I’m writing, for the first time I believe, about how my bipolar diagnosis and subsequent treatment has changed my life. Given me life. A love for life. Many posts on this here blog are impersonal or technical and lack personality. So here it is – the raw story!
It was 2016. I was diagnosed with HIV around April of that year and was truly gutted. Terribly afraid. Angry. So much anger. Angst. No person was off limits – everyone was a target of my wrath. I have since learned that this stress, or stress in general is a salient factor of the wheels falling off. December of the same year I was faced with a deep self-imposed stigma about my HIV diagnosis.
Having already disappointed my parents that I was gay I couldn’t find the courage to have a conversation with them about my HIV. This mistrust, perhaps more fear, was a stress enough to turn to the bottle and subsequently behaved like a real asshole with no consideration of how family and friends would react to the news of my infection. Or how family and friends would feel. That day I was number one on the “selfish prick” podium.
Why this story is important is that an entire holiday was a classic manic episode:
- Alcohol dependency / abuse.
- Heightened energy: walking to the beach several times a day, endless driving off the beaten track.
- Little or no sleep: spending hours watching TV, on my phone, on my laptop (I brought work with me), going for walks at 10PM at night.
- An out of control sexual desire: no man was off limits. None. I was thrown out of a club for making advances on a straight guy. Also took a guy home with me to my parent’s place – something I have never done.
- Conversations were difficult to follow (I think – would need to ask my folks). Especially when opening up about the HIV diagnosis. It must surely have been an all over the show convo with no congruent thought.
So, classic mania.
And I have never found the courage to apologize for the events of that holiday. I intend to though. Over time that episode has faded into a small blip in the past. But as time went on I showed more severe of symptoms , a built up rage, and more frequent episodes. All of them were noted by my boss.
This time it was depression:
- Totally MIA for work, numerous times. Mostly because I felt my contributions were not considered relevant. Severe feelings of guilt for not attending work and feeling worthlessness to my family who looked to me as an example.
- Poor hygiene with maybe a shower ever three day or so. No energy to cook a meal. No energy to get out of bed. The bed had me shackled down.
- Uncontrollable crying. An internal crying rather than crying about some third party’s sadness. At one point I was sat on the floor holding my knees up to my chest under a grand piano trying to hide from the house-attendant (a butler you’d call him, I guess).
Now we have who episodes. Mania and depression. Mania would soon strike again. Triggered again by stress. My line manager / good friend had a motorcycle accident. This left me to run the show, on my own. There were simply not enough hands for the job. Also, truth be told, I am not manager material.
This stressors started to build momentum and a few weeks later the dam burst its banks and I was sent off to the psychiatric clinic. The clinic definitely saved my life on the evening I was admitted. I was in the grips of a severe manic episode: convinced I could get my car to a 160 km/h speed along a winding road. When it couldn’t reach that speed I became so angry I was quite willing to drive it off a pier and into the Atlantic, that or a bridge – whatever came first. And make sure I was in the car too.
Now, even during the episode with the car, I was on treatment for Bipolar. But I was not on the right treatment. Being able to observe my behavior my doctor was able to better understand my particular flavor of bipolar. That flavor was many more manic tendencies and mild depression which was less frequent.
At first I was ready to throw in the towel on the meds I was prescribed. They were awful the first few weeks. I nearly fell asleep at the wheel and could strand up straight for a good week and a bit. I persevered through it. This is by far the best decision I have ever made in my life.
Once the meds found the cracks in my head and poly-filled them the world changed. Everything about it was different. I was different. Suddenly the sky was more blue and the sun less harsh. Grass between my toes softer. I could hear birds singing. I could recall happy moments from my childhood which I never could recall before.
The best change? I was laughing again. The loud laugh everyone loved to hate. It was a genuine laugh. It was a laugh I laughed at. The anger I had dissipated and was gone forever. I was also not in a delirious stupor of happiness. It was measured, I was in control of it. It was from that day forward that I came to know, with certainty, that the diagnosis was right and I was on the right medication for me at that time.
It was wonderful too when others noticed the difference in me. By boss, having made a full recovery, commented that he had not seen my so “invigorated” since I began working with him. Similar comments from the Secretary in our office. Soon after I was established on my treatment and the side effects had faded I gave my dad a call and exclaimed,”Is this how everyone feels? Has everyone been happy this whole time?”. I asked my psychiatrist whether I was manic through this and his answer was, “Who cares? If you can control it, ride the wave.”
But there was one person who saw and felt the difference in me: my dad. I am quite sure that he was skeptical about my diagnosis of BP. He likely still is. On one occasion now he’s made an effort to say directly that I was happy, that “sounded good” (a huge show of emotion from him). Most of all though he never once made me feel like I’d got it all wrong and had been misdiagnosed. For me this was a great step towards him acknowledging that I am my own man and need deal with my own demons.
And I’m ready to do just that.
