Yes, it’s soon to be summer and it’s mania season once again.
Summer mania is dangerous- it’s often missed- and lives can be changed forever if a person’s mania spirals out of control. I look at the dog in the picture and know that rush of speed and the wind in my hair! (Or fur!) That is mania for so many of us.
One strategy to prevent this mania is to know the signs of hypomania and start treatment at this level. Hypomania is subtle. It’s April. It’s a good time to have a plan ready for when the sun gets high in the sky.
Those of us with bipolar will NEVER want to tell someone we are hypomanic- we know they will do something to make us get help.
Who wants help when it feels so good? Come on man! Let us have some fun!
I had to teach myself to accept the signs of mania and then accept help when it was offered.
Here’s what I experienced during a recent euphoric manic episode:
- Eveything looked good.
- I loved talking.
- I didn’t eat. (If only this would last forever!)
- I wanted to drink- but this time I didn’t!
- I was fine being alone.
- Men looked really ‘hot.’
- I felt totally confident about my looks.
- All of the magazines in the grocery store just looked so interesting! So I bought four of them.
My mom saw some of this behaivor and asked if I was manic- I lied and said no, but she knew I was- and I knew I was!
But I didn’t want to tell her the truth. For those of you who care about someone with mania, it’s probably hard to understand how we could just bold face lie when confronted with our behavior. The truth is that it feels like the right thing to do. The mania lies to us and we lie to others in the same way!
It took me eight years to get good at catching my mania from the moment it starts. You can do it a lot sooner because you can learn from my mistakes! My strategies are in all of my bo0ks.
Take Charge of Bipolar Disorder is a good place for family, friends and partners to learn the very basics of mania.
If you go to the menu on the right and click on the mania tab- you can read all of my stories and tips. Don’t deny that you’re manic. Get help. It can spin out of control very quickly. And then it doesn’t feel as good.
Julie
PS: The best way to deal with mild mania is to make sure you go to sleep at the same time everynight- even when you don’t want to. You will probably need a sleep aid- but sleep is sleep. Take care of yourself!
Hello, Julie! Why is it so hard to make decisions? It takes me hours, days, weeks to make a decision and, after I