So a few days ago I went on a mini-twitter rant about how to answer “how are you feeling?”. I got to an answer. This won’t be a long post. In fact just this: It’s perfectly normal: – Being lucid, composed in speech, without parallel quips of humor to disguise your insecurity about appearing or […]
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Reference Harvard Medical School: Bipolar Disorder (Manic Depressive Illness or Manic Depression) Stanford University: Bipolar Disorders Clinic Advocacy Bipolar UK Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance International Bipolar Foundation General Interest Reference: List of people with bipolar disorder. Online Test: Mental Health America Academic Goldstein, B et al. The International Society for Bipolar Disorders Task Force […]
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Here you’ll find some of the cool people I follow on the interwebs, usually on twitter. These people are usually fellow BP bears and make me feel good and less alone in the world. Give ’em a follow. Follow Tweets Twitter Lists Interesting Bipolar Tweeps (by @hamboneZA): https://twitter.com/i/lists/1379162927924707330?s=20 Image by Sven Lachmann from Pixabay
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This is one illness that is very good at confusing the enemy. You and you doctors are the enemy here. Less than 3% of the world’s population live with bipolar, most of them never knew they had it until diagnosed with it by a specialist. We know that bipolar is common in children and teens […]
Continue ReadingSeriously, you should bookmark this one. A great community of bipolar folk from around the world. Seriously. Visit now: https://bcdx.org.
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Playing with words is fun! Wright?! Clang associations are pretty much a daily funny for me. Essentially as I’m reading something, or watching something, or thinking about something a particular word stands out among the others. That word seems to make an indelible impression on my thoughts for the next few hours (read weeks). You […]
Continue ReadingVisit https://weareneveralone.co/ to follow this great cause, support the business and share your stories. Here’s a few of the most recent posts:
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Thanks to the International Bipolar Foundation (IBF) for their support spreading the truth about bipolar and educating people about it. Visit them here: https://ibpf.org When you use the word “bipolar” incorrectly you could are implying that there is something “wrong” or “broken”. People with bipolar are neither of those things. If someone with Bipolar Disorder […]
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My intention was to unpack the triggers and symptoms of bipolar disorder as depicted in the documentary. It wasn’t my intention to come to new conclusions and other theories about the saga. Well, I got carried away and you now have James’ theories and and unjustified conclusions about Elisa’s Lam’s mental state of mind, peppered […]
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So… depression. It’s kak. This is probably the mot difficult post I have written. I never exaggerate. Not so much that it is so personal I have to replace my keyboard for the tears streaming down my face, but more so because life is hard. It’s so very, very hard. And I mean that in […]
Continue ReadingLink This is a large support and advocacy group that provides helpful information on different mental health disorders including bipolar and where to get help. It has mental health awareness programs, rural outreach services, a schools program and counseling for sufferers with bipolar, depression, anxiety/panic and trauma /PTSD and their family members. They have 180 […]
Continue ReadingSupport Groups bipolar.capetown Solid resource for information generally, and looks to have an active community in Cape Town. From their site: “This website is for the use of our members and anyone else interested in providing information or support to those living with Bipolar Mood Disorder and their supporters”. Check them out: http://bipolar.capetown/ Chat Groups […]
Continue ReadingNational Department of Health Mental Health Admission Information Link.
Continue ReadingDoJ on Capacity: https://www.justice.gov.za/juscol/docs/note-MOH01.pdf
Continue ReadingMental Health Care Act, 2002 as Amended
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Maybe I’m just an asshole. Something that often worms it’s way into my mind is that I am in fact not bipolar at all, just an asshole. Bipolar grandiosity is a wonderfully confabulated red-herring hiding an asshole in a sea of muggles. Bipolar mania, along with it’s siblings hypo-mania and others, often present as grandiosity. […]
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If I’m truly honest with myself the fear of happiness is something I’ve always lived with. Later I’ll get to why I feel it’s more pronounced, and nuanced, with a bipolar diagnosis. The fear of happiness. It sounds like some post-modern ailment of the rich and famous. I can assure you, dear reader, that while […]
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My dear bipolar disorder, You’re a real bastard, you know that? And selfish. And needy. And manipulative. It is quite clear you were in the driving seat with this relationship. It was years of ignoring you before you made damn sure you were in my life. You came in like a wrecking ball. Egged on […]
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I’m writing, for the first time i believe, about how my bipolar diagnosis an subsequent treatment has changed my lie. Given me live. Love life. Many posts on this hear blog are seal-deprecating or technical and lack a personal journey.
