[hahayeahtotallylol]

I'll start with a question: What was the come up of your last episode like? Were you happy and energetic at the same time? Were you one, the other, then both? One the whole time? Both the whole time?

Recently, I have been getting energy, but sometimes it is giddy excitement, and sometimes it isn't. Today was the worst of all because im hungover from drinking on wellbutrin which sucks, but tonight i feel a lot better.

So again, Were you happy and energetic at the same time? Were you one, the other, then both? One the whole time? Both the whole time?

Thanks

[hahayeahtotallylol]

I ask, because my first episode was one week in march. All happy, little paranoia. Second was 2 weeks in march. All happy, no paranoia. Third was 3 months starting in March, turned mixed, paranoia. Now, I am still in the very early coming up stages.. like i've never taken this long to come up it seems.. or maybe i'm just used to it now? But i feel like i am wobbling back and forth between hypomania, baseline, and agitated depression.

[hahayeahtotallylol]

anyone ?

[wildflowerchild25]

Generally I don't call myself hypomanic unless I'm happy and energetic at the same time. Like right now I'm having trouble sleeping, but I'm not especially energetic, nor am I exceptionally happy. So I don't think I'm hypomanic. But everyone is different.

[hahayeahtotallylol]

Have you ever been engaged in something that triggered a quick jolt upward or downward, unusually quick relative to the typical episode? Within the episode?

I feel like i am an inch above baseline, But some times of the day i am about 3 inches above. It's hard to tell because ive been smoking a lot so that usually dampens my thought speed and such, but man.. i don't know what to expect.

[Wanderlust90]

Originally Posted by hahayeahtotallylol

But i feel like i am wobbling back and forth between hypomania, baseline, and agitated depression.

I get this feeling, I don't know how to define it. I have 2-4 day periods of "up" where I feel positive, then it usually goes back to an apathetic mild-moderate depression, or worse I become agitated, like a mixed state, negative mood with increased activation (which is the WORST). It's always in constant fluctuation.

[hahayeahtotallylol]

Doesn't sound fun.

For me, this is the calm before the storm. Some bouncing around before take off. Or i don't get elevated any more at all.. which would suck.

[Icare dixit]

It starts with a effortless climb into mania, takes weeks, then some opposition, some storm and I start to look down, scared I might fall. I tax myself to the limit to continue my climb, physically exhausted but determined.

I become highly, psychotically, suspicious. I slowly really lose any knowledge about the ground below and don't feel I might fall, I am on relatively steady ground but very much isolated from the world. Then I become at times really afraid of my health: it comes and goes. I really feel like literally burning up or out when I do. I might start to hallucinate visually, pretty much always at least auditorily. I feel that I transcend my being, derealising, but with manic intensity and clarity. I don't think reasonably or logically, I don't think anything about anything: my mind is preoccupied by just experiencing.

My mood starts to get really erratic, changing first maybe daily to the extremes, but soon from hours to minutes to seconds. I constantly second-guess myself with real extreme vigour and depression intermingled. Depressive thoughts and euphoric thoughts can't keep up with the changes in mood. I feel being utterly bormbarded and want out.

At that point, either I become fully manic again for weeks, obviously with greater severity of psychosis, or I become severely, post-manically depressed. Suffocating. Feeling like my burned-out self is still smoking hot and evaporating any juices that give meaning to anything. It's not just experiencing to meaning, it's feeling absolutely being mentally starved out. It takes weeks and then lifts. I get a peaceful, mild depression and I feel not so much lucky to be alive, wanting nothing of it (but knowing that in time I will), but still very much lucky to have survived.

Possible trigger:

Only just after mania, deeply depressed, and when feeling I am manically and quite literally burning out, being very fearful, do I think of suicide.

Does anyone share the experiences of these different stages?

[Icare dixit]

Originally Posted by hahayeahtotallylol

Have you ever been engaged in something that triggered a quick jolt upward or downward, unusually quick relative to the typical episode? Within the episode?

I feel like i am an inch above baseline, But some times of the day i am about 3 inches above. It's hard to tell because ive been smoking a lot so that usually dampens my thought speed and such, but man.. i don't know what to expect.

Only great, existential fear and fierce opposition/challenges can do that for me: two days or so of severe enough depression before I manically continue the fight with everyone and everything.

As by magic, panic attacks can stop the ultra-dense (I deliberately use my own terminology because it's all on a very much continuous sliding scale, not just rapid-cycling or mixed) for some time (think hours).

[hahayeahtotallylol]

I relate to a good amount of your reply

Maybe i have already started a cycle, and now my mood is trying to figure out which polarity it needs to stay at to function. I do agree that being in challenging situations makes me more "manic", as you were talking about