To all those who read my previous post and wondered what in God's name my problem was, well, just be glad that that bit of pent-up negative energy wasn't directed towards you. I owe no one an apology or explanation; however, I do know that there are people who are reading this who might like some insight into my mind--mainly people I care very deeply for, like my family members and closest friends. For those people. and those people alone, I will satisfy any curiosity they may have about my chaotic mental processes.
First and foremost, let's clear the air by my admittance of this fact: I am bipolar. Very bipolar.
That means that the world is not a safe place for me.
I don't mean that the world is unsafe for me in a paranoid physical sort of way. In regards to that aspect, I don't really feel that the world poses an more of a threat to me than it does any other given person.
When I say that the world is not safe for me, I mean that the world is unsafe for me as a bipolar person in an emotional way.
As someone who deals with issues surrounding my diagnosis on a daily basis, I struggle at times. Many times these private battles (which are part of a continuous war within) deal with my ability to control myself and my reactions to outside stimuli, whether those stimuli are physical or emotional.
As anyone with bipolar disorder can tell you, my highs are higher than the Almighty, and my lows outreach the most lengthy stretches of the bowels of Hell.
But my head is also so full of noise, noise, noise: a cacophony of thoughts both rational and irrational and emotions both healthy and unhealthy. My mind is so busy, busy, busy--constantly. I get no rest from it, day or night.
I often don't react to a stimulus, I passionately react to it. I fly into fits of blind rage, but I also love with my whole heart. There is no middle ground with me.
And, yes, I take my meds religiously.
I'm what the mental health community likes to refer to as "recovered," but using that word to describe my current compliant and relatively stable state is a huge cosmic joke. Being a "recovered" bipolar person is like being a "recovered" amputee: you may have the prosthesis to help you walk, but your leg is still gone--you aren't whole.
I prefer the term "adequately managed" to describe the daily juggling act I engage in between myself, my intellect, my emotions, and my meds.
And it's a tough juggling act.
As a bipolar person, you're taught to learn to recognize the things that will "set you off" or "trigger" a cycling episode so you can learn to avoid them or work on learning to appropriately manage your reactions to them, but even having a "triggers list" is no fail-safe. Anything has the potential to trigger your cycling--and that is why I so viciously guard my sanity and stability. It's taken me ten years to get to where I am today--"adequately managed"--and anything that has the potential to get me cycling again--anything--is a threat to my delicate psyche.
And I'd rather have my sanity and stability over everything else. After all, what are we but our minds?
But that doesn't let the person who the previous post is directed at off the hook.
Part of my therapy over the years has been learning to distinguish my bipolar tendencies from understandable, healthy reactions to outside stimuli: in short, where I end and the rest of the world begins.
Unfortunately, I have spent a very large chunk of my life being mistreated by others--first by my classmates and later by my employers and the men that I've dated--and I'm very understandably frustrated to the maximum with a large majority of the outside world--especially since I expend a great deal of effort--both psychological and physical--in turning the other cheek and being fair. I am only now learning how to effectively express and manage my negative emotions instead of burying them within myself like I used to do.
However, I am not perfect. Sometimes I am hasty and extreme in my negative reactions, but I have also always had a strong personality and have never been everyone's cup of tea.
And if the rest of the world could stop pissing me off, that would be great.
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