In what way do you feel like you “can’t write like before”?

After my first manic episode, I also found it difficult to write. I was afraid that it was due to something in my brain that had changed or been damaged forever. However, I also have another theory that is more hopeful. When I was psychotic from the mania, I was constantly finding significance in minor details, making new connections between things and ideas (some of which made sense, others not), looking for patterns, and generally believing that there was some greater purpose to the universe (the secret of which I somehow knew, though I couldn’t articulate it)…

Well, my theory is this: having experienced psychosis, I cannot forget the way that it made my brain work. Even now that I am stable, when I read and write, I still find myself doing the same things (i.e., looking for special meanings, connections, etc.). Is this necessarily a bad thing? No, I don’t think so. But it does make writing a lot harder – not necessarily because I am impaired, but because my intellectual/creative expectations for myself are really high.

Anyway, that’s my two cents. What has been your experience?