Health. Fitness. Positivity. Lifestyle. Mental health. Self love.

The ups and downs of bipolar

Bipolar to me is quite literally my ups and my downs, there's no other way to describe it. It's an incredibly complex condition and is individual to each person and their type of their condition but this post explains my take on it.

Bipolar for me is feeling on top of the world one day and then not even wanting to be on it next. It's feeling severely depressed for absolutely no reason and it's not knowing what mood you're going to wake up to. It's feeling the happiest you've ever felt to then suddenly feeling the lowest. It's anxiety for no reason other than having anxiety. It's going from having the energy to take on the whole world, to not even having the energy to get out of bed. It's feeling so happy you could explode but then feeling so depressed you don't think you can survive another day. It's also feeling absolutely nothing at all, just numb.
Bipolar is defined as experiencing extreme swings of depression and mania. A person can swing between these different moods for periods of a month, two months or multiple times in a day. The different types of this condition are distinguished by the length of which the moods occur for, these conditions are as follows:
Bipolar 1:  This disorder includes manic episodes lasting a minimum of seven days, or severe manic symptoms requiring immediate hospitalization, with depressive episodes occurring for around two weeks under this type.
Bipolar 2: Like patients with bipolar I disorder, those who have bipolar II disorder must have at least one major depressive episode. However, the significant difference between the two is individuals with bipolar II disorder experience hypomanic episodes rather than manic.
Cyclothymia: This form has many mood swings with hypomanic and depressive symptoms occurring regularly, which can be a few times a week or a few times in one day.
The type I suffer from is cyclothymia, which means my moods often swing back and forth multiple times a day, although for many years now I thankfully have been stable due to being on mood stabilizing medication. However, sadly this doesn't in any way mean I'm fixed, it just means I'm mostly stable. My bipolar gets triggered very easy which causes an episode, where my moods will dramatically chop and change. My triggers, like most others, tend to be stress, traumatic experiences, change in circumstances and overwhelming problems. In all honesty, an episode completely turns my life upside down and makes getting through each day feel impossible and if I were currently going through one, this would be a very different blog.
With my condition, I have always found I suffer more so with depression than mania, with these moods lasting longer and feel far deeper. Meaning that I can often be severely depressed and suicidal for absolutely no reason, which is completely unbearable and I often say that I feel trapped in a body that just wants me to be unhappy. I imagine people think this means I am just a bit sad, but in reality, it entirely takes over your body, consumes every part of you and you have no control over when it comes and goes. These are the times when I've had to learn to just keep reminding myself that these feelings pass.
The biggest difficulty with bipolar is functioning daily. The problem is that a person often does not know how they will feel when they wake up in the morning, meaning they can have work planned or a social event booked but until waking up they’ll never know if they’re going to be up to it. I can't count how many times I've had to force myself to do things because you can't cancel but everything inside you just wants to hide under the covers all day. 
What is also one of the biggest challenges is having the thoughts and feelings you do for no reason, which makes getting other people to understand pretty much impossible. How can you explain to someone that you feel suicidal but have absolutely no reason for it? It's extremely complex and still baffles me but it just simply is what it is and if you've got good people around you, they will learn to understand it.
My condition means that I feel everything 10x more than the average person does, even when I'm not going through an episode. Something small that may not upset one person, can send me on a downward spiral for days. At the same time, something so little that would just usually make a person smile for a minute can make me feel on top of the world for the whole day. It's fair to say that the condition makes life more challenging, but I know there are so many positives that I receive from it too. Without my condition, I wouldn't have the appreciation that I do for life, which is something I’d never trade.


No comments

Post a Comment

© All things green

This site uses cookies from Google to deliver its services - Click here for information.

Professional Blog Designs by pipdig