bipolär
What being bipolar is like for me/ what is wrong with me?
Trigger warning: description of bipolar/depression, mention of self-injury and suicide
Note: I personally have not done all (some, but not all) the things listed below, they were just examples of common behaviors
The worst part about being bipolar is like being psychologically tortured by a sadistic friend. During (hypo)manic episodes, the friend gives you the love and confidence you’ve always dreamed of having. You feel strong, beautiful, important. You are on top of the world, cruising on cloud nine. Unstoppable. Invincible. It gives you the courage to hope and dream but not the brains to understand what’s realistic and what’s flat out insane. So you walk around, thinking that you are God’s gift to mankind. You will change the world, that’s for sure. You will help millions of people, everyone will know and admire you. Of course, you new attitude shows: you say stupid shit and you do stupid shit, and the saddest thing about it is that everyone can see it but you. You buy stuff you don’t need with money you don’t have, you spend hours watching porn or sleeping around, you start drinking too much, taking risks, living on false sense of optimism. You stay up all night writing or painting stuff. You get angry, you get furious, you get violent. There are times were you take a step back and realize that you’re not yourself. but a second later you’ve forgot all your worries because life is just too wonderful, isn’t it? May God help the person to tell you that there is something wrong with you, that you need help.
Then, all of a sudden, you’re falling. Down, down down. It’s like you’re stuck in an empty movie theater, watching yourself and all the dumb shit you’ve done during your (hypo)manic episode. You can’t believe it, how could you have been so stupid? It’s worse than all horror movies combined. You’re so ashamed, you can barely stand it. You feel guilty, depressed, worthless, like a burden. That evil, sadistic friend tricked you into doing all those things and make a fool out of yourself. Now, that friend has run off laughing, leaving you to clean up the mess and take the blame. You tell yourself that next time, you will see through it. You will learn, you will outsmart it, and never end up here again. But you don’t. You will fall for it every. single. time. It’s so painful, so unspeakably painful. It makes me so unbelievably sad to know that this will never go away. It might get better, but it will never go away. I’m stuck with this bullshit friend who will trick me over and over, and there is nothing I can do about it. Except that friend is a chemical imbalance in your brain. I’m exhausted from fighting it and utterly tired of ending up here, time and time again. What’s wrong with me? Why do I keep getting so depressed? Why do I keep wanting to hurt myself, to end my life? Sure, it’s all part of the disorder, but really.. what the fuck is wrong with me? I just want to feel better, I want to stop making my boyfriend worry about me. I just want to be able to go just one day alone without getting so low.
What to do?
So the 10th of October is world mental health awareness day and I thought I’d do something a little special to acknowledge and celebrate this. I was thinking of making green ribbons (mental health awareness-ribbons) and giving them to people on the street for free, and ask them to kindly wear the pins and explain to anyone who asks what the hell a green ribbons represent that it’s about those invisible conditions that affect about one in every four people, worldwide.
Also, me and a friend of mine are talking about getting together and celebrating our mental health (or the lack of it)! Do you guys have any ideas on how to acknowledge this day?
Look what I can do with my thumb
Like if you get that reference 😛
If you have been following me for a while, you’ll probably know that I’ve been in a very dark place these last couple of weeks. I am finally feeling a bit better, so yay for that 🙂 Therefore, I wanted to share something that makes me really proud and happy, an achievement of great magnitude, at least for me.
I’m disabled, I’m mentally ill and I have several personalities. My sense of times is non-existent, I get lost in shopping malls (literally, my sense of locality is rubbish). Sometimes I’m hit by crippling social anxiety, which can make the simplest things like grocery shopping or just leaving my home impossible. I’m awkward in social situations, the thought of having to meet and interact with strangers scares the shit out of me.
I can’t get through the day without medication.
I can’t function without therapy. Hell, I have two psychologists.
I can’t speak or move sometimes.
I can’t get by without basically daily help, reassurance and encouragement from others.
BUT:
I CAN climb a mountain!
This summer, I participated in a camp way up north here in Sweden. While I was there, I bravely and successfully looked one of my biggest fears, namely heights, in the eye and laughed in its face! Haha!
The mountain is called Skuleberget, and it’s about 280 meters/920 ft high. It was on of the most nerve wracking things I’ve ever done, but I did it! Needless to say, I’m very proud of myself and I’m planning to do it again next year 🙂
So here I present to you some pictures me and my friend took while climbing a mountain. Enjoy! 🙂
Getting better and new thoughts
I’m finally feeling better, yay 🙂
I saw my psychologist today and we talked about how some of my alters are kind of sabotaging my therapy, about their specific problems and the fact that I’ve become way more forgetful lately.
