I was diagnosed with Bipolar – type I disorder three years back. A little background here – my father is bipolar type II and my grandfather was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s during the later stages of his life. By now you would have started to pity the women in our family, well if you haven’t you shouldn’t either. More on them later in the piece
What is Bipolar?
It’s a strange world up there in my head. It’s a world which makes me feel more. Let me break it down – a mentally healthy person experiences happiness or sadness. A bipolar is never happy or sad; a bipolar is either elated or depressed. Just like how happiness and sadness vary cyclically for a mentally healthy person, a bipolar also goes through the same cycles, albeit the emotional ranges are higher.
My Bipolar
I have spent 2 of the last 3 years of my life in depression. I have been in mania for the past one year.
I think most of you would have read about personal experiences of people dealing with depression – a lot of people have openly come out with it. I would rather tell you about mania. Mostly because I am in the state right now and I am in no mood to talk about depression. I have been sleeping less – an average of 6 hours a day for the last one year. My libido is through the roof on most of the days. Women who I have dated have both relished and repented this particular attribute. Thankfully, I am not easily irritated or distracted. I have learnt to deal with this.
I feel extremely energetic, and my productivity is high. I am extremely optimistic in life, and I am not able to see obvious things, which can and have gone wrong. I have made some really stupid mistakes. Mistakes which come with their own baggage of guilt.
If you think you exhibit these symptoms, see a professional. It would be the best use of your money, you anyways don’t care about money (lol, see what I did there :p).
Dealing with mistakes, I would say is the biggest problem I face. I make rash decisions with very little thought to consequence. I have hurt people immensely. I will not go into the details of any of them – but on multiple times I have thought of committing suicide to get rid of this baggage. I also once woke up with a knife next to my pillow. I am working on this and I am damn sure I will find a solution.
How to deal with it?
For the rest of the post, I would rather let you know about how I have learnt to deal with it than tell you about my extensive research on how to commit suicide.
You have to work on yourself; you have to work a lot
It took me a year to learn it, eight months of which were spent sleeping 14-16 hours a day. Professionals will advise you 1000 things – most of them might not work for you. You have to devise your own thing.
You have to talk about it
You need to find someone who you think will understand it. I would say the best person is someone who has dealt with some issue in their life – depressed people are natural allies.Family support is super important. I have been blessed with a rockstar mother and sister pair. I have seen a bipolar case in the family gone wrong and I want to fight it for these 2 super women. I think they deserve this from me more than anything else.
Humor is the best medicine
You have to make fun of it. It’s like a dementor. I have grown to joke about this with my mother and sister. Overtime – they have understood why I do this and have started enjoying it with me. This is extremely important. The WhatsApp group between the three of us is an extreme grim place for any outsider.
Don’t take yourself seriously
This might actually sound random, but you need to learn to do it. You will make mistakes and feel guilty about it. You will make mistakes that you cannot be sorry about. You will have to live your life with it. Taking yourself less seriously would help.
Medicines
You need to learn to manage your health very closely. Medicines are good.
