Day 27 Reflection: Gratitude

Everyone knows that gratitude makes people happier.

Maybe not everyone, but popular psychology instructs us to write gratitude journals, naming a magic three things per day that we feel grateful for. One can find gratitude journals in hard-bound form, in smartphone apps, and in Facebook memes. That’s because gratitude journaling works, according to research in positive psychology (Emmons and McCullough, 2003).

Some days it’s hard to write anything in the gratitude journal. Days when little things go wrong one after another, we hug those hurts to ourselves as if to use them as currency to bargain with our Maker for better luck. When we fall into negative self-talk, learned patterns of pessimism, we can’t find a thing to be grateful for. Gratitude doesn’t come to mind when we suffer from depression or post-traumatic stress disorder.

I have those days of suffering, given that I live with Bipolar 2, which I’ve been open about in these pages. I also wrestle with negative self-talk. I’ve wrangled these two into submission for the most part, but still depression and darkness pop out at times.

I challenge the darkness with gratitude:

I am grateful for my bipolar disorder, because it has made me take care of myself. I am grateful because it has given me insight into suffering.

I am grateful for getting my manuscripts rejected because it has forced me to work harder and improve my writing.

I am grateful for my struggles because they remind me that nothing is simple in life.

Day 20 Reflection: Play

I have never stopped playing.

At age 55, my hands shape themselves into imaginary critters that talk in squeaky voices or growl and nip noses. I sicc them at my husband in the middle of restaurants when nobody’s looking, and he talks back. I don’t do this when the waiter’s visiting, because adults aren’t supposed to play.

I play with words. I make bad puns, which I’m told is more acceptable play for adults. I rename my cats silly things several times a day (Weeblebuttz sits next to me as I type this). I rewrite songs on the fly as jokes, or commentary, or nonsense.

My mind spontaneously explodes into play. I don’t have to make an effort to be playful. I don’t know if this is because I’ve never quite grown up or because I have bipolar disorder and possess the creativity that goes with the neurodiversity, but play is never far from my mind.

And I consider this a blessing.

Redbird

I was 25, and I was going through a hard time in my life. I faced waves of agitation and depression, flashbacks, a relationship in flux — and a persistent feeling that there were evil influences lurking in my life. The latter may have been the fact that my bipolar was not at that time treated, or it could have been that I believed in those things at the time. Or those could have been one and the same.

One day, I was in a neighborhood in Champaign I hadn’t been in before — it was a sleepy boulevard, complete with mini-park tucked into the median. I had gone there because I had a bad crush on someone even as my maybe-boyfriend gave me mixed signals — and I wanted to see where he lived. (I don’t think I ever devolved to the point of being a stalker, but I worried about it some nights.)

I was sitting on the bench in the mini-park, watching the occasional car drive laconically by, and suddenly I felt a feeling of dread, ominous dread, blossom from my stomach through my body. Something bad was going to happen — I could imagine the strains of foreboding music in the background.

And then a cardinal called. I looked up, and he sat on a phone line directly above me, flame red and stalwart. I felt a flush of calm pass through me. He launched himself in the air and landed on a tree branch a few feet away, then stayed there. I followed him there, and this dance continued until I was away from the boulevard.

I was safe.

**********

Almost thirty years later, I don’t know what to make of this still. Yes, the feeling of foreboding may have been from the tricks that bipolar plays with the body. Remember as well that mania triggers the religious/mystical elements of the brain.

But the bird was real. Whether it was a cardinal acting peculiarly or a flame-feathered spirit guiding me to safety, I will never know. I will not pretend to know — there is no certainty in mysticism. But there is one more story:

During that same time period, I left a party because I felt like I was barely holding myself together inside a great glass bubble that distanced me from everyone. My heart was breaking, and at the same time, I was afraid that I would be taken advantage of by someone or something malign if I opened up. A friend of mine walked me home from the party to protect me from what I felt was out there (Scott May, if you’re reading this, thank you. I never appreciated you enough).

I got home and was lying in bed shivering and hugging myself. All of a sudden, I heard a commotion just outside the window and saw a cardinal, male and shining red against the lowering clouds, fighting a starling with its black, speckled wings.

I heard a voice in my mind: “Do I have to knock you out to help you?”

“Yes,” I thought back.

I instantly fell asleep.

