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lydyI used to get god-like manias and Lucifer-be-damned depressions. It's a much less interesting way to live than you might think. The real world is still out there, ready to cause endless trouble, and it has no interest in adjusting itself to your current biochemical state. I've been depressed most of my life, so when the mania hits, I find myself thinking, "Oh, this is what it feels like to be normal. Oh, this is great! Now I can do all those things that other people manage. Wow." I may be a little more hyper, and I do overspend, but my shrink has gotten the swing down to the point where I no longer get flashes of vision through God's eyes. Absolute certainty and total fearlessness are no longer occasional companions of mine. It is amazing what you will risk if you have no fear, if you are certain about your exact capabilities, and if your perceptions reach a few seconds into the future. On the other hand, it's nice to be able to get up off the couch and get a glass of water without having sat on the couch for 2 hours, trapped in a bubble of fear, unable to move for fear of breaking it.
The meds I'm on now have flattened out the moods significantly, which is a good thing. Every incident of flying high above the plain of causality, stooping on a single fact which, once caught, feeds my own reality instead of the punier one it had been involved in -- every incident of that grand feeling of mania is accompanied by a depression. The higher I fly, the harder I fall. Some days, I feel like I've stooped on a star, and fallen to the center of the earth. So my shrink, then, must be my falconer, in this metaphor. She's tied on jesses and bells, weighted my talons and made it impossible for me to soar too high. Because I cannot fly as high as once I did, I do not fall as hard as I once did. No gain comes without loss. Every silver lining has a touch of grey.
Less dramatic mood swings my psychiatrist calls cycling. Mostly, I don't notice it. The way I feel at the moment is the way I've always felt, with the exception of some abnormal circumstances. My productivity goes up and down. I don't always know what's going on. If I'm heading into a serious depressive episode, I usually go into denial about it, and it takes weeks for my friends to get me to make an appointment to see my shrink early.
It's been less stable this last week or two than normal. I'm taking a ton of Depakote, which is supposed to keep me from getting manic, and an even larger amount of antidepressants. Theoretically, I'm supposed to live in the space between the Effexor floor and the Depakote ceiling. Recently, though, I feel like a superball that's been thrown very hard at the ceiling, and is now rocketing around the room, richhochet after richhochet, without losing inertia. I hope I'm one of the cool light-up ones that flashes every time it makes contact. A pink ball with a blue flash would be really cool,
I'll bounce off now, ineffective but sporadically brilliant. Maybe sleep would help.
The meds I'm on now have flattened out the moods significantly, which is a good thing. Every incident of flying high above the plain of causality, stooping on a single fact which, once caught, feeds my own reality instead of the punier one it had been involved in -- every incident of that grand feeling of mania is accompanied by a depression. The higher I fly, the harder I fall. Some days, I feel like I've stooped on a star, and fallen to the center of the earth. So my shrink, then, must be my falconer, in this metaphor. She's tied on jesses and bells, weighted my talons and made it impossible for me to soar too high. Because I cannot fly as high as once I did, I do not fall as hard as I once did. No gain comes without loss. Every silver lining has a touch of grey.
Less dramatic mood swings my psychiatrist calls cycling. Mostly, I don't notice it. The way I feel at the moment is the way I've always felt, with the exception of some abnormal circumstances. My productivity goes up and down. I don't always know what's going on. If I'm heading into a serious depressive episode, I usually go into denial about it, and it takes weeks for my friends to get me to make an appointment to see my shrink early.
It's been less stable this last week or two than normal. I'm taking a ton of Depakote, which is supposed to keep me from getting manic, and an even larger amount of antidepressants. Theoretically, I'm supposed to live in the space between the Effexor floor and the Depakote ceiling. Recently, though, I feel like a superball that's been thrown very hard at the ceiling, and is now rocketing around the room, richhochet after richhochet, without losing inertia. I hope I'm one of the cool light-up ones that flashes every time it makes contact. A pink ball with a blue flash would be really cool,
I'll bounce off now, ineffective but sporadically brilliant. Maybe sleep would help.
