BEING BIPOLAR, Part Thirteen: A New Project

Being Bipolar is a series that began in the winter of 2011.  Every now and then I post a new article, as an ongoing attempt to chronicle what it is to have a mental illness.  In my case it is bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression.  Perhaps in doing so others might gain greater insight and understanding of what it means for millions of people who likewise must deal with severe mental and emotional disorders.  As always during this series I strive to be as honest and forthright as one possibly can possibly be.  I am not a psychiatrist.  However I do come from a background of being a state-certified peer support specialist for four years.  And it is especially in that capacity as having been a mental health professional that I endeavor to document mental illness.  If you are experiencing a mental health crisis, especially if you are having thoughts of self-harm or harm to others, please consider calling 911, or go to your nearest hospital emergency room.  Trust me, I've been there, done that.  You may also find help and encouragement from a support group, such as those sponsored by mental health advocacy organizations like National Alliance on Mental Illness (nami.org).  Help is available.  You only need reach out for it.  People care about you.  Remember that.

Throughout the course of Being Bipolar, going back fourteen years now on-and-off, I have written extensively about the disease and its consequences.  Those being the episodes, the medications, the affects on my faith, how it's altered my outlook on life... lots of things.

It struck me in the past few days that maybe it's time for another edition of Being Bipolar.  And perhaps it's time to change things up a bit.

I've been defined by this disease for too long.  I've let it touch upon aspects of my life that should have by all rights been mine, not a chronic misfire of my neurobiology.  Unfortunately that's what I've allowed to happen.

And I'm finally sick and tired of it.

I'm fifty years old, going on fifty-one.  For fully half of my life I've had to struggle against a mind turned against itself.  Something that has cost me careers, friendships, a vibrant relationship with God, and even a marriage.

It's time I take back my life and everything pertaining to it.  I'm in a place where I believe I'm finally able to do that.

In a week and a half I begin a new career.  One that will let me help other people, much as I did when I was at the state mental health department.  It will require intensive training.  It will also require much patience.  It will certainly require a focused mind and an empathy for others.  It will call upon skills and experiences that I have gained at various times throughout the course of my life but have not had to employ for quite awhile.  But it will be personally rewarding.  It will have me feeling accomplished every day when I leave, and eager to come back the next morning.  It will also, I have to believe, be a little fun.

This job comes after more than two years of a career drought.  I had to depart from my position at the mental health department because the economy turned bad and I wasn't able to afford living on it.  Exiting that was one of the worst things that ever happened to me.  I had to leave behind many good people.  People who I worked with and the people I was helping on a regular basis.  I became part of their lives and they became part of mine.  I miss them.

I've been without reliable income all this time.  And I have had to rely on help from others to get me through.  It's not an enviable situation, but it was having to accept reality.  Maybe God has needed me to go through this.  Perhaps it's His way of making me more thankful for the blessings He has given me.  Perhaps it's making me hungrier, to be the person He made me to be as I've never been before.

I am ready for the new career.  And now maybe I'm ready for other things, too.  The things that have mattered for most of my life.

Throughout this time without a real career, I have had to put my writing on hold.  I've been too busy trying to stay afloat, keeping my head up in spite of the financial difficulties.  It's not just for my own sake: there is also my dog Tammy, who I promised my father as he was dying that I would take care of her.  I can't let him down.

I've lost my writing.  Something that my freshman English teacher in high school told me was my gift.  That's something I've tried to exercise and cultivate ever since.  When I was seventeen I began writing for publication.  I thrived on that.  It led to some really amazing opportunities, like working at a couple of newspapers (okay, one of them turned out to be a swindling operation, but that was not my fault) and being an associate editor of a major pop culture website.  I've maintained a blog for more than two decades.

The past two years caused me to lose my touch.  I know it.  I can recognize it.  It's one of the worst things that's ever happened to me.  And in great part it's not only because of struggling for better employment, it's because of the bipolar disorder and especially the meds I take to manage it.

The meds take a lot out of me.  They take my edge off.  Have stricken me of much of my passion.  I'm not the Chris Knight who I used to be.  I can't write as I once did.  And a few weeks ago it struck me that if I were to engage in community theatre again, I couldn't be as good an actor as I had been when I was living back in North Carolina.

I've become someone different from the person I once was.

But I believe that I can find it again.  And that's what this installment of Being Bipolar is about.

Two months ago I finished writing my first book.  It's a memoir.  Actually, it's more like two or three mushed together into a cohesive autobiography.  Every phase of my life - childhood, the Christian school and then transition to public education, the Elon years, the onset of manic depression, my marriage, coming to terms, the year spent driving across America, the "chrysalis" stage - is included.  The book is something that I've spent ten years of on and off laboring upon, and now it's done.  I was able to commit three months of solid work, when I wasn't eating or sleeping or a part-time job or playing with Tammy, on the manuscript.  It was very difficult.  It demanded a lot of me.  But in the end it was done.  I'm hoping to eventually see it published.  If it can make it to a real brick-and-mortar bookstore's shelf then that will be a supreme accomplishment.

Doing that showed me that maybe I haven't lost all of my touch after all.

Earlier this month (January 2025) I began an endeavor.  That being to write a new op-ed piece every week for the rest of the year.  Hopefully for publication elsewhere but if not when I'll post the essays here on The Knight Shift.  It's already been a challenge.  I have come to spend my Saturday and Sunday evenings (helpful hint to self: a lot of work can be done while Svengoolie on MeTV is on every Saturday night) thinking about new pieces and composing the with my iPad Pro.  As of this writing I've had two pieces published.  And it's sparked my inner fire again.  Like Rocky Balboa I'm re-discovering "the eye of the tiger", the part of me that enjoys taking part in the arena of ideas in this world.  That's been gone too long.  And now I'm doing something about it.

