The reason I am writing this is to help someone who is in the same situation where I found myself eighteen years ago, so they can benefit from my own funny, unique, sometimes hurtful, painful, and uncomfortable and even humiliating personal experience.
Bipolar or manic depression is a psychiatric illness also known as bipolar mood disorder or having mood swings. I have lived with this debilitating, mysterious and deadly disease my whole life. I have struggled to overcome the stigma attached to this disease by people who are intimidated by anything that they do not have any control over.
This is my story. Sometimes I imagine that I am standing on a stage giving a seminar when I say those words.
I am just like you. I believe there is nothing extraordinary about my life except the way I choose to live it. Some people have to have physical proof that something is amiss with their body. We put so much of our faith into the hands of healers. Faith is a supernatural force of will. Time, God, homeopathy, holistic repatterning, reflexology, full body massage, tea, herbal infusions, therapists, psychiatrists and doctors are all healers. We do not have time to visualise and reflect what our bodies are trying to tell us why we are hurting.
The illness was there for a long time. Now when I look back the truth about it is undeniable. It can be cured, or at best prevented from recurring, to the best of the patient, the doctor and the pharmacist’s ability.
I do not believe in labels like gifted, talented, creative genius or eccentric or savant.
It is such a fine illness that influences subtle nuances in an individual’s behaviour, that it takes a cluster of specific symptoms to diagnose it. It takes charge of your brain’s serotonin and dopamine levels. The feel- good hormones in your brain and that are when your slow descent into a personal and very private hell begins – your secret pain.
I was brought up in a liberal-minded household by parents who believed that love, happiness and peacefulness where greater aspirations than prestige, position and status. I am part of only a lucky few. I was taught not to bear grudges. I was told when someone hurt my feelings to ignore him or her and see him or her for who they truly were. I was taught to be forgiving and understanding and that there was not any difference between the rich and the poor children at the schools I went to. I was taught that the noblest profession in the world was being a teacher. Re-enforcing values and excellence, as well as enriching wonderfully young lives filled with so much hope and promise.
My parents taught by example. My father is a community leader and my mother is a teacher.
What I do believe is that the word stigma is a synonym for phobia. I believe people choose to see the very best in someone and that their judgement is clouded when they ignore the rest. Acceptance is something that I think we all think comes at a very high price. It is the denial of human dignity that comes at a great price with unforeseeable circumstances.
The signs and symptoms of a hypomanic episode are as follows. You behave wild and free, have depressive slumps, spiralling depression. You do not sleep. You do not nap. You are the focus – the centre of the universe. You are beautiful, smart, determined but the reflection that everybody else sees is militant, horribly annoying and irritating.
You feel humiliated in later introspection while others felt uncomfortable in your presence. You, Dr. Jekyll incognito and Mr Hyde in the flesh.
There is a genetic predisposition to depression and mania as well. There has been a history of mental illness on my father’s side including alcoholism, depression and suicide. Depression is a devastating illness that affects millions of people worldwide. The more family values are on the decrease the more suicide is on the increase.
People refer to their depression as sadness and stress. Mental health seems not to be a moot point for people in government.
I am writing this is to answer questions I had about the suicidal illness and myself. The discovery that my depression was not clinical depression but that it was manic depression, the onset of my mood swings and Christianity in my own life. If North America can be described as the ‘Prozac Nation’ by the North American author Elizabeth Wurtzel and the USA coined the terms ‘hype’ and ‘spin’ then why is mental health such a low on the list of priorities of the people we voted into power when it basically affects everyone around us directly or indirectly, in a significant manner or otherwise?
Note by Abigail George: The following essay was published in the book ‘Being Bipolar: Stories from Those Living with the Disorder and Those Who Love Them’ by Rachel Ellen Koski (Editor) as well as the 34th Ovi Symposium in Ovi Magazine: Finland’s English Online Magazine.
