Hullo Dolfin,
I had to go on a two-month medical disability leave from work last November and December. My AD fizzled overnight. I didn't think much about what things would be like when I went back to work, but your feelings sound a lot like mine at the time. Every day seemed onerous, just too much weight to handle. The whole notion of spending about seven hours each day at a job (in my case, staring at a computer screen) increasingly struck me as absurd. Toward the end of my fifth week back, I was in a severe auto accident that left me wounded physically and psychologically. All I wanted to do was an about-face and head home as soon as I arrived at work every day, but, like you, realized the bloody bills wouldn't pay themselves. Bottom line: Life has slowly -- sometimes painfully slowly -- gotten better for me. I'm gradually finding that life feels less oppressive when I allow myself to just go with the flow at work and when I just forget about work the moment I'm out the office door. You're likely stronger than you give yourself credit for in terms of slogging through this period of readjustment, but for what it's worth, based on my own experience, I agree that returning to the grind after a disability leave can be brutal -- and can leave you feeling worse than you did when you went on the leave in the first place. I've no platitudes to offer -- just the belief that a great many people go through what you and I are going through. The difficult part about all of this, though, is that everyone seems to expect you to be "healed," as if you'd beaten a flu bug or something. My response has been to keep my symptoms and feelings more hidden from co-workers than ever before. It's probably not a healthy one, but after all, my life has been one big improvisation since I was first diagnosed as being bp. Good luck. Cheshire Cat