Christmas day

I just reread my post from yesterday and, surprisingly, it kinda makes sense. Kinda. Holy crap was I pissed at church.

This morning we went to my mom's house for breakfast and presents. It was lovely. My mom makes some kickass breakfast casserole and she's not drunk in the mornings so that's an added bonus. It was fine. It was good.

Then we went to Denver to J's aunt's house. Which was fine, but not as fine. See, there's a lot of people there. Like, 15-20. And there's noise. And apparently Clancy can't handle that much stimulation anymore.

It didn't take long before I felt overwhelmed. Trapped almost. Unable to cope. Effectively at least. I was a little withdrawn. As time went on I became irritable. I was shouting at family members in my mind. Yelling at them for their (seemingly to me) stupid comments. It was like church all over again. I became more withdrawn because I didn't want to inadvertently say what I was thinking.

About an hour before we left my mind started racing. Images, thoughts . . . all melded together, coming and leaving almost too quickly to be registered. The racing thoughts continued the whole way home. Even when I plugged in my iPod and sung along, which usually helps, the thoughts and images still came.

At home they reached a fever pitch. My mind was going so fast I couldn't hold on to a single thought. I tried writing in my mood journal and it came out as one long, nearly illegible, run on sentence. I was almost in tears my brain was so frantic. It's a horrible feeling not being in control of your thoughts. Not being able to slow them down enough to get a sentence out. Being confused with all of the images flashing through your mind, completely unrelated to one another and anything you're thinking.

I had J bring me my electronic cigarette. I did deep breathing. I ate so I could take my Geodon. I talked with J a little and texted my best friend L.

My mind is slowing which is why I'm able to type this. Not enough that I can write eloquently - it's still going fast - but at least I'm getting something out.

Yesterday and today made me realize something - I can't handle too much stimulation. It's like my brain short circuits. Too much input and it goes into overdrive and I can't cope. And when you sit back and say, well, I'm still in a mixed episode and this is to be expected, it doesn't seem too bad. But what I worry about is what if it's not entirely from the mixed episode? What if I continue to have issues like this? Issues with stress or crowds or too much visual stimulation? What then?

Only time will tell. I'm trying not to think too much on this, lest I drive myself crazy. Well, more crazy. I'm hoping, obviously, that this is the mixed episode and as I get to the therapeutic dose of Geodon it'll get better.

Because if not, I'm screwed.

And not the good kind of screwed. The screwed kind of screwed.

That doesn't even make sense.

Just a quickie

My mood has been everywhere craptastic since Tuesday night. Like, "fuck is this a relapse because I can't even cope" craptastic. And it's shitty and annoying and I'm done with it.

I'm writing in my mood diary. I'm ignoring it. I'm faking it. I'm focusing on positives. I'm forcing myself to do things and be social and not a withdrawn hermit.

I'm overwhelmed.

And since I don't know what else to do, I'm just gonna leave this here:

Bitch, I'm fabulous. Deal with it.

Today is supposed to be different

I'm here at work and it's loud and annoying and I don't even know what my mood is doing today. Everyone here (the labor nurses) is talking about the stupid Obama Care and I kinda want to stab them all. Shut up. Just . . . shut up. Seriously. 

I'm everywhere bad today. I'm down, I'm frustrated, I'm annoyed and cranky and I feel like I'm going to lose it. I'm trying, really trying to fake it till I make it. I'm really trying to stay positive and ignore my feelings and surroundings. Today, it's hard. Today is a day I would spiral, a day that I could spiral. I'm trying not to. 

Which is why I'm writing right now. There are a few things I'm frustrated with at the moment but I can't even concentrate. I want to hide. I want to go home and sleep. Last week was shitty - this week isn't supposed to be. I'm trying. I will make it a good day. God willing.

Developing Positive Emotional Habits

Heads up: this is very much stream of consciousness writing. Yep.

I went to a seminar today on developing positive emotional habits. That, in fact, was the title of the seminar. It was geared towards healthcare professionals - I even got continuing education credits! Now, my reasons for going were purely selfish - let's be honest, I need all the help I can get. Especially since what I'm working on right now is curbing my negative thoughts/behaviors/emotions.

