[Row Jimmy]

I am relatively new to a BP diagnosis. As such, I continue to educate myself on this condition. All the while, I sort of missed the obvious.

I was speaking with a good friend of mine on Saturday night who has/had all sorts of addictions - booze, drugs, sex - driven by a PD. It cost him his marriage and almost cost him his job. I respect him very much and always have.

I haven't been doing well lately and was sort of concerned because I had a solid one month run of goodness where everything clicked. And then he hit me with what I already should have known. This will be a lifetime thing. It is a disease just like anything else.

There will be ups and downs no matter how we treat it. I assumed that it would get better and continue to get better until it sort of went away. But, like any addiction, it always looms in the shadows and can come out at any time. I got away from my routine due to all sorts of stuff going on right now and that caused a bit of a relapse.

But now I know - it's all an education and I still look at it as a blessing.

[~Christina]

Educating yourself about Bipolar and about your unique Bipolar is the best way to find ways to have a more stable life

You have a great attitude

[Row Jimmy]

Originally Posted by ~Christina

Educating yourself about Bipolar and about your unique Bipolar is the best way to find ways to have a more stable life

You have a great attitude

Thanks. This forum helps me tremendously.......like many people, I'm a raft of excuses (at least for now) about the time I have to deal with this appropriately so coming here and telling my story is a big benefit to me. According to me, I'm too busy most of the time.

My friend is the only one who knows I'm BP. Family members have sort of tuned me out even though they were supportive in the beginning. Or they treat me like a sad sack. I suppose a lot of it has to do with the fact that many people in society don't understand mental illness. And perhaps they've tired of me ranting or being up and down.

My friend told me that he *still* has his old party friends (a different crew than mine) trying to get him back into the circuit. Wow, imagine? Perhaps that aren't "friends" after all.....you'd think they'd be there for him after all he has experienced. And it was all bad......being dumped in an empty field in the middle of nowhere bad. Freaking out on his family because he couldn't find his dope bad. This was at age 40.

Good Lord we travel some interesting roads.

[Disorder7]

It's true it will never go away. But I think I've been BP since I was a kid. It's just something that I've always been and something I'll always be. It's just.... me.

[Crazy Hitch]

I remember what it felt like when I was first diagnosed with BP too. I think it's kind of one of those things I won't necessarily forget that easily. "Education is the most powerful weapon with which you can use to change the World." were words spoken by a wise person. And I second that. So the fact that you are actively educating yourself will pay you dividends in the long run.

I'm sorry to hear that you haven't been doing well lately. Yeah snapping out of an episode where things seemed to be going well at the time is not nice.

Yes, I think you're right - this is a lifetime thing - and certainly there will be ups and downs along your journey.

I'm glad you're optimistic. This is something that we definitely can manage with support systems in place.

Keep us updated with how you go.

[cashart10]

It is a hard realization. I'm glad you have a friend who can relate. Having someone who can grasp our minds greatly helps us to overcome dark and intense emotions. My best friend also sufferred from severe post partum depression and understands and supports me as much as my (very supportive) family. I am blessed.

[blue_eyed_panda]

When I heard my diagnosis, I didn't feel anything. But when I got to my car it hit me like a ton of bricks... I realized it probably won't ever go away.

It's not an easy realization, but it's probably a good one to have.

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[Chickenkicker]

It truly is a punch to the guts when you digest the fact that bipolar doesn't lessen, and it doesn't go away. Studies are still undecided on whether bipolar is degenerative or not.

But at the end of the day, now you know. I wish I would have known 30yrs earlier and got a heads up before I blew opportunities, marriages and money fumbling through life like I was snakebit, wondering why in hades I was so scared of prosperity. So now you set -realistic expectations- for yourself...perhaps choosing an easier life path through gently rolling hills instead of the fecking Matterhorn everybody else wants you to climb.

Unipolars have a really really hard time understanding and having empathy for people afflicted with bipolar. Some family and friends may turn toxic to you. Some others might not walk life's road with you very far.

It'll be ok. Its gonna be different, but its gonna be ok.

Goodluck on your journey.

[LettinG0]

While I was not officially diagnosed until last year (I am 50) and was never properly treated for all of those years, I had gained some insight in my latter years and knew that my issue was more than just depression. Anyway, I had a "lull" that actually lasted a few years. I was still cycling but didn't wreak too much havoc during the hypos and the lows were not that severe or debilitating....and I had convinced myself that I had 'outgrown' my issues with age. Ummm, yeah.....about that...about a year and a half ago all hell broke loose and I crashed my world with guns blazing. Wreaked havoc impressively. Ended up IP three times in just a few months battling extreme depression.