So committing to write op-ed commentary articles is going to be one part of a greater project.  I'm going to strive to bring the original Chris Knight back, absent the occasional depression and racing thoughts.  In writing, and also in other ways.  Who knows, maybe I'll be back on stage again sometime in the future, collaborating with others on a theatrical production.  If that desire is there, then I have to believe the drive and the ability and the raw passion is there too, waiting to be uncovered.

It may take awhile.  But it will be worth it.  At fifty I don't believe that I'm done with life yet.  Not by a long shot.  Manic depression has taken a lot from me, but there is still plenty of time to make the most of my life.  Hey, maybe I'll even be blessed with a relationship again someday.  I would be very thankful for that.

In the meantime though, there is zest for life and the hunger to make an impact on this world for the better to find again and cultivate.  I aim to play that particular sword to the hilt.

Expect the unexpected from here on out.  That is my mission.

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BEING BIPOLAR, Part Twelve: Report on Mixed Episode

Being Bipolar is a series that began nearly fourteen years ago in the winter of 2011.  It is an occasional look at what it is like to live with bipolar disorder, or manic depression as many still call it.  This blogger posts a new article whenever he feels the time is ideal to write about an aspect of bipolar disorder, so that others might have deeper understanding of this disease and appreciate what it is to have to exist with it on a routine basis.  In doing this I do my best to be as honest and forthcoming as is possible.  I am not a medical professional.  However I spent several years as a peer support specialist - a person with mental illness who undergoes extensive training so as to help others with like and similar conditions - for a major state department of mental health.  I believe that this may put me in a unique position to examine bipolar disorder.  Perhaps writing this series will be in some way how I get to make up for many of the things that I have done while in a depressed state or exceedingly manic (ESPECIALLY manic).  If you are experiencing a mental health crisis, please consider calling 911 or if you are able to then visit your nearest hospital emergency room.  You may also find help and encouragement from a support group, such as those sponsored by mental health advocacy organizations like the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI.org).

 

Hey hey!  Once again it has been quite awhile since I have posted anything under the Being Bipolar brand.  That last one came almost two years ago.  And a lot has changed since then...

When last you read this space, I was still working at the South Carolina Department of Mental Health (the very first mental health department among any of the fifty states, and they're dang proud of it!).  And I would still be there too, had the economy not turned so rotten.  That compelled me to seek out employment that paid better.  I spent two weeks at the car manufacturer near here...

...And then had to leave voluntarily.  The meds I take to manage manic depression made it impossible to have the fine precision finger mobility and speed to keep up.  I quickly realized that when it came to critical car components my presence was more a liability than a benefit.

After that I was at another manufacturer.  I was doing really good too!  And then two months into that job I was dismissed.  Because they discovered that I was taking medication to manage bipolar disorder.

Well, I can't really talk about that much.  There were legal proceedings and an out-of-court settlement.  It ended as best as it probably could have.  But that still left me unemployed.

Several months of work drought followed after that.  And then I was able to sign on as a substitute teacher for a local school system.  But as was reported almost a year ago that didn't last long (because ahem... I was accused of teaching high school juniors how to make high explosives).

THAT led to a job that nearly killed me.  The less said about that one, the better.  It was destroying me mentally, physically, but also spiritually.  I was never able to attend a place of worship with others on weekends, or during the week either for that matter.  My relationship with God is something that has always been precious to me, even during my worst of moments with manic depression.  For those reasons and more I left the job just before my birthday this past March.

What happened after that was practically a God-send.  A friend got me involved in training artificial intelligence systems.  We're talking real cutting-edge stuff here.  I've been able to see the AI industry from a vantage point that few get to witness.  I'm now beholding all that goes into making AI work.  Its good points as well as things that I don't believe computers will ever be able to surmount (I very strongly doubt that AI will come close to approximating real human thought, and that's a great comfort).  I consider AI training to be my true career now, and it's solid work that employs much of my educational background and experiences.

Unfortunately there are times when there is a lull between projects.  And it is during those times that I need supplementary employment.

Which brings me to where I am today.  I've been able to be a part of the establishing of the first branch in this state of a respected company that is experiencing nationwide growth.  I've been with the company for almost two months now and have really come to enjoy the community and camaraderie among the staff.  That's all that I can probably say at the moment however.  For reasons which are pretty easy to figure out.

So now we come to August 13, 2024.

I've written about having a depressive episode before, and the previous installment of Being Bipolar dealt with experiencing a manic episode.  Well, since last night I have been having a mixed episode: an entirely different beast altogether.  So I'm going to do my best to describe what this is like.

This morning I had to call in sick.  I was nowhere in any condition to handle the tasks I regularly engage in.  I probably was not even fit to drive the relatively short distance to the location.  Not when I was unstoppably blinking back-and-forth between extraordinary mania and then curling up in a ball on the sofa.

This has been a day of extremes, to be mild about it.

It started yesterday evening.  I felt it coming.  And prayed that it would pass over.  Maybe God let it be not as severe as it could have been.  As severe as it was fifteen or so years ago, when I lacked the proper medication and the counseling and the tools to deal with an episode.  Back when I had to be rocked here and fro by manic depression.  The time in my life when I caused so much damage and destruction to relationships that I cherished so deeply with those who I loved.  But that's digressing, sort of.

I sensed this coming.  And braced for the storm.  It could have been worse.  But it was harsh enough.  By 8 a.m. this morning my thoughts were racing furiously.  At 9 the swings toward the opposite direction began.

It's funny.  A little after 9 there was a brief respite.  And I found myself inspired to post the following on Facebook:

Dear God, thank You for giving me this morning. May I have a great day today. Let others see not myself but You within me, that they might be drawn to You and You alone.

 

I was hoping that the day would turn out well, in spite of how it was progressing.  And maybe I was trying to bargain with God: that I would surrender to Him and that in return He would make my day a blessed one after all.

It was not to be.