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Something that’s fascinated me is why one would stop taking bipolar medication. Don’t do that. I want to share some other thoughts I’ve had about acceptance of a bipolar diagnosis and some of the things I’ve learned that really make acceptance and staying the course really difficult and how to one might overcome these. Here […]
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[This is not a cry for help. Btdubs.] I’ve been meaning to write this for a long time. I guess I’ve been putting it off because there’s some (a lot) of guilt for the role I’ve played in either absconding or destroying friendships along the way. I’ll live with that guilt until I do something […]
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A friend sent a text saying: “You, my friend, are hilarious 😂” All the signs just fell into place by that one phrase: You, my friend, are hilarious 😂: Funny I may be, but soon it will fade to childishness. This morning I was totally over the top chatty to a barista and am now […]
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Tbh, this entry could be summarized in a single line: it’s ending when you’re no longer doing the things you were doing during mania. Of course it wouldn’t be appropriate for me to leave it there, even though it could be. Maybe I’m hypo-manic and don’t know ow to shut up. Or it’s just who […]
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Wrote this on a lazy Sunday afternoon… what started out as a “10 things on working from home” turned into a hypomanic-adjcent mega post . Sharing here because, hey, it’s the internet and I can. I’m too lazy to bookmark headings rn but you’ll be strong. There is little debate that the Corona-virus has changed […]
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So here it is: the list of (most of) the medication I’ve been on before landing on my current medication cocktail. I’ve been toing and froing about about posting this one, I can’t quite put my finger on why. Maybe because it’s like looking into my actual chemical soul or sommat? Whatever. I’m posting this […]
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Misdiagnosis has meant me missing out on loving life, my whole life
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Bless me father for I haven’t written in 3 weeks. You’ll be strong, also. While you’re nursing your feels here are five things I wish people without bipolar knew about bipolar bears: 1. Stop walking on egg-shells. We’re tougher than you think. We’d far rather you played open open cards and told us the truth […]
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I’ve got my regular appointment with my psychiatrist tomorrow. For the most part these sessions are productive and a great opportunity to better understand my bipolar diagnosis. I’m truly grateful that I’m in a position to have monthly appointments with my practitioner – not everyone is so lucky. Having regular appointments is almost like a […]
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Tell that to me when I’m on a roll and soon heads will. The human mind is a complex beast. Our understanding of it is minimal and usually when the neurologists says they understand something what they really mean is that that they can measure something against a hypothesis. It’s not often that science is […]
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This lock-down has not had the effect I thought it would. For the most part I’ve been coping well, very well even. Psychiatrist agrees he’s never seen me better and can also say the same for many of his other patients. Of course this got me thinking: why have many bipolar folk and others with […]
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I don’t want to jinx it but my first week in full lock-down has been one of the most pleasant I’ve had in a long while. Certainly there were moments when I could feel rising irritations: usually spurred on by the riff-raff, alarmist, cabal of misinformation fearmongers on social media an inane WhatsApp groups. Somehow […]
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Recently I found myself in a desperate spiral of of unadulterated, uncontrollable rage that brought me to the brink of what I’ll call ‘manic disillusionment on the brink curtain fall’. I suspect this will be a very long post – I’m not sorry. It’s worth understanding the context of my most recent manic episode: this […]
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I promised myself I wouldn’t do one of these posts. But here we are. I’ll keep it short though: Contact your pharmacy and fill the remaining repeats of your medication and if you have no more repeats ask for a new script with repeats from your psychiatrist. Social distancing doesn’t mean total isolation from the […]
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I knew this day would come: writing about bipolar depression during bipolar depression. Everything is hard. That’s it. That’s all I have. Tomorrow will be better.
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A classic bipolar symptom: irritability. Or is it? The muggles are already at, “blah, blah, blah… we all get irritated” and that’s irritating AF. It you just took the time to READ up, just a little, about what irritability is to bipolar bears and the consequences then maybe you’ll get. what. a. fucking. big. deal. […]
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You’d be forgiven for concluding that I have a pretty jaundiced view of hypomania. I mean I’ve written a great deal about the wrecking ball that is hypomania on all your relationships – from work to play. It’s not all bad though. I say that with a caveat though: it’s not all that bad if […]
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I’ve written before about rapid cycling. I was rapid cycling that time if that wasn’t obvious enough from my writing style. I also wrote something similar here. I figured I’d put together something describing to muggles a comparable experience of rapid-cycling (not bicycle related). And some of the possible triggers (only two). The DSM-IV describes […]
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Retrospect is 20/20. I’ve been living with varying degrees of bipolar for as long as I can remember (I’ll chat about the first ‘incidents’ some-other time).
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It’s 00:24. He’s well aware that he should be in bed. That seems like such a waste of time. After all, he could be writing a novel, his next best app, a new and brilliant way of increasing engagement on the learning platform he’s come to call his craft. Sleep? No, not for him. Speaking […]
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To tell or not to tell, that can be the big question with bipolar disorder. It’s your choice. There’s still a stigma surrounding mental illness, so you may want to be less open about it. You really don’t need to tell anyone at work about your bipolar disorder. But in certain circumstances, it can be […]
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