To wrap up this long story. Finally got dx'd, started a med regimen (never found the right combo), lost my insurance (and therefore all tx and med) and am now waiting on insurance to get back into tx.

And the sobering realization that I didn't and won't outgrow it. I need to become more self-aware, more vigilant in my self-care, get in tx and have a tx team and support group....just be smarter about my MI and taking care of myself. . . for a life time.

[SilverSprings]

Just want to chime in here- I am also newly diagnosed and am really just letting it all settle in ... like you find this place truly awesome to tell ones story ...
Until about a week or two ago, I had no idea what was wrong w/ me. My therapist and recently Pdoc confirmed BP (still waiting for full Eval for actual degree of BP). I was going and still am going through the motions of understanding this, and i suppose getting over the shock of diagnosis... Relief is starting to settle now that meds are in place. And that I can't trust too many people to tell about this except a small few friends and family. I realized I need to be careful in trusting people- almost everyone I have told thus far said "I think I am bi-polar too". ugh. Lesson learned... keep my mouth shut! And watch who I share with and spend my time with. Having a really supportive, awesome loving partner is tremendously helpful.
Sorry you relapsed- and hope you can get back on the wagon soon. Sending good vibes~~~~~

[Capriciousness]

Yes. That word. Forever. As people have said it is a sucker punch. As some said as well it hits me at different times in different ways. Unfortunately, when I am depressed it smacks me in the face over and over again. It can be a dangerous word.

Along with that comes the whole thing about acceptance and learning about your own condition. I in no way feel defeatist when I say that it was lowering my expectations of how I SHOULD be able to be and feel in the world and allowing myself to wriggle off the hook sometimes and realize that I am Bipolar and that's ok. I'm not like everyone else and I have to live my life differently than others.

[Toodles333]

It's a filthy illness. If a dog suffered like we do, they'd put it to sleep.

[Row Jimmy]

Originally Posted by blue_eyed_panda

When I heard my diagnosis, I didn't feel anything. But when I got to my car it hit me like a ton of bricks... I realized it probably won't ever go away.

It's not an easy realization, but it's probably a good one to have.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

I agree - it is a good realization to have, especially when I think I've been like this for a long time. It has gotten worse over the last few years. So I look at it as a blessing of sorts.

[Row Jimmy]

Originally Posted by SilverSprings

Just want to chime in here- I am also newly diagnosed and am really just letting it all settle in ... like you find this place truly awesome to tell ones story ...
Until about a week or two ago, I had no idea what was wrong w/ me. My therapist and recently Pdoc confirmed BP (still waiting for full Eval for actual degree of BP). I was going and still am going through the motions of understanding this, and i suppose getting over the shock of diagnosis... Relief is starting to settle now that meds are in place. And that I can't trust too many people to tell about this except a small few friends and family. I realized I need to be careful in trusting people- almost everyone I have told thus far said "I think I am bi-polar too". ugh. Lesson learned... keep my mouth shut! And watch who I share with and spend my time with. Having a really supportive, awesome loving partner is tremendously helpful.
Sorry you relapsed- and hope you can get back on the wagon soon. Sending good vibes~~~~~

I can relate. I don't trust many people either. Most people won't even get it. Some members of my family think I need to "drink more beer" or "suck it up".

For me, it was less of a shock because I knew something was up. It was more of a relief because now I can focus on how to attack it so I can get better. I used to whine a lot about the unfairness of the world and how things drove me to behave the way I do. I may not be "normal" like other people but that's OK.

[SilverSprings]

Originally Posted by Row Jimmy

I can relate. I don't trust many people either. Most people won't even get it. Some members of my family think I need to "drink more beer" or "suck it up".

For me, it was less of a shock because I knew something was up. It was more of a relief because now I can focus on how to attack it so I can get better. I used to whine a lot about the unfairness of the world and how things drove me to behave the way I do. I may not be "normal" like other people but that's OK.

The funny thing is- who is "normal" anyway? I thought I was, and my F up behavior was acceptable, because I was mirroring other relationships I was exposed to. Guessing if it is genetic, some in my family (parents) have some degree of mental illness.. That is something I am going through- also... forgiving them for that. Seeing it more clearly in those around me, and wishing they could get help and/or gotten help before so I wouldn't have so much trauma. But- then again I try not to have a pity-party... though i think at a time like this, a little pity for myself (in the form of kindness, patience and understanding) is acceptable. I hope you can take care of yourself, and not let those around you bother you too much. I am trying to do the same!!

[Chickenkicker]

It was regrettable why my adopted parents chose to expend negative energy in beating me down instead of looking for help for me. But if I wanted to move forward I had to climb out of the hateful pit I was wallowing in and realize the reason they didn't...was because they had issues too. I couldn't very well expect sympathy for me...if I wasn't going to give it to them. Hating someone for all this felt good, but it stopped my forward progress and was a wasteful waste of time and energy that, at the end of the day, didn't accomplish shite.