First thing’s first: the last couple of weeks have been difficult, and I’ve always left my psychologist feeling triggered or just very low. A friend of mine told me that every time I get back to school after seeing my psychologist, my eyes were completely blank and that it scared her. My psychologist told me that she feels like every time she suggests something I could change, I just shut down and I totally agree. It made me realize that I have about three alters who don’t want to cooperate, for reasons that I haven’t fully figured out yet. While I don’t have a real solution to this problem, I still feel calmer knowing this. And honestly it has helped me not feel so guilty about being reluctant to really give therapy a try because I now understand that it’s not my fault and that the alters who don’t want to help have their reasons.
It felt so good to be able to talk to her about their problems because I have sometimes felt as if she doesn’t want me to explore my alters but rather I don’t know… not accepting them? I’m pretty sure that’s not what she meant, but that’s just the feeling I got. Anyway, it was such a relief 🙂
We also spoke about my forgetfulness and how it’s gotten worse the last couple of weeks/months. I remember having trouble recalling things and dissociating more heavily certain periods of my life, were I would be “gone” for a few seconds or a minute or so (not sure) and then wake up and realize that I have no clue what the people around me were talking about or what they’ve said to me. Now, I’m also starting to have trouble remembering what I’ve done certain days, like for instance, I know that I saw my psychologist three times two weeks ago, but I can’t remember being there at all. There’s just nothing and it kind of freaks me out a bit. My psychologist had a very interesting theory, she said that memories a linked to emotions. The times that I had been seeing her, but am unable to remember, she got the impression that I wasn’t really there emotionally. She said she simply couldn’t get to me, that I was too detached somehow. I think it makes a lot sense because it recently dawned on me that whenever the rational part is out, the depersonalization get much more intense- I just feel far away and untouchable, like this body isn’t mine, nothing matters to me or affects me and almost as if I’m some sort of alien who has nothing to do with life on earth, you know what I mean?
I was also introduced to another quite interesting theory, coming from my mentor at school. He said something like that my alters kind of represent what I actually want to do. I think there might be something to it. When I grew up, there was no way for me to explore the world and myself because abuse restricted me from it. Instead, I was forced to spend every day fighting for survival. It seems logical that I had a lot of fantasies about what I wanted to do, both in terms of how I wanted to fight back but also in terms of finding out who I am and what I like and so on. I never really had the chance to stand up against my abusers and what they put me through, and also never had the opportunity to live a normal, happy life. I never really could act on those fantasies, so maybe I created people in my head who could. And maybe those people went from being surrogates for me to being their own and being alters. A theory certainly worth considering.
Don’t forget, if you have any questions or things you want me to write about, please leave a comment or go to my tumblr wemethem and ask away! 🙂
Shit hit the fan yesterday
I had a major relapse yesterday and just thinking about it upsets me…
[Trigger warning: self-harm, anger, suicidal thoughts]
I was doing fine until I saw my psychologist. We talked about the fact that I worry a lot and that my worries sometimes become very far-fetched. Especially my fear of making others angry with me can become almost absurd. So she suggested a coping strategy called “worrying time”. The basic idea is that you try to “make an appointment with your worries”, or in other words, you try to put your worries aside until a particular hour, like 3-3,30 pm for instance. During that time you’re allowed to worry as much as you like. That’s all fine and dandy, but it triggered me and it wasn’t until I left that I could figure out why: fear and worry has always been my only motivation to get out of bed in the morning. Hell, I would have killed myself years ago if it wasn’t for the fear of making others angry and disappointed. Worry is what gets me through the day. And I don’t think anyone understands that my entire life and being is based on worry and fear. I’m sure some people think that I enjoy life, or that I’m ambitious. That’s not the case, I’m just terrified. It kind of pains me to realize that the worry and fear is so deeply rooted in me that it doesn’t show on the surface. I just feel like if I was to put aside my worries, I’d stop functioning all together. I probably wouldn’t even bother to get up in the morning.
To be fair, my boyfriend motivates some parts of me. Unfortunately, it’s not enough to keep me functioning. Sad, isn’t it?