*******

I have to wait for dreams now to have these experiences, possibly because of the medication, possibly because of the fact that I’m older and busier and not accustomed to living between worlds anymore. I don’t know what the “real” interpretation is, but the belief that the redbird was a kind spirit that protected me against malign forces makes for a better story.

Happy National Bipolar Awareness Day!

Being someone with bipolar issues seems like something not to use the word “happy” about. People with bipolar can plunge into deep depression, while for some people, mania becomes psychosis at times. There’s always the self doubt — “Is this feeling real, or is my bipolar talking?” And any medication that works on brain chemistry is likely to have strange side effects, so the medication search for “what are the least annoying side effects” becomes an odyssey of pharmacopeia.

But here are reasons to be happy (and educational opportunities for the rest of you:

Bipolar people are not crazy. “Crazy” is a word made up by people who fear difference. It has been used to marginalize people (with or without a mental health condition) for ages.
Bipolar people are neurodivergent. Isn’t that a cool word? That means our brains work differently than other brains. The Neurodiversity Movement is one that seeks to normalize people with mental health conditions, autism, epilepsy and other mental conditions as being “just the way some people are born.” The Neurodiversity Movement does not prohibit treatment of symptoms of a condition, such as antipsychotics for someone with bipolar.
Bipolar traits may relate to enhanced creativity. Some doctors still dispute this, but most doctors see a link between bipolar and creativity — even when the bipolar is being treated. So that stereotype of the artist on the edge is true, but the artist is still an artist when pulled back from the edge with medication.
Compliant people with bipolar are following the health advice that everyone should. We get enough sleep at night, establish regular routines, give up alcohol and (of course) illegal drugs, meditate, manage our moods through affirmations and cognitive exercises …

Neurotypical people are scared of people who are bipolar, but it should compare to other health conditions:

Being around a manic episode can be scary. So can being around someone who has a fierce temper and a disdain for cops (there’s a story here). Neurotypical people can be scary too.
Your bipolar friend sometimes gets spacy with their medication. Someone with diabetes gets spacy when their blood sugar is too low. Your friend who stays up late gets spacy when she hasn’t gotten enough coffee. It sounds like a universal condition to me.
Bipolar people get depressed. So do people with diagnosed depression. And those with triggered situational depression. One is not scarier than another.

So bipolar awareness day is happy because I get to share these points which tend to contradict the excessive drama on the Lifetime Channel. Now some people learn about their bipolar by something really dramatic like maxing out the credit cards or having an affair, but so do neurotypical people. And people who get medication fare better than people who don’t. But I’m glad I get to talk about what people with bipolar disorder face in a positive way, where people aren’t saying, “SHHHH. You shouldn’t talk about it!”

Whether you’re neurodivergent or neurotypical, I hope this has helped you see the world a bit differently.

Personality and a Mood Disorder: Questions in my Mind

The musing below is something that might eventually get edited for the creative/nonfiction book about living with bipolar. I feel I always take a chance writing about being bipolar in this blog –I don’t want to be considered a lesser being just because the jilted fairy godmother showed up at my christening and said, “Just for not inviting me, this little girl is going to have MOODS!”

Thank you for reading.
*******

When I first got my diagnosis in 2012, I was devastated in a way I hadn’t been when I was earlier diagnosed with simple depression.

There’s a certain degree of difference between being diagnosed with depression and being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. In the former, the disorder can be separated from one’s personality easily. People talk about being followed by the “black dog” when they’re depressed. The “black dog” is described as outside, not inside oneself.

In the case of bipolar disorder, however, both the ups and downs are exaggerated by the disorder. People tend to view their positive moments as their genuine self, even saying “I am genuinely happy right now.” If one’s highs are held suspect, the natural reaction seems to be “Who am I? Who would I be without this lifelong disease?”

I estimate my bipolar became active when I was in high school, if not sooner. My mother described me as “an exhausting child”, and I wonder if that was my bipolar ratcheting up back then. My bipolar has had plenty of time to affect my personality:

People describe me as extroverted, outgoing, and a bit eccentric. However, the things I love to do most are more introverted — writing, puttering around in my grow room, and having one-on-one conversations with people. I think the “bigger than life” me — the one who teaches classes, the one who participated in theatre in high school — came from my feelings and experiences while hypomanic. I’m pretty sure my hand and facial gestures come from there as well.

