Hi Thriving! I've been on disability for my bipolar disorder for a long time. I've collected SSDI for about 8 years? Before that, I was on and off short-term and long-term disability for 3 1/2 years, attempting to return to work on a number of occasions. I had had that job for almost 10 years before I became fully disabled. However, I had lots of mood issues occur during that period. Usually my productivity and work quality were excellent, but my behavior was up and down. Just prior to my 1st hospitalization, I was so manic that six of my work colleagues went together to HR to wage a complaint/concern about me. They threatened to fire me, but didn't. I was in the hospital then IOP for over 6 months. Then in and out of hospital/IOP 11 more times. Scary! Scary!

I'm one of the bipolar types that experiences elation, extreme irritability (to put it mildly), grandiosity, impulsivity, disinhibition, etc. That's problematic in life. Really, those symptoms affected past jobs in various ways. Also, sometimes my mania made me so extremely project-driven, and in overdrive (taking on monumental efforts), that I would basically be driven to a major crash. That's what killed my last job, and likely my work life. It was a combo of glory and tragedy.

If a job was too slow, I got stir crazy and quit, if I couldn't create my own projects. I would get furious at having reprimands because of my manic behavior. If I decided I didn't like something anymore, I would quit, even if it meant losing a lot of money. That happened to me when I was working in Taiwan R.O.C. There, I became depressed and the boss had to take me to the hospital. Then they gave me medications that clearly triggered a mania. I quit the job and started traveling by myself in Hong Kong and Thailand. I thought I would work in Thailand, then I got robbed and decided to go back to Taiwan, which felt safer. Then I got depressed again, and came home, but bought an open-ended ticket back to Taiwan. I ended up staying in the US because I met my husband. I had a few temporary jobs, then I settled at a couple for a few years before the 10-year job.

I somehow managed to get through college in 4 years, but had to really take huge course loads in my senior year because of a depression in my sophomore year. That summer I had two different jobs in my college town. I got fired from one, then quit another and went to Poland to teach English. I'm glad I managed there, but recall being at least hypomanic. I was manic for part of my senior year. It's amazing I got through it like I did, but I did a horrible thing. I stole my best friend's boyfriend and was a little crazy with hypersexuality. I was hypersexual in Hong Kong and Thailand, too. Part of the reason I moved on to Thailand when I did was because a young women kept screaming at me because she thought I was stealing her boyfriend. [The boyfriends weren't that innocent, either.] I mention this because manic behavior can make one "move on" for various reasons.

Is there a "shaking my head" emoji?