Ten o'clock.  The mania had been roaring for some time.  About this time I plummeted back into depression.  It was what ever since the symptoms first began nearly a quarter century ago I have called "the Dark Fountain".  Winston Churchill called depression his "Black Dog" that hounded his steps wherever he went.  Mine is the Dark Fountain.  When it erupts it sends dark viscous fluid seething across my neurobiology, and it takes a supreme effort to fight against those black waters or else drown in them.  And it has come close to drowning me completely at times... make of that what one will.

Today around noon I could almost hear the Dark Fountain bursting forth.  Could almost feel the waters creeping throughout my brain.  And then it stopped for a little while.  Enough to post on Facebook that I needed prayer, from whoever might be reading my words.

 

Several people responded, and I am very thankful that they did.  I believe in prayer, now more than ever.  Prayer is nothing more or less than talking with God in a personal way.  He hears our prayers.  He may not answer them as we would like for Him to... and trust me, I have prayed to Him many times over the past two and a half decades to relieve me of my own "thorn in the flesh" (as Paul described his own ailment).  He hasn't done that.  I doubt He ever will do that.  Not on this side of the veil, anyway.

 

Maybe God needs me to have a mental illness.  It's a way of keeping me humble, of having to rely upon Him, and to rely upon the prayers of others.  It would be a pretty sad and miserable world if we didn't lift each other up, somehow or another.  But again, I digress...

 

One o'clock.  Two.  Three.  I was SERIOUSLY fluctuating.  It was almost making me physically sick.  I've been trying to eat healthier lately (because, hey, it's time to admit the truth: I'm no longer in college and it's way past time that I start eating like a responsible adult, so no more frozen pizza for awhile) and later on a friend suggested that maybe this episode was triggered by my turning to healthier food TOO suddenly.  I suppose it's possible.  There can be any number of triggers of a manic or depressive (or both) episode.  Sometimes there's no apparent trigger at all: they just happen.  I mention this now, just openly wondering if the change in diet is what precipitated this latest bought with bipolar disorder.

 

And then, almost as suddenly as it began... the episode stopped.

 

Well, it was more of a tapering off.  Fortunately that occurred quicker than an episode usually does.  I could literally feel the episode coming on and now I could feel it abating.  Like a hurricane that passes over a beach, the rain decreasing until there is a measure of peace.

 

The episode was over.

 

Cost to me: a day's lost wages.  And I needed that work.

 

The alternative however, would have potentially been much worse.

 

This is what it is to have a mental illness.  But the good news is that it is controllable, to some considerable extent.

 

I no longer believe that I'm too dangerous to be with others.  Including colleagues on the job, wherever that may be.  Nor do I believe that I would be too dangerous to be in a relationship with someone, if  God were to ever bring a woman into my life (and I would never cease to be thankful to Him for that if He did).

I'm not the person who I was a decade and a half ago.  I think about the Chris Knight who existed then, who was struggling to fight against his own mind and losing that battle ever more with seemingly each passing day.  That Chris is long gone and in his place is the Chris who was always meant to be here.  Someone who can love and be loved.  Who is a hard worker, without depression being a regular hindrance. Someone who isn't going to go out on eBay one night and buy two hundred dollars of LEGO models, just because he saw The LEGO Movie and decided he needed to recreate those characters on his desk.

It's not a perfect life.  But it never will be, for any of us.  We each have our burden to bear.  Sometimes it's just more apparent than others.  I should be thankful, about mine.  I've never turned to drugs or drink to make myself not feel numbness incarnate or to stifle the excess energies.  I've never been homeless.  I've been blessed with a wonderful support system of people who sincerely care about me, just as I care about them.  When I was in southern California I got to see many people who were not so fortunate.  They were obviously mentally ill, had no permanent places to sleep at night, whose meager belongings fit inside grocery carts that were no doubt stolen from supermarkets.

In a different reality, that could have been me.

I'm not thankful enough.  To God or to the people He has put into my life.

I truly hope that someday I can make amends with the people who I have hurt, which stemmed from this disease.

That is the true burden of bipolar disorder that I bear.

Maybe God can make that be so.

 

He has done miracles before.  He can do it again.

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God and mental illness: Why won't He heal my mind?

Obviously the notion entered my mind that maybe this could be an installment of the Being Bipolar series (which there may be much more material for coming soon).  But Being Bipolar is more about the disease itself, and is intended to be a resource for those looking for insight and information from someone who lives with that condition.

What I'm sharing now, on the other hand, has less to do with that aspect of my life than it does with others.  Although mental illness is certainly the precipitant.

It was twenty-four years ago this month that the symptoms of manic depression, or bipolar disorder, first began to manifest themselves in me.  At first it was wildly intoxicating, all the boundless energy and creativity that came seemingly out of nowhere.  I was still looking for a job post-college and failing in that but other opportunities were coming to the fore (like my time at Star Wars website TheForce.net, which gets a bit of interesting light shined upon it in the book I'm currently writing).  Long story short, I was bouncing off the walls with enthusiasm and optimism and sheer drive.  That those seemed to be peppered with moments of despair - like the horrible night that winter when I stripped off all my clothes and tried to freeze myself to death during a snowstorm with temperatures in the single digits - were inconsequential to how inflamed my uttermost being had become.

By early spring however, it was increasingly obvious that something was very, very wrong with me.

That was almost a quarter century ago.  But it seems like only yesterday.  In one way or another bipolar disorder has been in the background of everything that I have attempted or somehow accomplished despite the condition.  It has factored into my relationships (one of which ended in divorce), in my career history, in my choice to leave my old hometown... there has not been a single aspect not impacted by manic depression.

And all along, there has been one question that has been most on my mind: Why did God let this happen to me?

Two and a half decades later, I'm no closer to understanding the reason than I ever was.  But there has been a modicum of comfort to be drawn from scripture.  Second Corinthians 12:9 has the apostle Paul sharing with us that God told him "'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.'"  Or as my Uncle Nub once told me: "Maybe God let you have it because He knew you could take it."