I say what’s on my mind, even when most people would stay quiet. If I don’t, I feel a pressure — figuratively, not literally — in my brain demanding to let the thought out. Is this why we call it “venting”?

I’ve developed an internal censor and some tact over the years, because when I first came back to the Midwest after five years teaching in New York state, I scared my students. (For the Americans in this readership, think “Consumer Economics by Gordon Ramsey”. Isn’t it “Dave Ramsay”? Not when I taught it.) I still deal with that pressure, and that mindset that if we would just drag things out in the open, we’ll all feel better.

I get crushes because beauty strikes me like a stab to the heart. Richard finds my crushes amusing because he trusts me not to pursue anything past friendship. He’s right to trust me. I used to tell people I had crushes on them and that I didn’t want to do anything about it. (Yes, they were flattered. Yes, they thought I was strange. No, they never had a crush on me back.) Some of my poetry is an attempt to relieve the pressure. I’m pretty sure that crushes are not hypomania themselves, but a high I learned from hypomania. When I become hypomanic they become extremely painful rather than amusing.

Depression has not really shaped my personality, because as it is for other people, depression is not me. Depression descends upon me and separates me from all I love with a black shroud. But I’m sure my unleashed imagination, my curiosity, my optimism, my straightforwardness, and my occasional flamboyance (and bold choice in lipstick) were gifts — yes, gifts from hypomania.

The theoretical book outline

The theoretical outline of the book I’m thinking of writing looks like this:

I. Intro and Foreword

II. About Bipolar Disorder

III. Mania and Hypomania

a. Racing Thoughts/Words Piling up like Boxcars

b. Higher than Normal Drive/Project Obsessions

c. Hypersexuality/Sex, Fidelity, and The Other

d. Increased Spirituality/Transcendental Experiences on a Daily Basis

e. Plummet into Depression/The Words Crash Down

IV. Depression

a. Pessimism and Hopelessness/Living Cursed

b. Lack of Enjoyment/The Grey World

c. Feeling Empty/The Emptiness In My Center

d. Coming Out of Depression/Breathing Without Pain

V. About Medication

a. The Toll on my Body

b. The Day I Couldn’t Stop Walking

VI. The Rest of My Story – How I Manage

It’s scary contemplating writing a book about how I experience bipolar through the lens of my creativity. It’s easy to talk about what’s going through our heads when it’s within the realm of normal, but sometimes I live in a different world than you probably do. As I have Bipolar 2 — half the mania, all the depression! — my mania is mild and perhaps even functional, but my depression can be hard to fight. Most of the time my medication works; I have an excellent psychiatrist who keeps an eye on things. But sometimes it fails — I get my dosage wrong, I hit a very stressful time, the seasons change — and I am left to navigate through a slightly skewed landscape. When I am hypomanic, the colors are brighter, the lines sharper, and I imagine the trees glow with knowledge. When I’m depressed, I walk through the aftermath of a forest fire, in the snow.

I hope you don’t see me differently — no, I hope you do see me differently, as someone who is neurodiverse, whose brain is wired a little differently than yours. I hope you don’t see me as a curiosity, as a victim, or as an undesirable. My world takes fantastic turns in the the old sense of the word — tinged with grace and otherworldiness; tinged with horror. That’s all.

Ups and Downs — Bipolar, Academia, and Creativity

Now, Shelly and Lanetta, I’m not saying that I WILL write this book, and I’m not saying that I WON’T, but here’s the introduction:

*******

If you look around the walls of the main library at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, you may find the name Lauren Leach on a Bronze Tablet dated 1981. This denotes I graduated in the top three percent of my graduating class. It doesn’t tell the story of breaking down in my last semester of college with moods that could fluctuate from destitution to a mild euphoria in a matter of hours.

If you were to look at the faculty roster at a moderately selective regional university, you would be able to find me under my current name, Lauren Leach-Steffens, as an associate professor in Behavioral Sciences. You would not find the story that my prior department, Family and Consumer Sciences, had been disbanded, nor that the impending news of its demise caused a shockwave of stress that led to swings of terror and agitation, racing thoughts, and a month of less than two hours of sleep a night. I finally received a diagnosis for that episode and the myriad episodes I had experienced for most of my life — bipolar 2.

