Well, it’s always a challenge to know when to be honest and when to be sort of honest or when to lie!
I’m refereing to how I tell people if I’m depressed. It really depends on a lot of things. How is the person I’m talking to doing? Do they need to hear what I’m going through or do I just need to listen to them? How do I present my situation? Is it possible I’m overwhleming them?
I learned a long time ago to spread out my depression talk in order to keep my friendships balanced. If I’m always asking for help from friends without giving them anything in return, I become a problem and not a friend. I’ve wrecked quite a few friendships this way. If someone asks me, ‘How are you?’ and my answer is always, ‘I’m really depressed!’ then who in the heck wants to talk to me! People want to help, but they have to see progress in the person they are helping.
I bring this up because I’m not doing very well today. It was worse yesterday, but today is more of the same. I’m snowed in. 100% snowed in. I am looking out my window and all I can see is show and half buried cars. I live in Portland, Oregon and this is the worst storm in over ten years. I manage my bipolar disorder by getting out in society and feeding off the energy of others – yikes, that makes me sound like a vampire! So when I’m truly stuck inside, it’s hard for me. I have to decide how I want my day to go and then decide what I will say when I talk to friends. They all understand my depression, so I can defintely talk about it, but I think today is a day to listen to them and see what they are going through. That will bring me up without bringing them down.
Julie
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Julie,
We love you so much and hate to see you upset. Turn on the TV and watch the outside world for now, you’ll soon be able to go back out!
Whew! I’m snowed in here too in Hillsboro. We got over a foot and with the ice added in, driving is iffy at best. Lost a chain while driving today.
Anyway, enough about the weather! I’m just the opposite – struggling with Mania, and the Kaiser clinic where I was supposed to go to today to get my Lithium blood draw was CLOSED! So, I’ll try again tomorrow. Take my dose, then try to get in 12 hours later for a blood draw. I have to say, with all the bad press Lithium gets, it’s my drug of choice
Anyway, keep warm, and hang on – the depression will lift and life will go on as normal as soon as the rain moves back in. lol. Take care.
Julie -
I hear that the weather continues to be awful in Washington State. I hope you are all right. I’m in Washington, D.C. where the weather is very much not frightful.
Have a happy holiday season and know that there are so many of us who are in your corner.
Terry
Hi Julie,
I read you article a couple of days ago in BP magazine about dating. I am dying to respond to it and this is the only way I have found to contact you.
Yes, I am bi-polar and Borderline, recently diagnosed after a hospitalization at St Vincent’s (yes, I live in Portland too) which came about after a broken relationship. These diagnosis and realization come after 30 years of not really knowing what the hell was wrong with me. Now I am attending DBT therapy and am part of a dbsa support group.
So, when it comes to relationships I am so incredibly needy I am just insane. Of course, I was culturally conditioned for this, I mean, remember the fairy tales with the handsome prince always ending up with the princess, or the TV shows and movies where boy always gets girl, and wives are always loving and supportive and they cook dinner as well. Even the cartoon figure Underdog had his Polly Purebred who adored him! Add to that religion, check out Genesis 2:24 if you have a chance.
Words like yours (I don’t mean to pick at you, I am just making a reference) like “..stable and loving relationships are the best treatment…” sink deeply into my soul and make me cry out for companionship and understanding. I ascribe way too much to the possibilities of a relationship, dreaming that someone will come along some day and “save” me, like my own personal Jesus.
Anyways, all that was just background. This is what I wanted to say about my experience with dating. Here is what it is like for me.
I meet someone I like. She is, of course, attractive, smart, talented, articulate, everything I am interested in. She is nice to me in return. Things are going well. I make every possible effort to hide what is happening in me from her. I think of her all the time. My thoughts run wild with romantic fantasies. I need and want to talk to her all the time. I need to see her, to be with her every day. I start freaking out, getting all the more desperate, as I ascribe to her almost divine qualities and start worshipping her. Maybe I can keep all this under wraps and things continue to go well. Then we make love. Oh my God! Then the problems really start! I start cycling. Cycling between what I call hope and fear. Hope that she is the “one.” Hope that life can be different, finally. Emotional and physical intimacy. Friendship and compassion. Loyalty and trust. Then the other side of the cycle, fear. Fear of losing her, of her discovering my illness. Fear of rejection and abandonment. Fear that I will say something wrong, that I am not a good enough lover for her. Fear of everything!
So I cycle rapidly between these two emotional poles, cycling from joyous, manic highs to depressive, suicidal lows within hours on a daily basis. Eventually, she gets the picture. My needs are far too great. And in all the mess, I have forgotten to listen to her, and be there for her. She realizes she has made a mistake with me. She starts to distance herself. I go off my rocker, saying things in phone messages or in emails that are just plain loony. She stops talking to me. I end up drunk for days, weeks, or like last summer, in the hospital after a three-day bout of mania.
So, after finally coming to my senses, and some good therapy, and a new prescription for Lamictdal, I can think clearly. I have given up dating and I am at peace with that. I have given the whole thing up to “God.” Like step number 3 in AA. I just said to the higher power, you are in charge now, whatever you want, then so be it. Now I have stopped the incessant searching, the fretting, the obsessing, and can focus my energies on things that are important like my recovery. And I am finding new friends in support groups, and talking frankly about my illness without people getting scared or wanting to “fix” me with simple and trite answers to my complex problems.
Well, that is what I wanted to get off my chest.
Thanks for doing what you do! I hope to read more of your writings and you books to gain some more insights into our disease.
Thanks again!
Keith