Now, the seminar starts with reviewing the basics of brain chemistry as it relates to emotions - all the basic primitive stuff (fight, flight or freeze) - to all of the new information gleamed from experiments and brain imaging. It's all very interesting, fascinating even (to me at least). We learned all about the reward centers (controlled by dopamine), the emotional hub spot (the amygdala), and other fun structures (hippocampus, frontal cortex). The science of emotion and habits and addiction is just amazing. This is neat stuff y'all. Trust me.

Then we moved into discussing how to change our emotional response, and why it can be difficult to do. All these ideas. All these techniques. My mind was a jumbled, racing mass of what-ifs and maybes, and could-haves. Some things I've already been practicing. Some were new. My mind went hog wild. I became excited. I became motivated. This. THIS. All of THIS. I will do ALL of THIS and it will be epic and awesome and I'll be better and amazing and life will be grand and I'll be happy and I'll eat bacon cupcakes and fuck those who oppose me!

And then reality likes to bitch slap me. Because reality is a cunt-faced whore sandwich bent on ruining my new found motivation. See, I actually do have a mood disorder. And despite my best efforts and intentions, I will have emotions/moods/behaviors that I can't control or can't manage or don't understand. This is distressing.

On the one hand I have this new knowledge, this motivation, to really step up and work on squelching my negativity. And on the other hand I have my mood disorder and all of its uncertainties and tenacity and lies. I can have the best "control" over my emotions and be positive and optimistic, but if bipolar depression truly takes hold again, all of that control is for not. If anything more elevated than mild hypomania strikes, all bets are off. I have no self control, despite my knowledge. Despite my training and practice.

See, that's the problem. At least with me. I'm working so hard right now on ending the negative, fostering the positive. I'm using techniques I've learned in the past and I'll apply the new ones I learned today. I know the science. The actual mother fucking science.

But how well will this work for me? How well does it work when trapped in the steely grips of a mood episode? Knowing that I can change my dopamine response to a stimulus doesn't help much when I physically can't get out of bed or I'm holding a bottle of pills. Knowing I should be practicing top-down control while I'm manic and impulsive isn't going to stop me from blurting out something inappropriate or making an impulse buy (or worse).

That's my problem. All of this knowledge is awesome and will work and I'll be great. Except I won't. Because how well will it work? My mind races back and forth, back and forth. From thinking that I'll have this emotion thing pretty much figured out and all is cool, to the reality that I do have a mood disorder and this may not always work and I may be out of control.

This back and forth is so fucking distressing. It's so fucking tiring. And it's so fucking stupid. My brain picks this all apart, looks at it from every possible angle. It tries to categorize it, put it all in neat little boxes which doesn't work. But it's what I do. I have to analyze, I have to make sense of abstract bits of everything. This shit doesn't fit in boxes. It doesn't sit on the shelf, tidy and organized like I want it to.

Seriously. Why is this so fucking difficult for me to grasp?

So much of my writing and thinking lately is about this. I keep turning it over in my mind, hoping I'll see something new. But there's nothing new. There never is. The emotional control will work well when I'm stable or having mild mood swings. In a mood episode . . . who knows. Probably not. Maybe it will help me recover more quickly. I should be able to accept this fact. It's simple. But I don't. Or maybe I can't. I don't even know anymore.

I don't even know what the hell is going on in my brain lately. It's almost as if since I've been working so hard on changing my thinking and my behavior and my emotional response, my thinking has become more obsessive. Deciphering my moods and emotions: was that bipolar? ACOA? Normal? How do I categorize this? How was my response? I had a bad mood? Quick! Damage control! You can't spiral again for God's sake don't go down that road again!

I can't not try to figure it all out. But I'm driving myself crazy. I can't leave well enough alone. I truly am my own worst enemy.

Hey! A real post!

Remember how I've been saying I was going to do a real post? Well, here it is. Kind of. I think.

I've been working a lot on staying positive. Identifying negative thoughts and behaviors and stopping them. Fostering healthy thinking. And I've been doing pretty well with all that. Making some headway it would seem. And I'm grateful for this. There's even times when I think I'm feeling "okay", where I'm feeling "normal". Maybe even feeling like "me". Which is strange and wonderful and still a bit confusing.

