Where to begin this post. Geez my mind is everywhere this morning which I guess is a good thing to document because so many people don't get how our brains work compared to those so called 'normal' people. I have said that I would love to have a day to know what 'normal' feels like because I know my mind works much differently than most peoples'. Yet, I feel I cannot really say there is a 'normal' mind, maybe an average mind.
I have wanted to feel normal mentally and physically for years. I guess I do though right because I am used to the way that I feel. I am used to the pain, the agony, the ups and downs. I know many know about my physical ailments but I want to share them with those that don't know. I have degenerative arthritis in my lumbar spine, accompanied with arthropothy (or however that is spelt), a bulging disk, a nicely pinched sciatic nerve, muscle spasms that are so bad they give me what I call a 'neck boned', and lastly, I have an abnormality in my right hip bone and a focal tear (which thanks to Medicaid should be fixed soon). So pile all of that on top of mental illness and you have me- one bat shit crazy lady that is sometimes neutral, most times manic, and often depressed severely. My husband and a bunch of other folks believe that I need more exercise and I FULLY AGREE. However, I just did an hour workout-dancing like a mad woman around the house as I have heard it burns more calories than most dull workout videos I cannot stand. I took time to stretch everything out nicely, then I went and showered. Well you know how it is usually the next day you are sore well today for me it was right after the shower. I literally fell down a couple stairs as my right hip and leg gave out. FUN! I have also started walking and by the time I get back to the house that hip is on fire. It's very hard to get motivated to do workouts when it ends up in not just the normal workout pains but some heavy serious pain because of your broken-ness. This never helps my mental state. I usually become lethargic and sedentary which is horrible for me
I like dancing around when no one is home, I love taking walks, I love feeling fit when I am, but wow how easy it is to become unmotivated. Mental illness then takes it's toll. You may not want to eat at all or you may want to eat everything in site. I kind of slide between the two. So I lose some weight and am cool with that and then I gain several extra pounds back and I am kind of mortified. Now I am a pretty confident person for the most part. I know I am not ugly, and I am by no means fat at 5'6'' and 142 pounds but my mind does not like working with me. I am a woman who believes that media is fucking stupid and makes beautiful women and men feel inferior and fat and I firmly believe that there is beauty in all bodies. What I hate is that when you are bipolar you can become extremely self conscious and that can be a tricky and dangerous situation because you may end up starving yourself or vomiting up your food.
So here is a TRUTH story;
When I was younger between 18-21 I would buy ipecac and hide them in my room. I would usually skip dinner, and my lunch would be minimal. If I ate a lot of food, guess what I drank some ipecac and would throw it all up minutes later. I know most stick fingers down their thoughts but ipecac was an easier solution and this is at a time when you could just pick it up in the first aid aisle. I don't believe you can anymore. I would workout non-stop (hours a day at home or the gym and at lease 5 days a week not to mention I was in the Army for two years so I thoroughly enjoyed PT because that meant I would get thinner. I even got caught making myself throw up in the unit building by a sergeant but she let it go and didn't bring it up but made me promise to not do it there again. It was surely embarrassing. I made weight, I was always find but I would just get these bouts of feeling so disgusting that that's exactly what I would do. Eventually I realized that this kind of action is making me worse. It's causing me to be sick and I was at a point where bowel movements without all the fiber pills and laxatives was damn near impossible. That still haunts me to this day. Days on end where nothing moves through my body. Which also makes it look like I gained weight when I am really just carrying pounds of food in my stomach because my intestines aren't working right.
The point: don't ever let someone you love who is suffering from Bipolar ever feel like you think she/he is fat, or sagging, or whatever. Just Accept the beauty they have. Sometimes we may blow up for a bit because of our meds but that doesn't mean we are not still good looking or sexy. We may slim down so drastically it's amazingly shocking but that doesn't mean we need to be told nasty things about that either. Who cares as long as they are healthy, alive, and there.
I guess I am in the mood to discuss this because of how I have been feeling. When I am really down I usually daily find something to fixate on- be it weight, manic episodes and why they are what they are, books, so on. I had to put our 20 some year old Cockatiel down and it is devastating. It sucked because I thought he couldn't feel any pain or at least not much because he had paralysis in his feet. We all thought it. But we learned at the vet that he was feeling it all. Just because they had no function didn't mean they were pain free. The little guy was literally trying to chew his one toe off. I held him in the vet's office watching how happy he was to be held, off his feet and pet. He had a way of smiling and I cannot get that out of my head that last few moments with him where he seemed healthy and I just wanted to run away with him. But it hit me; When I get old, or I get very ill I do not want to be kept alive for longer than I have to be-I do not want to endure the pain of dying- I do not want to spend my last days sedated by drugs just to have a few more weeks that I won't even cognitively be there fore. I realized I cannot hold Michael all day long to help his pain. I cannot put him through the torture of being forced into taking meds that will pretty much sedate him just so he can live a few extra weeks, or more like days. His feathers were changing colors, he was starting to smell very poorly, and something was not okay. He most likely had a tumor on his spinal cord (hence him not being able to move his feet), and to get around the cage he had to drag himself across the bottom with his beak. Then he would manage to get up on the little platforms I made him so he could just sit without tipping over. I wish I had known he was in pain. I wish I could have fixed him but it was either do a bunch of test to tell us he was dying or let him go. So we let him go. He deserved peace for once. He deserved to now have to endure all that pain and all sadness I think he felt.
I'm depressed because of that while being maniacally depressed. It's not fun. It hurts. I wish it could all just go away and I could wake up and feel good. I felt okay this morning after I worked out. But then I felt miserable again. I think my doctor will have a field day with me on Friday. There are so many symptoms to Bipolar Disorder you could write a book describing each one. Racing thoughts, immense guilt, anxiety, appetite changes, increased or decreased energy, increased or decreased sexual behaviors that could be dangerous, Drug abuse, worthlessness, making awful decision, being suicidal or simply thinking about death too often, etc. These symptoms are no joke and I feel the longer they go unnoticed or denied the worse they get which is why I am desperately clinging to the hope that my doctor will listen when I say I need an increase in mg for my meds. Nothing is helping really or I am double dosing to take me down closer to the neutral line on the really bad days. That's not okay. And even though I feel that a mania state is about to happen that is not good either because I feel a crap ton of anxiety through mania. I am feeling empty, like a passenger in my own body. I don't think I am even keeping my thoughts straight enough to make the point clear. Or I try and say the why and deviate to some random thought. This is almost exhausting and what am I supposed to do? I just want to scream at the world. I want to fall down and cry almost every hour and I just want to feel okay. For my sake and my family's sake. I feel I am losing it slowly and the bipolar is progressively getting worse with my age. I wonder if anyone else feels that way. I am sure there is but I have to get off here because I will rant on all day and never finish the post. Thanks for reading feel free to comment or ask for support/advice.
Lea Silva
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