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[myso-calledbipolarlife]

Ball is in your court

Bipolar affects our perspective on everything — the world, others, and especially ourselves. It is easy to see how moods affect this, but there is a stronger effect on ourselves. It has to do with how any brain works. There are important differences in a bipolar brain, but there are also important commonalities. The brain is the most complex network known to man. To have a thought, a neural pathway is generated and triggered. Then every time you have that same thought, it is stimulated. The more it is stimulated, the stronger it becomes. That’s why it takes awhile to change a habit. A fun thought experiment is to tell someone not to think about polar bears. The more they think about them, the harder it becomes not to think about them.

That works with everyone, especially bipolar people. One important difference about our brains is our neurons are more sensitive. This means it takes less to fire them. This creates very strong neural pathways. A hallmark of bipolar is racing thoughts. Neurons are constantly being fired, sometimes for no other reason than you are bipolar. This creates racing thoughts.

Thoughts bouncing around can actually be a blessing. This means they aren’t continually fired and strengthened. Some often forget these when they are no longer manic. There are thoughts we tend to have more than others. Top of this list are how we think of ourselves. These are the strongest thoughts we have.

I am BP1 and most of my non-medicated time was spent manic. Positive self esteem becomes delusions of grandeur. Those always stayed with me regardless of my mood, even depression to some degree. That’s because every time I thought I was hot stuff, that fired and strengthened a specific neural pathway. Even when I’m medicated and basically level, I have an extremely positive self image. I’m no longer a god, but I am an X-Man. My superpowers come from the genetic mutations that make me bipolar.

I miss the highs of mania, but I am willing to sacrifice them for the good of my daughters. My self esteem annoys those around me, but I am not willing to give it up. It takes tremendous self esteem to believe anyone would want to read my essays, let alone that they could help anyone and even change the world. My self esteem is one of my super powers that allows me to attempt and therefore actually do things many can only dream of.

But that is me. Just as mania created, strengthen, and provides me with incredible self esteem that allows me to do things, depression and dysphoric mania can do the reverse. I think positive things, but depression and dysphoric mania can create and strengthen negative self images. One thought that may seem healthy, but ends up harming you is I wish I was normal.

This doesn’t necessarily mean a lack of acceptance. It is a self insult. If you wish you were X, that means you are Y and Y is bad/inadequate/insert negative word. Every time you say or think you wish you were someone else, you strengthen the neural pathway that says you are bad.

Depression robs us of so much. There are many who are BP2 and spend more time depressed than manic. Negative thoughts come like raindrops until you are underwater. These reinforce themselves, so even when you aren’t depressed, these thoughts are strong.

Because of the way bipolar affects me, I see a lot of benefit in it. It makes me who I am and I like that person. Others don’t feel the same way. I’m not sure anything I can say can reach them. Logic is useless. I can use myself as an example, but perhaps I am as incomprehensible to them as we both are to normies. It takes a leap of faith, trusting that someone else knows something that can help you.

It’s not like meds or therapists. We turn to those when we have no other choice. Without proper motivation, we can’t take the scary steps in life. For me, that motivation was my two daughters, I continued to find motivation in my friends, but ultimately what it comes down to now is I like myself and I have goals. Those goals require lots of scary steps. Each one taken makes the next one not as scary. I can’t make trust not scary. I can listen. I can write based on what I hear, but one way you know I’m not manic is I accept my limitations.

The ball is in your court.

[myso-calledbipolarlife]

Welcome to my so-called bipolar life.

It’s hard to figure out what to start with.

My first manic episode was when I was 15, but I’ve always had what can be called bipolar traits. I think it takes certain tendencies to make a brain susceptible to full blown bipolar. There is a blood brain barrier to protect us. Something has to cause that to become permeable. Also, mania is caused my a build up of neural pathways. Bipolar does not generate these. Something else must and that something would affect you on a profound level. In addition bipolar neurons are more sensitive than others. Lithium reduces this. That too has an affect. Basically bipolar is a perfect storm of things in our brain. That’s why I’m bipolar and my brothers are not.

This essay is a perfect example of what I can do because I am bipolar. It takes pieces of the puzzle I’ve gathered from various sources, including scientific papers and my own experience. At one point, I thought everybody did this and thought like this. That’s basic human nature, we believe everyone is like us. Because there are people who have these traits and aren’t bipolar it makes people think they aren’t related. Like I said, bipolar is a perfect storm in the brain.

I’ve been highly intelligent my entire life. Part of that is because I think and react faster than most. I also have a phenomenal memory, nearly photographic. It’s one thing to remember stuff. It’s another to be able to combine them in unique ways. I believe all these are the results of neurons that are sensitive and the ability to easily generate neural pathways. That makes up the warm air from a low pressure system.

I have bipolar on both sides of my family, but I probably got it from my mother. There’s the cool, dry air from a high pressure system, Growing up with my mother was not fun. Something happened when I became a teen. Not only did my bipolar fully express itself, but my mother, for lack of a better term, turned on me. Her barbs were not only passive aggressive, but were plain old aggressive. She never physically touched me, but at a time when I most needed my mother, she attacked me verbally.

My brain helped me weather her. I was starting to realize I wasn’t like almost everyone I knew. It was more than intelligence. I had super smart friends. I had a super power — I could see things others couldn’t. These things felt self-evident, but slowly I was realizing others were’t like this, even my friends. This was building up my self esteem as my mother was trying to tear it down. Mania’s’ grandiosity further insulated me.

How vicious my mother was, according to all psychological theories, I should be either a narcissist like my mother or a small ball of schmo hiding in the closet. I’m not. I identified with people like Mark Twain, Neil Gaiman, and Steve Jobs. I was a visionary who had the ability to go with it. These role models saved me from my childhood.

Being bipolar took those initial things in my brain and gave them rocket fuel. I am definitely BP1, but my episodes weren’t dysphoric. The main way mania expressed itself was essays and self assigned research projects into things I considered so important my writings would change the world. These projects kept up my self image. I had to leave college because of PTSD (not related to my mother). These projects were tangible evidence I was intelligent and important and I still saw things out of the box. Mania made me feel like I alone could fix these things and if I didn’t, they would remain broken.

Eventually my non-fiction projects gave way to fiction. Even medicated, I still had habits I developed while manic. Not of all these were bad. My work ethic and love of research got me far. I loved taking classes on fiction and my interests collided in The Mark of Abel, my novel. It combines, Christian mythos, art, psychology, history, and others. I used over half a dozen languages in it. I researched several historical events. I love this book. It wouldn’t have existed if I wasn’t bipolar. Even sitting down every day and cranking out a few thousand words a day and then editing it was a habit I developed.

Being bipolar and properly medicated has improved my communication skills. I think more clearly and am able to listen to others. I actually like hearing from others. My world had expanded. All those project I used to take on have been moderated. Moderation seems to be a key word with medication. I can stop doing research and do other things with the family. I don’t think my ideas will revolutionize the world, but I can improve the lives of some. This essay and others like it are my attempts at this. I write to get things out, but I also write to help others. All of this is because I’m bipolar.

I would love to hear how being bipolar affects you. Feel free to share this, but give me credit.