Last Friday, while working with Chance, I had another revelation type moment. N and J had me ground drive Chance. Don't know what ground driving is? You've seen horses pull carts, right? Well, imagine me as the cart. I walk behind Chance, directing him with the long reins just as if I was in the cart behind him. Neither of us has done this. But N sent us off on our own after showing me the basics. The first 10 minutes or so was chaos. Neither of us knew what we were doing, there was miscommunication between us and we floundered about looking like idiots. Or at least I looked like an idiot.

But then something magical happened - we connected. We got it. We drove and it went smoothly and it was awesome. And then the tractor came. And spooked Chance. Surprisingly, I stayed calm, pulled his head around so he could see me and talked to him, calmed him down. We stood for 5 minutes or so and just relaxed. Breathed. And then we moved on, as if nothing had happened. When we came back to N and J, they had things to say. First, why did we stop? I told them, and explained that we needed a minute to calm and collect before we moved on (and from a driving/horse training stand point, that was exactly the right response). Next question: you had a rough start. Did you feel like you couldn't do it? Did you feel like a failure? Well, no. Neither of us knew how to do this. We had to figure it out - it's not going to be perfect.

Oh? Said J. So you're doing something new, something different, and it didn't have to be perfect? And you didn't worry or beat yourself up over it? Isn't how you're trying to work through your moods new and different? Yet you try to be perfect . . . and you beat yourself up when you're not.

A light went on. M has been drilling this into me since I met him. My hubby has been drilling this into me for God knows how long. But it took working with Chance to make it actually click. To make me actually see what I've been doing, how I hold myself to so high a standard and then beat myself up if I don't reach that standard.

And what a concept! To work through this new way of being, stumbling now and then but dusting myself off, moving forward and going easy on myself. This is a new way of doing things, of being, for me. I won't be perfect. And that's okay! I'll get through it, I'll learn, and I'll be okay.

But I'm me. And this is hard. Amazingly hard. Stupidly hard. I have to really think, really concentrate. And I'm too analytical. Which, in this instance, is probably not helpful.

M gave me homework last week - a mood diary. I have to track my moods throughout the day, what's going on during that time, etc. Kinda like a food diary. So I'm tracking them, writing them. I'm a good, perfect little ACOA doing my homework. And this week we discussed my previous week's entries. And by discuss, I mean M had me read them aloud and then we discussed. Which is good, which is fine, and reiterates the fact that my mood shifts are often within the realm of "normalcy". They're not too far out there. And that's a wonderful thing! I'm not being completely ruled by my mood swings!

Except that I am. In a different way. Every time I have a mood shift that seems slightly outside the norm, I analyze it. Was that normal? Was that an aspect of bipolar? How can I tell? I recognize this and I tell myself to stop - that isn't important! What's important is trying to stay in the moment - it doesn't matter if the mood was caused by a normal shift or bipolar (unless the mood is exaggerated and/or out of control). So I acknowledge it, write it down, try to ignore it and downplay it and move on.

And then I end up obsessing over it. And analyzing it in spite of myself and my best intentions. Because this is what I do. This is what I always do. This is what I'm trying to correct. Because it can lead to another spiral if I let it. Which seems to always lead to depression.

Funny thing is, I don't feel depressed. I'm not sure I could make myself feel depressed. But I'm still trying to. Or at least still hanging on to these "bipolar swings", playing up their significance. Trying to convince myself that every emotional shift is the bipolar disorder and not me. Because remember? I'm ACOA. I'm bipolar. I'm different because of this and so I don't fit in and I have to categorize myself and give myself these labels - because I've held so tightly to them, and for so long that I don't know how to let go.

And there's still that part that doesn't want to let go. It's almost like a drug. Depression is my drug. I've become dependent on it to govern how I act, how I see myself, and how others relate to me. If I feel good, I start jonesing for that familiar depression. I'm a druggie - and drug addiction is a hard habit to break.

But I'm trying. By God am I trying. And I'm stumbling. So I dust myself off. I move forward. And I fight the urge to shut down and spiral. I've come a long way over the last year and 9 months. . . but that drug . . . it tempts me. It haunts me.

Say no to drugs y'all. And God DAMN that was a ramble!