The verse continues: "Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me."  Which dovetails well, I think, with Romans 8:28, a verse that a colleague quoted to me yesterday:

"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

It has taken many years to come to this place, where I am no longer angry at God for allowing mental illness - something that at various times I have described as a "hell" - to strike me.  I better understand now that this is still a fallen world, and not all the medication and counseling remotely possible is going to change that.  I believe that God is the master Healer, and that there is no disease which is not without His power to alleviate.

But even so, disease happens.  It can occur within anyone, with all its nefarious varieties.  I suppose that I should consider myself blessed.  In two months I turn fifty and at my last medical examination the doctor told me that I've the health of someone in his early thirties.  Obviously God has let my physical well-being be good.  That is more than a lot of guys in my demographics get to have.  The only real physical malady I have is anemia, something that prevents me from being a blood donor anymore.  Perhaps sooner than later we'll get to the bottom of what's causing it, because I hate being out of the running with my friends who contribute blood.  But I digress...

With time has come understanding, and I hope a little wisdom.  And it has also brought with it an appreciation for my condition.  Had the economy not taken such a turn downward I might still be enjoying a career as a full-time peer support specialist with the state's department of mental health.  That is a job you literally must be crazy to have, I often tell those who don't know what peer support entails.  I was someone who made use of experiences and intensive training toward helping other people, who also have mental illness, and letting them have a chance at full and meaningful lives.  It was the most personally rewarding work that I have ever done and I would be doing it forever if that had been possible.  I got to be of assistance to a lot of good people.  Some of whom I still keep in touch with, just letting them know I still care about them.

Some people who God has placed in my path at times, have been close to giving it all up.  Have gotten too close to the line separating want-to-live from I-want-to-die.  I've been there too, more times than I can possibly count.  And ironically I got to be the one who convinced them that their lives are worth living.  I got to be someone who saw how precious their existences are, when they could not see it themselves.

It's possible that a lot of people wouldn't be with us still today, had it not been for God letting me have a mental illness that put me in their place first.  But I don't say that to boast.  God can be glorified in even our worst weaknesses.  If some are still alive today, that's His doing and not mine.  I'm just the instrument He chose to use.

And I can and will be thankful for that honor.

I guess the catalyst for this post is that, recently, I did something rather foolhardy and potentially very dangerous.  I attempted to move out of the way of God from healing me.  Or in other words: I tried to be made whole by faith only.

And so it is that I went a few days without my medication.

There wasn't any one agency that led me to attempt such a thing.  At various times across the decades I've earnestly wondered if my faith in God was not enough: that maybe He would heal me if only I had more trust in Him.

I went off the meds and instead I threw myself into prayer and fasting.  I turned toward immersing myself in scripture.  I asked for prayers from others: something which has become a regular occurrence for me and indeed I do not believe that I would be here today were it not for prayers from people dear to me.  I covet prayer now.  Which is another irony, since once upon a time I would have likely laughed at such a notion.

I tried relying entirely on having faith in God, that He would deliver my mind from the torment of mental illness.

And in the end, He did not do that.

After two days being without the meds my thoughts began racing out of control, again.  But I tried to endure.  Sought to increase my faith.  I want to think that my faith in Him is strong enough that it weathered the torture without ceasing to trust Him completely.

I went as far as could be tolerated before going back on the meds.  Blessed relief arrived a few hours later.

So, once again, God did not heal me from bipolar disorder.

Or, maybe He did.  Maybe He still is.

We are told that Luke, the writer of the eponymous gospel as well as the Book of Acts, was a physician.  Doubtless he of all people understood the wondrous qualities of human health and self-care.  I don't know what medications were available circa 60 A.D., apart from a form of aspirin known to the ancient Greeks.  But Luke was in all likelihood well versed in their array and uses.  God gave Luke a capable mind and adept hands to be a healer.  Perhaps God was not dealing out divine intervention toward the healing of those in Luke's care, but He certainly was the ultimate Author of betterment and recuperation.

I have to believe that God gave us a beautiful thing in medical science.  Something that can not so much replace God's place in healing as it does complement it.  In the employ of those dedicated and devoted to the healing arts, medicine is by its very existence a miracle of God.  In its purest form medicine is a thing wholly given over to the betterment of life.

I can't possibly contend that medical science is something God would not want us to make the most of, if it means having better and more purposeful life.

What about when medical science fails?  I have friends who in recent weeks have each lost a loved one to disease.  Is that a judgment against medicine when it could not prevent their respective passing?  No, it is not.  As I said before, it is a fallen world.  Injury and illness have been a part of that imperfection for a very long time and barring God's intervention that doesn't look to change anytime soon.  Nothing is guaranteed.  We can only trust in God and His will, that things are going to work out for the best in the end.  And that's the absolutely best answer that I can give.  But I've seen His will work out well before.  I have to believe that His will, will manifest itself as something that gives Him the glory and proves to be of benefit to us.  God operates on a vaster scale of time than we can comprehend.  And even the failures of the best of our schemes will serve to honor Him, in the end.

Personally, I believe that this lifetime isn't all that we get.  There is more past that.  What form that takes is up to the person living it.  God knows who are His.  For the one who loves God, this life and its afflictions are not the end.  There is something better waiting for us still.  I dream of having a mind that isn't plagued by mania or depression or sometimes both at once.  That is coming, in the fullness of His time.  And that is a great comfort.

I'm not going to willingly go off the medications again.  I've tried trusting God to take my condition away from me.  For whatever reason, He has not done that.  But He has provided knowledge and wisdom and tools that can make the condition much more better manageable than it would be without those things.  Here I am on the cusp of fifty, and with each passing day I feel more like what it is to not have a mind turned against itself.  I feel younger today than I ever have, and it's because of what God has provided many scientists, researchers, and engineers with over the course of the centuries and especially the past several decades.

