[Traveler5]

Below are the clinical symptoms of Hypomania that I could find. Can you give me some specific examples of each one, please.

- You don't need much sleep.

- You're more talkative than usual or feel pressure to keep talking.

- You experiece a flight of ideas or feel your thoughts are racing.

-You are easily distracted.

- You are driven toward accomplishing specific goals (either socially - at work or school - or sexually) or you are experiencing psychomotor agitation. -- (By the way, what is Psychomotor Agitation?)

- You have grandiose thinking.

- You've become excessively involved with pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences, such as unrestrained buying sprees, sexual indiscretions or foolish business investments.

[roads]

Welcome to PsychCentral, Traveler. I'm bipolar II and know I'm tipping over into hypomania when I get really irritable really fast over pretty much anything. Road rage starts pretty much when I get to the car: I will have forgotten to bring something and I have to go back for it, or my neighbor stops me and wants me to do something--grr!!

Then I get on the road and of course there are only bad drivers out today except for me. Every traffic signal is set wrong. I could improve traffic flow 100%! Hypomania gives me greater insight and knowledge, and I'm more willing to get out there--get involved. Yes, I might even call the City Manager about delaying the red light at that intersection. I don't, but I think about it.

When I get to work I'm more sociable with my coworkers. More talkative. I work in a library and have lots of public contact, and when I'm hypomanic I'm inclined to think I know things--don't really need to look it up. I do, because I know now it's the hypomania that's so smart and not me .

I'm an alcoholic, and if I was still drinking I would probably be drinking more in hypomania. Some people's sex drive will go up. Others have so much an increase of energy that they don't/can't sleep--often for days on end. You hear of artists like this, but it's more common in bipolar I & full mania. I don't experience those.

I went offline and replied to your initial post so this doesn't fully answer, but VM or PM me if you have any specific questions, Traveler. Take care.

[faerie_moon_x]

- You don't need much sleep.

You are not tired and you don't go to bed at your normal time. Maybe you stay up and extra 2-3 hours. Then you go to bed. You sleep, but you wake up early. You don't feel tired or like you need more sleep.

- You're more talkative than usual or feel pressure to keep talking.

You just start talking about nothing in particular. You keep talking, you can't stop. You jump from topic to topic. The person your talking to can't get a word in edgewise. If they do start talking, you are very likely to interrupt them. Everything reminds you of something you need to say. This is called pressured speach.

(Also in a forum, you type and type and are frustrated when there are no posts to reply to. Word walls are often created by this, I call it "pressured typing.")

- You experiece a flight of ideas or feel your thoughts are racing.

One idea leads into the next. They move very fast. Sometimes it is so fast you can't keep up. You have so many ideas at once they seem to crowd your mind. All of your ideas seem brilliant. You may try to act on some of them, but they become unfinished projects.

-You are easily distracted.

If you are interrupted in doing something, you forget what you were doing before and might not get back to it. You might suddenly remember you wanted to look up something, call someone, or do something in the middle of a project and then stop to do what you just remembered. It's hard to read a long post, article, or book.

- You are driven toward accomplishing specific goals (either socially - at work or school - or sexually) or you are experiencing psychomotor agitation. -- (By the way, what is Psychomotor Agitation?)

Tapping, fidgeting, pacing, rocking, twriling your hair, clicking a pen. Psychomotor agitation is any type of movement you make because you're feeling mentally distressed in some way. Holding still feels impossible. Like your full of lightning and if you don't move around it will explode out of your skin.

I pace around and around and talk to myself. I also rock and fidget a lot.

- You have grandiose thinking.

You are suddenly overly confident but this over confidance feels completely logical and well thought out. You feel super amazing and powerful. "I'm a genius. I'm amazing. Nothing can stop me." This can drive you to take on way too many goals and then it falls away once depression hits, causing you to fail at the goals you set.

"I'm going to write 7 novels and a blockbuster movie screenplay and win a Hugo award by teh time I'm 18 years old!" (Example of mine)

- You've become excessively involved with pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences, such as unrestrained buying sprees, sexual indiscretions or foolish business investments.

This is also known as "risk taking" behavior. Some people gamble, shop, have promiscuous sex etc without caring about the consequences during hypomania. It is a damaging venture such as you spend way more than you should, running up multiple credit cards, then can't pay the bills because it's far beyond your means. You can have something as major as you buy a ton of shoes and leave no money for rent or food. This really varies for everyone.

