Rambling on Bipolar and Goals and Going Forth and Doing

Did I mention in the last entry that I am going to be reading quite a lot this year?

I like to read.  I have been an avid reader since I was a little girl, but lately I have not read much other than my Facebook feed and the blogs that are posted to it on a regular basis.  While some of these pieces are certainly worth the time and effort it takes to read them they are not books, just like this is NOT a book, though I hope you enjoy it.

So yesterday, while Hubby and I waited for the ball to drop in New York, I downloaded free books on my Kindle.  I was pleased that many of the free books are non-fiction, though there are not nearly as many biographies as I would like.

And of course I had to download some fluffy fiction.  It's fun to get lost in someone else's angst now and then . . .and a book lets you do that without the side effect of drama and accidentally giving someone horrid advice and having it backfire all over you!

Anyway, I guess reading is part of my New Year's Resolutions.  Reading, but not just reading.  Reading and then jotting down the concepts that I find applicable to my life and learning how to implement them.

That means not just skimming.  I am great at skimming.  Dh is annoyed by the way I fly through books and is quite sure that I only read every other word.  He may be right, but I do get the jist of the story and if necessary, I can always flip back and reread.

It occurred to me this morning that there may be a whole demographic of people who might look at the title of this blog and immediately dismiss it.  After all, Bipolar!

It is commonly known that Bipolar is not a title that anyone asks to have bestowed upon them.

And yet we who have been called "Bipolar" know ( if we've done any research on it at all) that there are so many people who have accomplished SO much in spite of their condition or in some instances, because of it.  I don't know how much of the genius of some of these people was fueled by mania, or their charm by hypomania.  Just check out this link:

http://www.famousbipolarpeople.com

It makes a person wonder . . .what does it do to the path a person might have walked when one chooses to eliminate highs and lows and be stable?  Still, I'll stick to my meds because I value my life too much to risk becoming suicidal and ending everything.  I couldn't help but notice Marilyn Monroe and Kurt Cobain on the list and immediately I thought of how their lives ended.

In another entry I talked about Abraham Lincoln and how at times his friends took turns staying with him because he was so depressed that he had no desire to live.

And yet here I am, sitting in my dining room, in my normal house in a normal neighborhood . . .blogging about universal themes ( God, keeping order in my day-to-day living, parenting, etc.) These things have nothing to do with my Bipolar because, thank God, I am stable at the moment.

The only way my Bipolar is affecting me now is when I think back about the story I have written by my actions in the past several years.  I know that there are moves that Hubby and I would not have made, friendships that never would have occurred if I hadn't had that first very traumatic episode.

I do mourn our lack of some of the "things" that other people who have lived their lives very steadily, like the tortoise.  Hubby and I are more like the hare.  We have experienced some amazing adventures ( life on a tropical island with your three children, anyone?) but then after that we had some tremendous setbacks .  . .like the hare waking up from his nap.

But life is not a competition and the best I can do is figure out what I am supposed to be doing at this point in my life ( some of the things I am to do are SO obvious and others are not clear at all) and then I must GO FORTH and DO.

I'd love to hear what other people know they are supposed to be doing and how they plan to accomplish their goals.

Do you care to share?

~ Jennifer

Three Qualities that Keep Me Alive and Stable

Before I get started, let me say that I am very fortunate that my doctor was able to find a magic drug that fixed my brain chemistry.  Not everyone is that fortunate, but I pray that someday everyone will have access to brain chemistry that lets them be in control of their brain the way they need to be to make decisions,  to understand what's going on in their heads and to flourish.

1. Acceptance.  I had to accept that I have bipolar II and that I have to have help to stay stable.
2. Dedication.  I have to keep working at staying healthy.
3. Vision.  I have a vision of what I'd like my life to look like and that motivates me to stay stable.

Acceptance. How did I get to the point where I accepted that I have bipolar II?  I think it took reading a lot about bipolar and joining a bipolar support site for me to be educated to the point that I understood what bipolar is.  Eventually I realized that yes, I feel the same way as other people who carry this label.  If I hadn't accepted that I had the disorder, I wouldn't have sought help and I might have become discouraged to the point of hopelessness.

Dedication.  I had to decide that I was dedicated to staying well.  For awhile it was easier to beat myself up than to build myself up ( I had worn some very destructive thought patterns into my brain), but the more I learned about what felt good and what didn't . . .the more I became determined that I didn't have to live in the gray place if I had the meds that would allow my brain to function.  I could obviously choose to think whatever I wanted when my brain wasn't broken.  I could still be negative with a brain that could concentrate.  I had to make a conscious choice that I was going to be positive and do positive things even when I woke up and was in a bad mood.   There was the temptation to believe that it was okay to be blue because I had bipolar BUT no, it is NOT okay because it can spiral out of control.    It's probably even more important for mentally ill people to guard their thoughts than it is for "normal" people.  I began to realize that I could allow myself to stay in that bad place and sink even lower, or I could choose to think on positive things and get myself busy and distracted so that the bad thoughts were banished.

Vision.  The thing about getting to the point that you no longer want to live is this:  you realize that you could "go there" again if you let yourself.  I had to make a conscious choice that I never wanted to get to that place again.  Part of that was dedication, but another part of that was vision.  I needed to think about the future and what I want to see in the future.  For me that involves goals like wanting to help my girls pick out their wedding dresses.  I want to hold my grandbabies.  When my second episode hit I had a baby.  I wanted to live for my fourth baby.  Instead of beating myself up and driving myself to a overdose, I told my husband what was happening and I made myself be around other people until the medicine kicked in and I started to feel like myself again, even though I was not my normal competent self and I felt self-conscious around other people.  But my vision made me be around people because that is what I needed to do to be healthy.  I was determined that my baby would know her mother.  I knew that if I didn't get help my baby wouldn't have the mother she needed.   So vision saved me.

So what qualities have kept me alive and allowed me to be stable?  Acceptance of the disease, dedication to staying well, and a vision of what I'd like the future to look like.