But of course, it never hurts to pray too.

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BEING BIPOLAR, Part Eleven: A Weekend with Mania

 

Being Bipolar is a series that began in the winter of 2011.  It is an occasional look at what it is to live with bipolar disorder... which some still refer to as manic depression.  A new chapter is posted whenever this blogger feels that the time is ripe for a further examination.  In doing this I try to be as honest and forthcoming as possible, within reason.  I am not a medical professional. I am however a former peer support specialist in the field of mental health, and though I have recently left that post I am still dedicating myself toward advocating for others who experience mental illness.  If you are experiencing a severe crisis and are having thoughts about self harm or harm toward others, please do not hesitate to call 911 or reach out to your most available health care professional.  You may also find help and encouragement from a support group, such as those through National Alliance for Mental Illness (nami.org).

 In the previous installment of Being Bipolar, I documented what it was like to have experienced a depressive episode.  Although in hindsight I see now that I could have done "better" and by that I mean that it was so minor an occurrence that it couldn't possibly be called a textbook case.  A truly severe depressive episode lasts much longer, and is so debilitating that one finds it taxing just to get off of the sofa to use the bathroom.  I got off easy that time.

Some things have changed since that last chapter.  I'm no longer a peer support specialist with South Carolina Department of Mental Health.  Tomorrow I begin a new career, one that will be rather challenging I think.  It will also afford me some more breathing room so far as being in the proper mindset for writing.  I won't deny it: being in peer support has been rewarding.  But it also doesn't pay as much as other mental health professionals earn.  My new job will be earning more money than I would have once thought possible for someone in my position.  So with that worry gone, I think I'll be able to write better than I have in the past few years up 'til now.

But you're probably wondering why I'm writing a Being Bipolar this time.

It so happened that last weekend I was in a severe manic state.  I confined myself to my house for its duration, which certainly bewildered my dog Tammy.  She had to watch me pacing back and forth through every room in the place.  Too wide open to sleep.  Being incapable of writing for a website that I'm committed to contributing toward.   I was WIRED last weekend.

Fortunately I was able to see it coming and I knew what to expect.  And that afforded some capacity to observe and note what was happening to me.

I have said before that I have lost a lot because of having bipolar disorder.  Most especially friendships, family, even a marriage.  It was both extremes of manic depression that wrought devastation but as I've gotten older I can see that it was the manic phases which wrecked the most havoc.  Mania takes whatever you have -- be it good or bad -- and wildly magnifies it to horrific extremes.  Mania makes responsible decision making impossible.  It robs one of any modicum of self control.  It lays waste inhibitions.

Thankfully, the mania has withdrawn in large part, due in no small part to medication and counseling.  I've had to address other aspects of my diagnoses in addition to bipolar disorder.  Especially post-traumatic stress disorder: the spawn of abuses from my childhood.  Mania fed off of that, too.  As I've confronted that, the mania has had less to work with.  I wish I could have been the man fifteen years ago that I am now.  But that's a post for another time...

 So, last Friday afternoon I began noticing that my thoughts were beginning to run faster than usual.  There were too many of them, all playing at once.  I'd already committed to working on a story for the Western Journal website and was looking forward to that.  But over the course of the next few hours my thoughts wouldn't hold course.

By that evening I knew that I was having a manic episode.  A bad one.

I tried my best to sit down at the computer and start writing.  But as soon as I did I had to stand back up again.  Had to walk back and forth as I struggled to keep the thoughts straight in my head.  At 8 PM I thought if I laid down on my bed for awhile that it would give me a little relaxation from the madness.  Five minutes later I was back up again.  Trying to sit at the keyboard and typing SOMETHING but there was too much clutter in my head.

It only got worse.

I had to be careful, that night.  I couldn't sleep.  Neither could I trust myself to not do something stupid.  I would have probably started running circles around my yard if I let myself out the door, just as I found myself running up and down the dirt road when I was back to living with my parents following the separation.

Driving was out.  I also remember the night I was coming back from Greensboro on US 158.  That long stretch of road near Bethany.  Not another car in sight.  I turned off the headlights and floored the pedal, screaming into the darkness and not caring if I went off the road or whatever.  And then sanity returned and I turned the lights on and slammed on the brakes just short of  hitting a deer.

Being on the computer was fraught with peril.  I'm mindful of the time that I was manic, after having watched The LEGO Movie, and I decided that I wanted to replicate those characters on my desk.  So I went on eBay and bought two hundred-some dollars of LEGO sets.

So there was really nothing more to do than endure it.  Suffocating with mania.  Trying to stay afloat in the flotsam of madness.

The very worst of it was the realization by Saturday afternoon that I had become hyper-sexualized.

Overly enhanced libido is a common feature of mania.  Something that has sent many a manic-depressive sailing over the cliff of sanity.  Books have been written by those who have been driven by mania to satisfy sexual longings with anyone and anything.  The risks are enormous.  And yet these do not matter to many who are manic.  Limitations dissolve.  All that matters is the orgasm.

Sophocles is said to have remarked that the male libido is akin to being chained to a lunatic.  How much more so, then, when reproductive biology becomes saturated with frenzy?

There are ways of dealing with inflammation of sensuality.  None of those are very appealing to me, for a lot of reasons.  I believe that intimacy is something to be shared between one man and one woman in the union of marriage.  It isn't to be indulged in thoughtlessly.  Nor is "self satisfying" a solution.  Also, for reasons which do not need divulging.

I will not deny it: I have as healthy an interest in beautiful women as most other red-blooded American men.  I also have a photographic memory for EVERY beautiful woman I have ever seen.  And when one is overcome with mania the tendency is to mentally replay those images in one's head.

It does not make things any easier.

And so turning into a hyper-sexual had to be endured also.  And I did my best to drown out the lust to be satisfied sexually.  Reading from the works of Tolkien helped (lately I've been re-reading The Silmarillion).  So too did music.  By late evening I had decided to lose myself in Fallout 4.  That lasted half an hour, roughly.