So like I said, I was very triggered by this and therefore very upset when I got back to school. I was way to pissed off to talk to anyone, at lunch I could barely stop myself from using the fork to scratch up my skin. When I was finished eating, I had calmed down a bit. So me and my friend headed back to our classroom, as I walked back to my desk I felt a classmate of mine hit me with a ruler. It wasn’t hard and it didn’t hurt at all but it was enough. Phemie turned around and looked him dead in the eye for a while, as I was trying hard to stop her from hitting him. I almost lost that fight, but I managed to walk away to the basement. Now, this is were it gets a bit blurry, but I called my psychologist but I just got that tone telling me the line was busy, I texted my boyfriend and then I did something I hadn’t done in years: I bit myself. Last time I did it, it lead to my first hospitalization. Well, I never bite hard enough to penetrate my skin, but the pain really helped me to focus. So I got up, meaning to find my mentor and tell him that I need to go to the hospital ASAP because I was really feeling like hurting myself badly or trying to kill myself. Unfortunately, he was stuck in a meeting. Now, Phemie was going to just walk in there and drag him out but social anxiety got the best of us so we waited outside, at the entrance of the cafeteria. Time passed, I was freaking out but waiting patiently. I five minutes late for class, but since my mentor was still in that meeting (and it was his class I was late to so I wasn’t missing out on anything) I waited. That’s when one teacher passed me and decided that my business was his business. He asked me what I was doing there, and I told him that I’m waiting for my mentor, and he was like: Well, he is in a meeting so you’ll have to wait (In my head: WELL NO FUCKING SHIT SHERLOCK DIDN’T I JUST TELL YOU THAT I’M FUCKING WAITING FOR HIM?!). You should go to your class and wait there (YOU NEED TO SIT YOUR ASS DOWN. HAS NO ONE TOLD YOU THAT TALKING ABOUT STUFF YOU HAVE NO IDEA ABOUT MAKES YOU LOOK LIKE A STUPID ASSHOLE? GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY FACE). I was unbelievable angry, but being conditioned to not piss others off, I said that I wanted to wait here. He walked away, and I had had it. My boyfriend was telling me to come home to him. After the incident with the teacher (this was not the first that that particular teacher triggered me by the way) I told my boyfriend that I couldn’t stand it anymore, and I was honestly close to doing something really bad. Instead, he urged me to come home right now, so I took off and e-mailed my mentor on my way back instead. While I sat in the bus home, I couldn’t stop myself from biting my arm some more. Seeing the marks on my skin was so satisfying and comforting and.. addicting. When I got home, me and my boyfriend laid down on the couch, he took me in his arms and we talked about what had happened. I tried calling my psychologist several times more, 12 times in total but always got the busy-tone, which was weird. I think I calmed down pretty quickly though, or maybe I was switching to Wynn or so, I’m not sure…
My arm is bruised, but that’s okay. I’m better now, at least for the moment. I still am easily triggered, but I made it through school. I’d be proud of myself if I knew how to. It’s so frustrating when all you want is a quiet, happy life but then people get all up in your business and face, questioning your every move and making you feel like shit all over again. As if I haven’t had enough drama and trauma for a lifetime. You know what I’m talking about, right?
What Phemie kind of looks like
Once again: these are just pictures I found on the internet, I didn’t make them and I don’t own any rights to them.
It’s pretty hard finding pictures that fit Phemie’s description, so I’m guessing I’ll have to split it up into her appearance, her clothing style and the way she does her makeup.
Here we go, starting off with her looks:
She has brown hair, slightly curly hair that goes to just below her shoulders, and she has pale, olive-skin. Her eyes are brown or possibly green. She is fairly short and neither skinny nor curvy. She will often look indifferent or gloat over others bad luck. And, believe it or not, she is a Mila Kunis look-alike. Kind of like this:
Both her fashion and make up choices are grunge-ish. She wears mostly muted or dark colors, preferably checkered shirts and gray jeans, boots and little to no accessories. Like I mentioned in an earlier post (These past couple of days part 2) she will usually wear makeup. Most of the time she will wear fairly dark, brown or wine-red, eye makup, dark rouge and nude or dark wine-red lipstick. It sounds pretty dramatic but she keeps it quite natural-looking. This are some outfits she would wear:
And her makeup looks a little something like this:
So I hope that was interesting and that it helped you get an idea of what Phemie looks like!
These past couple of days part 2
As I laid there in the blanket fort I suddenly remembered something: I have been an insomniac for literally as long as I can remember. I recalled that when I was younger, about ten years old or so, when I laid in bed at night and couldn’t sleep, I fantasized that me and my stuffies were hiding in a tree. I had magical powers that I used to make our hiding place impossible to spot from the outside. I don’t know what we were hiding from, or why and I’m not sure that this memory means anything at all but I don’t know… I just think it’s kind of sad that even in my fantasy world I had to be afraid and hide. Oh well..
