguments were all over real things that need to be sorted out.

(I'm not being very convincing, am I?)

Everything else relating to mania was controlled. Coordination was slightly off as usual, but I was expecting that. No unusual purchases.

I was however, superproductive at work, to the point where my boss was complaining that I was forcing him to work harder. I made a big dent in the work not done while I was depressed.

I've also gotten this amusing compulsion to do everything. It's not a "walk on the cracks in the sidewalk" obsession. It's much more a "straighten the cushions on the sofa as I walk by" or "wash the glass instead of leaving it in the sink" compulsion.

It's awfully handy because a lot of the little tasks around the house are getting done, but most of the time I wasn't planning to do any of them. They just came to my attention and I felt driven to do them. It doesn't feel bad, just, surprising.

If C. finds out that I am this driven to do stuff, I could end up doing all the housework.

Anyway, this upcoming week is supposed to be the depression part of my mood cycle. I've been taking 300mg Wellbutrin daily for the last week (yes, through my manic cycle) and I am hoping I will stay manic this upcoming week too. If I realise that I am becoming less manic, I plan to increase the dosage to counter the effect.

We'll see what happens.

Note: I do not recommend anyone trying this. Consult your psych before adjusting medications.

Being Diagnosed as a Teenager - Part 1

I was diagnosed a few months after turning 30, which is fairly late (but not uncommon). But I think being diagnosed late has its advantages.

By the time I was diagnosed, I had created dreams and run with a few of them. In your twenties, the world can become anything, and you have the energy to remake it.

Some of the things I wanted became real, and some, well, didn't. And that's the critical thing. At thirty and before being diagnosed, I could look back on my life and think "Well, my life isn't headed exactly where I was expecting, but I've done some of the things I wanted to, and overall, I'm pretty satisfied that I am being successful, that I have done valuable things, that I have worth."

When I was diagnosed as being bipolar the following year, it didn't matter that it turns out that I was bipolar for the previous 15 years. There was a pre-diagnosis life and a post-diagnosis life. Things that happened in my pre-diagnosis life belonged to me. They were my successes and my failures. Things that happened after diagnosis, well, they could have been caused by the mania or the depression. They didn't fully belong to me.

There's a certain illogic about the reasoning above, but that doesn't matter. That's how I felt.

I've since come to accept that my actions while manic or depressed are fully mine. Maybe not what I wanted to do or intended to do, but mine nevertheless. My manic successes are fully my successes - I no longer bother to ask the question "Would I have succeed if I wasn't manic?"

But this is ten years later. At age 31 or 32 I was second guessing everything that I did. It was an ongoing critical analysis of myself. Is it me or is it the mania?

That sort of second guessing is incredibly corrosive. Imagine this situation - you are in a cricket match. There's one more ball to bowl before the game is over and you need three runs to win. The bowler is your best friend and knows you want to win the game more than anything. So he bowls you. You hit it for a six and win in style. Your team wins and you have the trophy in your hands. And in the midst of all the victory shouts and cheering and back slapping, you wonder if your best friend bowled you an easy ball so you would win.

Is the victory still as sweet as it was?

Did you win because you were good, or because you got help?

Was your winning stroke valuable?

You begin to get an idea of how corrosive this second guessing can become.

Imagine doing that analysis to everything that you do. Imagine that for every thing that you finish well - having a fast morning run, cleaning the kitchen for your partner, charming a girl into a date, having a productive day at work, finishing the six little things you'd put off for the last month, giving a great presentation - you wonder if you would have done as well if you weren't manic.

All of your actions become devalued. It's not you that did well, it was the mania in action. You were almost like a puppet.

Eventually you come to terms with the mania / self issues. But it takes time to integrate them, measured in years, not months or weeks.

So what keeps you going during this time? How do you maintain a sense of self-worth and value, how do you maintain the idea that you can be successful while this integration is taking place.

At thirty, I had a crutch - all my years of experience. I could look back to before being diagnosed and, through the haze of self doubt, remember that I had been successful in my late teens and twenties, that I had achieved meaningful goals. And I could hope and trust that I, me, not the mania, would be successful somewhere in the future, that I would be valuable among the people I knew, that I would have worth.


But what happens if you are eighteen when you are diagnosed?

(to be continued)

101 Ways to Talk to God

Here's a good sign if a person is bipolar. Our libraries are full of books on how to organise ourselves.

Not that we necessarily do a good job of it, but we buy the books in hope that someday we will be capable of setting out tasks and doing them.

Actually, that's not quite the truth. We usually buy the books when we are coming out of depression and heading into mania. And we usually buy them with the manic ability to spend money on just about anything and the manic certainty that this time we will get ourselves organised.

Not that it happens. And so the books are added to our library one by one. There's something poignant about being depressed in a messy, rumpled, clothes strewn apartment with a library shelf full of books on how to be organised.

But I do come across a gem every now and then. You should get your hands on "101 Ways to Talk to God" by Dandi Daley Mackall. There aren't any bible quotations in the book, just reminders that the little things in our lives are intrinsically beautiful and worthy of being thankful for.

Get one for yourself, and then get a few more to give to others as gifts.

Long Weekend - Arrgh!

I always worry about long weekends and holidays. They screw up my daily schedules and almost inevitably trigger a depression episode that lasts a week or so past the holidays.

I've realised that its best if all of my days are pretty similar, including Saturdays and Sundays. So I often go to work on weekends (for a few hours) just to keep the schedule stable.

It's amazing how much work I can get done when no one else is around, and it kind of compensates for the times in office when I am not particularly productive because I'm depressed.

So. Happy Easter.
I'll be at the office.