I still hadn't slept.  Still hadn't eaten anything either.  I was too energized to be tired.

At some point I found myself dancing throughout the house.  Then I was scrubbing the bathroom sink.  Then doing laundry at midnight.

I felt unstoppable.  I felt invincible.

I had taken my regular nightly schedule of medication about 6 PM on Saturday.  That had done nothing to quench the madness.  But I am thankful for them.  Without medication, the episode would have been worse.

It was now 2 on Sunday morning and I was finally, at last, beginning to feel some slight measure of exhaustion.  I took a sleep aid and some Benadryl for good measure, and crashed headfirst into bed.

I couldn't tell you what time I woke up the next day.  Still manic, but it was abating.  I still couldn't put two thoughts together enough to write something substantial.  The incensed sex drive was finally diminishing (although some would no doubt consider having that to be a GOOD thing about being bipolar).  I felt tired from all of the moving around that I had done the day before.

The need for food began to creep in.  I ate some slices of pepperoni that had been left over from making a pizza several days earlier.  Chased down with some sweet tea.  Then took a look in the mirror and didn't recognize myself.  I shaved and showered and that got the funk of the previous few days off of me.

By that evening the manic phase had ended in vast part.  My thoughts were beginning to be my own again.  This season of madness had joined the many other episodes I have suffered for nearly a quarter of a century.

And I found myself pondering that it had not been so bad, this time.  Rarely had I been able to exert that degree of self control over my impulses.  I hadn't even bought anything outrageous on Amazon or eBay.

Maybe I am getting better.  The Chris Knight who is writing these words today, has come a long way from the Chris Knight of 2007, when I was riding a manic high and doing anything that could make me feel like a cartoon character.  That's not just "wisdom with age" either.  But I also want to believe that it was more than just medication and counseling.

I don't talk about God nearly as much as I should.  My faith is not what it was, now twenty-six years ago this past week when I first committed my life to serving Him.  Yet my journey as a follower of Christ has been and remains the most defining element of my life.  That in spite of how so many times I have screamed at Him, railed against Him, wanted Him to strike me dead so that there would be no more wretched existence for me.

So far, He hasn't done that (yet).

He has given me strength and grace to endure, though.  He has brought me through ice and fire.  He has been with me in the valleys of depression and the peaks of mania.

I couldn't talk about God much in my capacity as a peer support specialist employed by a state agency.  But I can say now, more than my own desire to recover from having this condition, that God has been at work even more.

That's what I found myself thinking after the episode, anyway.

So here it is, a week later.  On the cusp of a new career.  I am NOT looking forward to being on site ready to start training at 6:15 in the morning though!  But I think it'll be okay.  This is a real hands-on job involving precision work (no, I'm NOT going to be a surgeon).  When I was fighting some of the worst of depression and mania years ago, I discovered that assembling and painting Warhammer 40,000 miniatures provided a distraction from my mind.  I think this new job is going to be a lot like that.  It also won't be "work" that I'll be bringing in my head home with me, as happened at times as a peer specialist.  And like I said earlier, it'll be providing a lot more peace of mind financially, that I'll be able to devote more to my real passion, writing.

Yeah, I got through that episode pretty good.

Here's praying that it will be a LONG time before the next one.

 

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Lenten Blogging 2022: Day 22

I can remember the very first time that bipolar disorder reared its ugly head.  It was the second week of January in 2000.  A very snowbound winter.  There was a storm every two or three days, it seemed.

Maybe being trapped inside by incessant snow and ice was a trigger for what came about.  Or maybe it was primed to blow up anyway, at that precise time.  What I most remember was that I became extraordinarily creative.  Inflamed with imagination.  Overwhelmed with energy.  I had received a flatbed scanner for Christmas and I found myself going full-tilt wacko finding uses for it.  Lots of mischief.  I spent two solid months in creativity overdrive.  I was writing.  I was making new images in Photoshop.  I got invited to join the staff of TheForce.net and I readily accepted.

It wasn't all fun and games though.  I was fresh out of college, looking for some sense of purpose about what to do with my life.  There were lots of resumes that went out.  Many, many jobs I applied for.  The one I recall most was with a Christian ministry in Colorado (I won't say which one but it is still one of the bigger ones).  It would have been a chance to use my writing to serve God.  I suppose I was still that "new puppy-eyed Christian wanting to further the kingdom".  I was one of two finalists for that post.  I didn't get it.  That's okay.  I wouldn't have lasted very long in light of what came next.

This was the manic phase of bipolar disorder.  All of the stuff that I was producing, the raw sense of euphoria.  I felt unstoppable.  My imagination and my drive would plow me through every challenge and obstacle.  Sometimes, I felt like I was divinely appointed and nothing would stop me.

The mania lasted through the rest of January and February, and into the first part of March.  And then spring came.

It was all that green, following months of terminal white.  It was too much life.  And suddenly I went the dire opposite of euphoric.  Without warning I became intensely sad.  Was stricken with depression, for the very first time in my life.  I couldn't look at anything without seeing uselessness and purposeless existence.  And when my grandmother passed away, and we had her funeral on my birthday and I served as one of the pallbearers...

A month later I found myself hospitalized in a mental institution for the very first time.  I spent the month of April looking at other people and seeing death reflected back at me.  And for the very first time I found myself wanting to die, so that there could be an end to the pain.

So began the agonizing flip-flop between mania and depression, that dominated my life and in many ways impacts it still.  Though today I have managed to achieve far greater control over my condition.

But I remember.  I will always remember, what it was like those first torturous months.  And I remember the person I became in the years that came after.  I don't know if I'll ever stop regretting the hurt that I inflicted on those closest to me.  Especially, the woman who became my wife and later left me.  But I don't hold that against her.  I don't hold anything against anyone.  This is my cross to bear.  No one else's.