I had two sets of parents, adoptive and blood. Even with 4 of them I couldn't get any quality parenting. I chased down my birth parents when I was 40...THEN I finally saw the generations of dysfunction that led down to me. My birth mother never wanted to meet me, and didn't before she passed. I found a full brother and full sister that were born to them after giving me up for adoption, and a half sister too. We compared birth certificates after we met and with what they heard through the years from various family member slip-ups there may be twin girls out there somewhere also. Great. More dysfunctional logs for the fire.

Woulda, coulda, shoulda: that obsessive nonsense will drive you insane if its allowed to lie there in your mind and fester. There was a truckload of drama and dysfunction that had accumulated around me in 58yrs, but I had to make a choice: either pull up a chair, sit in the middle of this shite, become part of it and ride it out to the end trying to appear happy with my lot in life, or get up on the wheel and pitch the entire stinking black gooey mess in that truck to take wherever the mental hazardous waste landfill in your mind is...and dump it.

I'll be 62 in August. I've had more quality of life in the last 4yrs after crashing and finally getting the treatment I've needed than in the previous 58. I hope like hell none of you have to waste that much time to find peace.

[LettinG0]

Originally Posted by Chickenkicker

It was regrettable why my adopted parents chose to expend negative energy in beating me down instead of looking for help for me. But if I wanted to move forward I had to climb out of the hateful pit I was wallowing in and realize the reason they didn't...was because they had issues too. I couldn't very well expect sympathy for me...if I wasn't going to give it to them. Hating someone for all this felt good, but it stopped my forward progress and was a wasteful waste of time and energy that, at the end of the day, didn't accomplish shite.

I had two sets of parents, adoptive and blood. Even with 4 of them I couldn't get any quality parenting. I chased down my birth parents when I was 40...THEN I finally saw the generations of dysfunction that led down to me. My birth mother never wanted to meet me, and didn't before she passed. I found a full brother and full sister that were born to them after giving me up for adoption, and a half sister too. We compared birth certificates after we met and with what they heard through the years from various family member slip-ups there may be twin girls out there somewhere also. Great. More dysfunctional logs for the fire.

Woulda, coulda, shoulda: that obsessive nonsense will drive you insane if its allowed to lie there in your mind and fester. There was a truckload of drama and dysfunction that had accumulated around me in 58yrs, but I had to make a choice: either pull up a chair, sit in the middle of this shite, become part of it and ride it out to the end trying to appear happy with my lot in life, or get up on the wheel and pitch the entire stinking black gooey mess in that truck to take wherever the mental hazardous waste landfill in your mind is...and dump it.

I'll be 62 in August. I've had more quality of life in the last 4yrs after crashing and finally getting the treatment I've needed than in the previous 58. I hope like hell none of you have to waste that much time to find peace.

Well, I have wasted a lot of them (I am 50) and sometimes find it easier to just 'sit in the shite' til the end.....but something inside me won't give up. I keep fighting to find a way to be stable and have some peace. Thanks for sharing your story. It is inspirational!

[Row Jimmy]

Chickenkicker, thanks - great post. I'm also a "woulda coulda shoulda" guy. I spent a lot of energy thinking in retrospective terms and it just made me angrier and angrier. I don't regret who I married but I regret a lot of decisions I have made in my life. I too am looking forward to a better quality of life know that I KNOW who I am and want (now) to leave it all behind.

[Crazy Hitch]

Row Jimmy

I can relate to what you've said:

I regret a lot of decisions I have made in my life.

[BastetsMuse]

Originally Posted by Row Jimmy

This will be a lifetime thing. It is a disease just like anything else.

But now I know - it's all an education and I still look at it as a blessing.

I trimmed your post considerably. Yes, bipolar is a disease, and it is a disease that WITHOUT TREATMENT gets worse. But if you treat it, and take your meds faithfully (and by that I mean make it your new religion), your good days will outnumber your bad ones and you will not be defined by having bipolar. In fact, it can and should be something that you deal with as a maintenance thing, like changing the oil in your car or taking your blood sugars with diabetes. I say this having dealt with the diagnosis for twenty-one years now. So rule one is fine a good combo of meds and TAKE THEM.... rule two is equal with rule one.... find a good pdoc and BE HONEST with him/her.

Life is still worth living.

[loophole]

I'm having the same problem right now.. Been stable for almost 6 months now.. Pretty awesome.. Feel like it's slowly disappearing.. But I know deep down.... I take my meds the exact same time everyday and in bed by 8:00... It sucks but so far it beats the alternative..

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