I could have kept my diagnosis a secret, as many people have throughout the ages, but then the only bipolar stories people would identify are those of addiction, disturbing behavior, suicide. The celebrities people vicariously watch and judge, the co-worker whose wake includes hushed voices behind the hand — yes, these people exist, but we assume that they will invariably break down in the middle of the street or die with a needle in their arm. We may even push them into those dark scenarios with our generation of stigma.

I’ve chosen to embrace the stigma. I can afford to — I am white, highly educated, a recipient of lifelong white privilege. I will not be shot in the street by cops, as has happened so many times with people of color. I’m not likely to lose my job unless I violate ethical standards or fail to do the essential responsibilities of the job. I think being open is a great way to use privilege for good. I would like to show people a story that doesn’t look like a sensationalistic biopic (which, truly, nobody with my condition truly resembles.)

This is why I tell stories.

****************

When I’m not being a professor — and even sometimes when I am, I tell stories. Many of the stories aren’t mine — for example, humorous typos from my students, an illustrative example in class, other people’s funny stories.

Some stories become writings. I write short stories based on my fantasies and dreams, I write novels based on my nightmares and my periodic feeling of hope, I write poetry when I want to get the most of my feelings into the tiniest number of words, I write songs because they’re contagious and a great way to spread ideas that need to be heard.

I write when I experience a transcendental moment and when I feel despair. I write when I look at someone and that moment tells me they’re so beautiful that I have to unburden that beauty onto paper. I write when I know that I will never know them. I write when climate change looks unstoppable.

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I think there’s always a little bipolar in my life even with the daily medication that causes me a handful of physical woes — manageable, a touch of moodiness here and there. You wouldn’t know it to talk to me, because I’ve been able to function through it all my life. But I tell stories through my ups and downs, small and big, because in the end, that’s the only way we will know each other’s stories, get to know each other — and ourselves.

Depression and how it feels

I stare out the window at a bleak landscape of snow and dead trees. I can’t go outside; the doors have drifted shut. The walls of the house whisper to me that I will always be trapped in this house and the others will leave me to die. Time passes; I can’t tell how much time, but now the walls tell me that when I die, I will have left nothing behind me. I will disappear as if I have never existed.
Nothing will change; nothing will ever change.
*****
Note: I’m not REALLY hearing the walls talk to me. This is figurative, damn it.
*****
I’ve been struggling with depression. It happens sometimes; if it persists or gets worse, I will have to see my doctor. I don’t usually struggle with my neurodiversity — i.e. not being wired like everyone else, which refers to a variety of mental differences one could have such as bipolar, autism spectrum and other mental health issues. However, when my moods go too far above or below the imaginary line of normal, I struggle.

You may have heard that depression is not just a “bad mood”, an accurate description. I can present to my students an enthusiastic facade. I can even be that enthusiastic, chipper person while I’m teaching. I can even “catch a mood” and feel chipper for a while afterward. But in depression, that state doesn’t last long, and I fall back to a feeling of hopelessness.

I’m ok; I’m doing what I need to do. My husband is keeping an eye on me.
Still, pop in and say hi if you’d like.

*****
It looks like I’ll still write — although I may not go the novel route for a while. I’ve never cared about getting anything else — like my poetry and essays — published, so I won’t deal with the rejection. I’m here because I think I have things worth saying.

Ups and Downs of Writing

The first thing I’ll do here is break a taboo — I have a mood disorder. Specifically Bipolar 2 — half the mania, twice the depression. No, I’m not crazy — I have wonky biology. Just like you do.

Is there a link between bipolar and creativity? Collingwood (2017) reports that there have been many creative people known to be bipolar, but that this may be due to a third variable. She also points out that people with bipolar disorder are more productive and creative when they are managing their condition.

This has been my experience. I could not have written a novel without my medications, which is why I’m a late bloomer (I wasn’t diagnosed till five years ago). Self-maintenance activities such as regular sleep, eating regularly, not overworking myself, and avoiding alcohol supports my creativity as well. In other words, all those things creatives are reported not to do.

My imagination still functions with all of this — better, even. Thanks for reading.

I hope you find
at the end of the day
that the yammering words
chained and rechained in the switchyard
fade into a night of indigo
with the texture of a cotton eiderdown.

Collingsworth, J. (2017). The link between bipolar and creativity. Available: https://psychcentral.com/lib/the-link-between-bipolar-disorder-and-creativity/ [April 27, 2017].