I went public with having bipolar disorder about eleven and a half years ago.  It was an act of desperation, out of the single darkest episode I have ever had.  It lasted months and I was flailing around trying to grab hold of something, anything, that would make it stop.

Some people praised me for coming out as having a mental illness.  The ones I was most trying to impress with it though, it didn't faze them.  But the die had been cast.  I would now and forever be known as a person with bipolar disorder.  As someone whose own mind had turned against him.  With all of the baggage that such a thing carries with it.

Maybe I had to.  It had become too big, too impossible to hide.  I'm a writer.  I write what I know.  I didn't want to know manic depression.  It was a study in madness and I was an unwilling pupil.  Sometimes I tell people, like the ones I work with, that I've earned a doctorate in insanity.

More than eleven years later, and now I wonder: what would have been, had I not gone public with having a mental illness.  Would I have had some semblance of happiness?  Could I have been married by now?  Have children?  Which, has always been what I have wanted most.  And now on the cusp of forty-eight I wonder if it's too late for that.

What would Chris Knight have been, without having lost so much to manic depression?

I love my job.  I'm a peer support specialist with a mental health organization.  That means I'm supposed to use my experiences as one with mental illness, and help others who also have conditions like bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.  I get to help people every day.  This evening I was an hour late getting home, because a patient needed medication and I was asked to pick it up from a pharmacy and deliver it to him.  And there was a sense of accomplishment in that.  Yesterday I found myself comforting a client, who was feeling very distraught.  She called me around noon today, and thanked me for coming to see her yesterday.  I really enjoy knowing that I've helped someone get through a rough time.

But even so... I have lived with the reality of mental illness for well over twenty years now.  As much as I have said it doesn't define me, well... it has shaped my life in too many ways.

What would have been, had I remained silent about having a brain turned against itself?

The two most potent words in the English language:

"What if...?"

And that is my blog post for today.

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Medication mementos

So, it's been a few months since I last shared anything with all two of this blog's regular readers (actually it's more than two, and I am thankful for every visitor, including our friends in County Meath, Ireland).  Lots has happened since then... and relatively little of it much good.

Let me go back a bit to earlier this year.  I had been having some issues with the medications I take to manage my bipolar disorder.  It was so bad that I took two weeks off from work to address them, at a daytime outpatient facility.  It did enormous good in some aspects.  The involuntarily shaking of my body when certain memories arose, that has been remedied with the addition of one new med.  When I got back to work, things were pretty good... for awhile.

But then it seemed that other problems arose to take the trembling's place.  Serious lethargy, chronic headaches (especially in the morning), some weight gain, an increase in racing thoughts, elevated depressive episodes... these and more became the bane of my existence.  What did I do to counter them?

Yup.  More meds.  So many during these past ten months that I can't remember all of them by name.

In August I was prescribed another medication.  One I had taken already, mostly in the early years involving my diagnosis of bipolar disorder.  This was going to make me less lethargic, it was thought.

I wish that I could tell you what happened after that, because I have no solid memory at all.

My neighbors have told me that they found me outside in the rain, dancing about barely clothed.  At one point I was trying to open other people's car doors.  There was other bizarre behavior also.  Some of it I only discovered later.  Like, how I found an oven mitt in the washing machine.  The mitt was filled with my dog Tammy's dry food.  The bottle of pink salt in a closet.  My toothbrush on the coffee table.  I have not one whit of memory about any of this but I trust my neighbors.  One of them said that he had seen this before in other people: a medication reaction.

Then came the next day, when I was found face-down and unconscious on the asphalt on the side of the road next to my house.

I don't remember the ride in the ambulance.  I remember my face hurting like hell though.  I also vaguely remember thinking that I had been attacked by someone.  Now, I'm not sure at all about it.  My face was beaten to a pulp.  It could have been somebody hitting me. It could also have been simply me falling forward face-first onto the side of the road.

At the hospital I had to have stitches in my left knee, and was given a CT scan.  I barely remember a sheriff's deputy taking me home that night.

My supervisor later showed me some of the texts I had sent her.  Something about a Dr. Pepper can "pulsing" and one about Perseus and Medusa.

It had all been a reaction to the new medication.  Thank God I didn't do anything else, or did something that would have harmed my dog.  It's an enormously disturbing thought, that I could have gotten behind the wheel and tried to drive off.

Well, I'm blessed to have some very good people in my life.  One of my best friends and her mother came to my house the next day and we agreed that I needed some time in an inpatient environment.  I called the same place where I had been earlier in the year as an outpatient, and arranged to voluntarily check myself in.

I was a patient for a little over a week.  That's the second time I've been voluntarily admitted to a psychiatric facility.  Involuntary?  Four or five.  Which is almost certainly what would have happened had I not gotten off the med.  That med was the only one of my regimen that I was not given during my stay.

And now?  After missing almost an entire month I'm back at work, as a peer support specialist for the local mental health center.  I'm trying to regain confidence in me, because this ordeal has caused me to no longer fully trust myself.  If I don't remember most of one month, what else don't I remember?  Were there times in the past where I was an entirely different person, but I have no memory of it?

I really could have ended my own life during that month, and not even know that I was doing it.  There have been times when I've had suicidal ideations.  Some of them, quite recently.  But there was always something stopping me from going too far.  I think that letting down my friends, and not being there for my dog, are what keep me from straying past the line.  But what if I lost my faculties completely, and did something to harm myself without my conscious mind knowing it was happening?

Suddenly, my world is a very different place.  One that I can no longer take for granted or believe that I can have complete control over.

And that's what's been happening these past few months, my friends.  Nothing more or less than trying to hold onto some shred of sanity.

Will have more to write again soon.

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EMDR

This blog has been operational for sixteen(!) years now, and it's covered a lot of territory.  Everything from pop culture to weird news to chronicling my run for political office and anything in between.  It's shown readers the inside of a nuclear power plant, to the ancient sanctity of Orthodox Christianity.

