I am rapid-cycling bipolar. I am also unmedicated. The disorder appears in my life everyday; the cycles fly up and down. Instead of popping the pills, I have decided to try coping with the symptoms. Writing them down and monitoring seems to help make them more bearable. This seems like the perfect opportunity to express what I experience. I can also make my therapy easier by giving my therapist this address. That way I won't forget to talk about something that happened or try to conjure up how I felt in a past cycle. It will all be accessibly right here.
Wednesday, October 27, 2004
Friday, March 12, 2004
cycling ~ March 12, 2004
You feel the energy pulsing through you. It throbs through every cell of your body. Your nerves are on fire, completely inflamed and outstretched, receptive to every whisper, any twitch of motion near you. Touch is so amplified. A pat becomes a slap, a light grasp a clutch, a caress amazing. A faint breeze raises goosebumps all over your flesh and teases your mind. You can hear everyone breathing silently and the entire world outside your apartment. It feels like your heart has released hundreds of fluttering insects into the cavities of your body. They are brushing against the walls, bubbling in your blood, palpitating in your heart. Disjointed thoughts race and flare over your eyes – blinding flashes in your sight. Every flicker is a new universe. But your mind is unable to concentrate. It all slips away and disappears as fast as it captivates you. Focus is too elusive. Distraction carries you randomly through the world. You start writing a paper then run to email your friend in another state then forget why you’re at the computer then start organizing your closet. You begin a conversation and sprint through topics blindingly. An endless flow of words leaps from your tongue. They scramble high and low in the room, swirl around your head. They sound so vital yet mean nothing and make no sense. There is a fascination in everything. The way the light filters into the room, the feel of the air on your skin, the sound of your incoherent words, your hair grazing your face, the texture of the plain, white wall. You want to feel, see, know, experience everything, now, now, NOW!
You blink. You breathe.
You lose your breath as your heart plummets in your chest. It leaves a gaping hole below the lump in your throat. Your mind screeches to a painful halt, deafening you, erasing every thought and sense. You stand frozen. All the brilliant, fascinating colors fade from the world. The dial turns down slowly, and it all becomes monotonous greys. The twitching bugs inside you have stopped flapping and fallen dead. Their corpses accumulate in those vacant cavities; they press on your lungs, fill your throat. You choke on them as they poison and paralyze your tongue. Your brain floats black and lifeless in your skull. It sloshes against the narrow walls, always sinking farther down. The world is so repulsive. Everything is thick and heavy and slow. You can barely move. The dreadful emotions have weighted every limb and muscle. Your sight has shrunk, grey and blurry around the edges. Sound is muffled and muted; it echoes slowly and softly through your head. You feel nothing. Your nerves have shriveled and died. They recede down below the surface where your skin still slightly tingles somewhere deep. You are bleeding on the inside. You can feel that heavy, warm, red liquid spilling from your veins, slipping down and filling you. You are drowning in yourself, being pulled to the bottom of an endless pit. You don’t care about anything. You can’t force yourself to worry about what you have to do or what you want. Fuck the world, and fuck everyone in it. You just want to die.
You blink. You breathe.
Your heard is spinning again. Wait, look, you’re me.
You blink. You breathe.
You lose your breath as your heart plummets in your chest. It leaves a gaping hole below the lump in your throat. Your mind screeches to a painful halt, deafening you, erasing every thought and sense. You stand frozen. All the brilliant, fascinating colors fade from the world. The dial turns down slowly, and it all becomes monotonous greys. The twitching bugs inside you have stopped flapping and fallen dead. Their corpses accumulate in those vacant cavities; they press on your lungs, fill your throat. You choke on them as they poison and paralyze your tongue. Your brain floats black and lifeless in your skull. It sloshes against the narrow walls, always sinking farther down. The world is so repulsive. Everything is thick and heavy and slow. You can barely move. The dreadful emotions have weighted every limb and muscle. Your sight has shrunk, grey and blurry around the edges. Sound is muffled and muted; it echoes slowly and softly through your head. You feel nothing. Your nerves have shriveled and died. They recede down below the surface where your skin still slightly tingles somewhere deep. You are bleeding on the inside. You can feel that heavy, warm, red liquid spilling from your veins, slipping down and filling you. You are drowning in yourself, being pulled to the bottom of an endless pit. You don’t care about anything. You can’t force yourself to worry about what you have to do or what you want. Fuck the world, and fuck everyone in it. You just want to die.
You blink. You breathe.
Your heard is spinning again. Wait, look, you’re me.
Friday, March 05, 2004
mirror ~ March 5, 2004
Look at me, bitch. You look at me when I’m talking to you. I know you hear me. You can’t escape me, you weak piece of shit. Oh, are you going to cry? Poor baby. Pathetic. Are you happy now? Is this enough yet? God, how do you live like this? Look at you. You are so worthless! Do you feel it? Is it burning yet? I know you feel it. I know what will make it all go away. I know what will make you feel better. Come on. You want it so bad.
Meet the other. Look into her cold eyes. Listen to her thick, persuasive voice and her vicious laughter. See my insanity glaring back at me from behind the glass.