Anyway. Texting with my boyfriend and hiding in my blanket fort eventually made me feel better. I started trying to map my alters, suspecting that there was more to find. It made me realize that I really need a secondary host (in other words, an alter who will manage my everyday life when the primary host, the rational part, can’t) to keep us going when the rational part is out of business. I figured Phemie would be the best candidate. I’m still not sure how to “make” her the secondary host, or if it’s even possible to just decide that that’s the way it’s gonna be. I guess I’d have to leave her more room and let her do her thing, but it’s so scary because she’s so different from me. For one thing, she wants to wear make up, which I rarely do. I’ve thought about just giving her free rein to dress and style me but then the social anxiety kicks in and I just can’t… What will people say? How will they react? How will I react to their reactions? What if someone says something about it and Phemie isn’t there to defend herself/us? Maybe that’s the main issue here- I’m scared that she’s gonna abandon me when I need her the most.
The next day was some sort of “outdoor recreation day” at school, we were supposed to go hiking, but since I had the appointment with my psychologist I couldn’t come along (I don’t think it had been good for me anyway) so I was home the next day, trying to keep myself occupied so I wouldn’t give in to the urge to hurt myself. Honestly, I have trouble remembering that day, I can’t seem to recall anything at all, I think I built a blanket fort again and I’m sure I went to see my psychologist but other than that, it’s just blank..
I don’t know if I should be worried that I don’t remember.
Anyway, I wanted to thank all of you for the support I’ve received! Thank you all so much
These past couple of days part 1
Hello everyone, I hope you are doing well. While I still am pretty unstable, I do feel like I’ve been sort of okay yesterday and today (so far). I haven’t been very active lately due to me being unwell, so I thought I’d try and give you an idea of what these past couple of days have been like for me.
[Trigger warning: self-harm]
I guess I have felt gradually worse for a few weeks, but it escalated last Tuesday. I want to see my psychologist to talk to her about when I got badly triggered on a camp I had been to the weekend prior to that Tuesday, and I talked to her about how I felt like no one was taking me, or more specifically the angry man (see “about me”) seriously. Unfortunately, her response was to try to normalize anger and rage to lessen my shame. It backfired, to say the least. The broken child got triggered out, the angry man was furious and I was caught in between. She obviously saw that I was very upset, but we had to end our session because the patient after me was waiting outside and we were already taking up time from her session so I went home (I was too upset to go to school). When I got to my apartment at the boarding school, I could feel my body moving towards the drawer where the knifes are. I opened it, and felt sick so I shut it again and took a few steps away from it. Again, I felt my body almost being drawn back to the drawer, I opened it and picked up the knife. I got these images of me cutting myself, it made me nauseous, reluctant, terrified but whoever steered my body apparently didn’t give a crap because it put the knife to my finger. It turned out to be too dull to cut with, which was both a relief and a annoyance. I was so disappointed in myself, and I still am. I called the psych-emergency room (I didn’t tell them that I had tried hurting myself though. I don’t know why I didn’t tell them, I juts couldn’t bring myself to do it) who told me to call my psychologist. I did that, got to her voice mail and left her a message.
Then, while I waited for her to call me back, I got a weird urge, which I followed through with: I wanted to hide in a blanket fort. I cleared my desk, put a sheet on it and a blanket under it and crept right in. I still felt the need to self-harm, so my body (I say “my body” cause I’m not sure who it was but it sure as hell wasn’t me) picked up my phone and started watching a video of a person showing his/her self-harm scars on Youtube. I felt so sick that I had to turn it off. I am not that easy to put off but there is just something about injuries that just makes me so sick. I couldn’t even read the descriptions of what happens when you sprain your ankle in biology class. So anyway… I stayed in that blanket fort for about four or five hours, with a few short breaks in between. I texted my boyfriend telling him what happened, and after a while I was able to calm down. My psychologist called me a few hours later and gave me an appointment for the next day.
Quick update: not doing well
[Trigger warning; mentioning of self-harm]
Hello everyone.
I have been quite unwell these last couple of weeks, really, but it’s gotten a lot worse the last few days and a lot has happened. I’ve been very depressed and low, feeling this urge to hurt myself (which i nearly did). A few memories have come back, I’ve discovered more about my history of mental illness and I’ve also become more aware of what’s going on in my system (a system being all the alters and their respective roles) and realized what probably needs to be done to get better and more stable. Of course I’m going to tell you guys all about it when I get a little better. Also, me and my boyfriend are moving in together tomorrow, so it might take some time to get settled and stuff.. Yeah, just wanted to let you know what is up and that I’ll be back as soon as I can.
I hope you’re all doing good
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