[Trippin2.0]

Originally Posted by Traveler5

Below are the clinical symptoms of Hypomania that I could find. Can you give me some specific examples of each one, please.

- You don't need much sleep.
I normally average about 4hrs, but when hypomania hits I need none and force myself to have 2hrs.

- You're more talkative than usual or feel pressure to keep talking.
I honestly just keep talking or typing, sometimes waking my sister or bf at 3am to talk or text because I have so many things to say and I will explode if I don't. Alternatively, I leave them annoying voicemails, mostly which entails me telling them they suck WetRabidDogAss because they need sleep and are therefore mere mortals (grandoise much), and then I proceed by singing them songs. Why? no convo, so nothing to say but words need to escape my mouth, so I sing whatever songs I'm listening to. Yes at 3am...

- You experiece a flight of ideas or feel your thoughts are racing.
My train of thought rarely completes before another starts, my mind is off on a fast-paced tangent, which also means I switch from topic to topic when I'm speaking or texting. Sometimes they make no sense, like when I told my mom "I want to smoke pink cigarette and 9 y.o tired clouds bath"

-You are easily distracted.
Zero concentration span, horrible when I'm at work because I can't comprehend / remember a simple instruction, without writing it down, or follow through with simple tasks without checking and rechecking, and sometimes enlisting the help of friend to see that I actually have understood after my many frustrated attempts or that I managed to complete my task accurately. VERY frustrating to experience at work.

- You are driven toward accomplishing specific goals (either socially - at work or school - or sexually) or you are experiencing psychomotor agitation. -- (By the way, what is Psychomotor Agitation?)
More like I get obsessed. Either with achieving something, or learning everything I possibly can about my new favourite topic. The goal there is to be the expert. Expert on folk lore, religion, lightning, Ancient Egypt, famous Urban Legends, and sometimes Serial Killers.

Btw an example of psychomotor agitation is uncontrollable pacing. Personally, I grind my teeth without knowing it and try to make myself stop when I realize my jaw hurts

- You have grandiose thinking.
I'm more intelligent, more creative and more beautiful than most people I know. Upside to that is, I actually like myself and appreciate my reflection more, I feel gorgeous, which is fricken fantastic

- You've become excessively involved with pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences, such as unrestrained buying sprees, sexual indiscretions or foolish business investments.

Shopping highs are theeee best except when I racked up a years worth of debt on underwear. Also I usually have a high sex drive, but these are the times I want to do riskier things, like when I got undressed and straddled bf while he was driving Lucky it was night and he's an excellent driver

[kaliope]

right now im having problems going to sleep. i am staying up hours later than i normally would. i want to shop. i normally dont shop at all. i dont like leaving my house, but i cant wait to go shopping this weekend. i buy all kinds of things i dont need. hundreds of dollars piddled away. i max out all my credit cards when i am manic and gamble away hundreds of dollars at a sitting. i like to overshare. i email people or call my t. i never call my t. but i am possessed. i cant not do it. i have to tell people what is going on with me. im going nuts and i feel like whoever i am contacting somehow holds the key to my sanity. then i feel humiliated and embarrassed the next day for all the information i left or gave that person. i drive fast with the music blaring wishing all the idiots would get out of my way. people irritate me. i make grand plans for hours in my head and the next day they dont make any sense at all. always, the next day, nothing makes sense.

[Nessa213]

Psychomotor Agitation I think it referring to just being overall fidgety. Like when you couldn't sit still to save your life and feel the incredible NEED to get up and move around.

A few other points:
I may get between 3 or 4 hours of sleep a night (maybe less) per night for a week or more. And I won't even be tired. In fact, I'll probably get more accomplished even than I normally would.

Being more talkative: This is more evidenced when I'm in a meeting at work or something. I have an extremely hard time not inturrepting when other people are talking. And when I start talking, I feel a need to continue to talk. Even to the point of being embarrassed by it, but there's something that almost feels like I NEED to do it.

- You experiece a flight of ideas or feel your thoughts are racing.
To me this is almost a dizzy feeling. Like drunk almost.

-You are easily distracted.
(Can I just say that I've been working on writing this post out for about 3 hours... and just leave it at that?)