I don’t know exactly when I met this other, when the mirror stopped reflecting me. Maybe as I descended into that black insanity, she slowly slipped into my reflection’s skin and was waiting for me when I was ready to break.
Her cold eyes met mine when I began to hurt myself. She smiled as she watched me heat up the curling iron or handle the blade. Her words screamed all of my self-loathing in my head. She reminded me of what I was and showed me how to forget it.
Just one more. Just one more, and you’ll feel better. Come on; it’s just one more. Those were her words. Those were always her words. One more sounded so simple, so insignificant. What was one more compared to the gravity of my sins? She knew this. She knew everything; she knew all of me because somehow she was me. So persuasive. Just one more. How could I refuse her?
She stared back at me in every mirror at every party, her sober eyes glaring from the reflection’s drunk body. She met me every morning getting ready, every night before bed. She laughed as I ran for tissue in a crying fit and nodded approvingly when I brought the knife. Her words were always in my veins, dancing with the alcohol, her breath in the smoke I sucked down. Her touch was on my skin when it tingled and burned, when it begged to be slashed. Her voice was always in my mind, pushing for one more cut, encouraging another drink to wash it away, talking me into bed with some guy and laughing when he left.
She sometimes quoted my father or his family, who disowned me, or my mother’s caring disapproval. She delighted in reminding me of how I failed them, of how I disappointed them, of how I was not ever good enough. She smiled reciting their painful words and rekindling my pain in them.
In the discovery and diagnosis of my disease, I have realized that she stood against me in my opposite cycle. When I was depressed, she laughed and taunted me from mania. Oh, look at you. Pathetic and weak, crying again. What the fuck are you upset about now? You have nothing to be upset about. I am so sick of you! Get over yourself. Suck it up, bitch. You’re chasing them all away. They’re all going to leave you again. When I was happily manic, she slouched behind the glass, reminded me of what was to come. Yeah, laugh and smile, you fucking idiot. You know you’re coming right back down here. Enjoy your five precious minutes. You cannot deny what you are. Nothing is ever going to get better. Don’t try to deceive yourself. She always opposed me, always contradicted me in every form. She made nothing easy for me and manipulated my every mood and though.
I still see her from time to time. I fear the mirror when I am drinking. There is a weakness in alcohol that she is all too inclined to take advantage of. She may also infect my reflection in the extremes of my cycles. In the ridiculous highs and disgusting lows, I am teetering on the edge of control and also easy prey. But for the most part, she has dissolved into a haunting memory always echoing in the back of my mind.
Meet the other. Look into her cold eyes. Listen to her thick, persuasive voice and her vicious laughter. See my insanity glaring back at me from behind the glass.
I don’t know exactly when I met this other, when the mirror stopped reflecting me. Maybe as I descended into that black insanity, she slowly slipped into my reflection’s skin and was waiting for me when I was ready to break.
Her cold eyes met mine when I began to hurt myself. She smiled as she watched me heat up the curling iron or handle the blade. Her words screamed all of my self-loathing in my head. She reminded me of what I was and showed me how to forget it.
Just one more. Just one more, and you’ll feel better. Come on; it’s just one more. Those were her words. Those were always her words. One more sounded so simple, so insignificant. What was one more compared to the gravity of my sins? She knew this. She knew everything; she knew all of me because somehow she was me. So persuasive. Just one more. How could I refuse her?
She stared back at me in every mirror at every party, her sober eyes glaring from the reflection’s drunk body. She met me every morning getting ready, every night before bed. She laughed as I ran for tissue in a crying fit and nodded approvingly when I brought the knife. Her words were always in my veins, dancing with the alcohol, her breath in the smoke I sucked down. Her touch was on my skin when it tingled and burned, when it begged to be slashed. Her voice was always in my mind, pushing for one more cut, encouraging another drink to wash it away, talking me into bed with some guy and laughing when he left.
She sometimes quoted my father or his family, who disowned me, or my mother’s caring disapproval. She delighted in reminding me of how I failed them, of how I disappointed them, of how I was not ever good enough. She smiled reciting their painful words and rekindling my pain in them.
In the discovery and diagnosis of my disease, I have realized that she stood against me in my opposite cycle. When I was depressed, she laughed and taunted me from mania. Oh, look at you. Pathetic and weak, crying again. What the fuck are you upset about now? You have nothing to be upset about. I am so sick of you! Get over yourself. Suck it up, bitch. You’re chasing them all away. They’re all going to leave you again. When I was happily manic, she slouched behind the glass, reminded me of what was to come. Yeah, laugh and smile, you fucking idiot. You know you’re coming right back down here. Enjoy your five precious minutes. You cannot deny what you are. Nothing is ever going to get better. Don’t try to deceive yourself. She always opposed me, always contradicted me in every form. She made nothing easy for me and manipulated my every mood and though.
I still see her from time to time. I fear the mirror when I am drinking. There is a weakness in alcohol that she is all too inclined to take advantage of. She may also infect my reflection in the extremes of my cycles. In the ridiculous highs and disgusting lows, I am teetering on the edge of control and also easy prey. But for the most part, she has dissolved into a haunting memory always echoing in the back of my mind.
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