But it hasn't depicted everything about my life.  Though there have been times that I've shared glimpses of personal frustration and tragedy, most of what happens on this side of the screen has been shrouded from my audience.  It's been a common lament of mine: how it seems that everyone I know gets to display their blessings and joy over Facebook while I've come up empty in those regards.  And then I'm reminded that people only show the good things on social media, not the bad.  So if that's a crime, then I suppose I'm just as guilty.

However, there are exceptions.  The Being Bipolar series is no doubt the biggest of them.  Hard to believe it'll be ten years later next winter that I began that series, and there is still much more to write about it.  I was first diagnosed with bipolar disorder (or manic depression) early in 2004.  By 2009 it had destroyed much of my personal life, including a marriage.  Being Bipolar began as an attempt to take it back.  On that note, it failed.  But I still ended up satisfied that it's documented my thoughts and experiences with a mental illness.

But it's not my only mental illness.

Early in 2018 came another diagnosis.  I now understand that I have Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  The result of numerous horrible experiences across the span of my life, and especially things that happened during my childhood.  That's never really been written about on this blog.  My best friends and circle of close associates though have seen it only too often.  The times when I regress, and have flashbacks and am immobilized by the weight of memories that cannot and will not leave.  My therapists have helped me find a few strategies for dealing with episodes of PTSD: helping me get back into the moment instead of staying thrust toward the past.  And in vast part they do work.

But that's only addressing the symptoms, not the condition itself.

Yesterday I began what we are hoping may be an endeavor to stem the PTSD itself once and for all.  I had the initial appointment of what will be a series of sessions involving a fairly new therapy called Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing... or EMDR for short.  It came about during the Nineties as a result of investigations by psychologist Francine Shapiro.  It essentially means that via visual manipulation and use of other stimuli (including the use of a gimmick that I've dubbed "the Walkman") my brain is going to rewire itself to route around the parts of it that the PTSD chiefly operates in.  Or something like that.

Not really EMDR since Alex
can't move his eyeballs around

Yesterday's session was an orientation/familiarization with the technique.  And I'm already very much looking forward to beginning it proper.  EMDR has enjoyed great success in helping others address their own PTSD and we think it holds a lot of promise for my own case.

This was already an exceptional week in regard to my recovery.  I cannot discuss much of what transpired, however.  Maybe someday that will be possible.  Maybe, not ever.  The EMDR though, I can and will be talking about that as the treatment progresses.  So, stay tuned!

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BEING BIPOLAR, Part 9: Full Circle (or: Tale of an Odyssey)

(It wasn't MY idea to start this post off with that, honest.  Thanks Nicole!)

A note about this installment of Being Bipolar: it's the longest to date.  There's no escaping that and soon you'll see why.  It's also the most straightforward and absent clever floridity (is that even a word?).  But that has to be too.  It's an account of all that's transpired in the past three years since I departed on this quest for happiness.  Ultimately it became a quest for myself.  And if you press on toward the end, I want to believe that it may help others in their own quest for purpose and fulfillment.

Being Bipolar is a series that began in the winter of 2011.  It's an occasional attempt to explore aspects of the life of a person with manic-depression, or bipolar disorder if you will.  Ummm... I guess it could be pointed out that it's me who is said person.  It's never meant to be a regular feature of The Knight Shift.  It comes along whenever "the time is nigh" for another installment to be committed to the "publish" button.  In this series I do my best to be as honest and forthcoming about this condition as possible, within reason.  As with anything else of this caliber of subject matter, it should be noted that I am not a medical professional.  So don't take anything written here as solid medical advice in the way of drugs etc.  If you need immediate assistance, please go to the emergency rom of the nearest hospital, or call 911 on your phone.  You may also find a great deal of assistance from a local support group, such as those sponsored by National Alliance on Mental Illness (nami.org).

The Journey Begins

Three years ago this morning, in a Camry packed with "the bare essentials" (including a cast-iron skillet, because one never goes on an epic odyssey without a cast-iron skillet) my dog Tammy and I left my old hometown of Reidsville, North Carolina.  Destination: unknown.  Like, literally, unknown.

All I knew is there was nothing for me if I stayed.  That's not a slight toward the people of that area: many of whom are and will forever be dear friends.  But there was no chance of a fulfilling life there for me.  Call it delusion if you must, but one night in February a few months earlier it was as if God Himself spoke directly to me:

"Chris, what are you still doing here?  Your father isn't coming back.  You know there is no happiness here for you.  No purpose.  No chance at family.  You know your dad would want you to be happy.  You know there is something more for you.  So... go!  Just go!  Sell the house and leave and don't give a thought as to where you are headed!  You won't find the happiness you are seeking immediately, and you are going to have to go through much to find it.  But you WILL find it.  Take a leap of faith as you NEVER have before.  Trust Me, Chris.  Leap into the unknown.  Just fill your car with what you think you'll need and take Tammy and the two of you... go!  You will be thankful that you did.  Trust Me, Chris.  And live as you never have before."

Selling the house where I grew up was difficult.  It was harder because of circumstances that need no delving into.  There was no choice in the matter for me.

But there was the issue of my having a mental illness.

I confess: it was intimidating.  It made me question my state of mind (as if it wasn't questionable enough).  But after pondering and prayer, and consulting with that inner circle of closest associates, well... it seemed right.  And then came that day when I said two words to my family:

"I'm leaving."

There was objection.  Some didn't want me to depart.  They thought it was a foolish notion, that I couldn't handle it.  Some wanted me to be placed in an assisted living environment: because the bipolar disorder was too severe for me to have a "normal" life.  And for months they tried to talk me out of it.

There was no convincing me.  There was no going back after those two words.  The path had been committed to.  The Rubicon had been crossed.

And so on the morning of June 12, 2016, I said goodbye at my parents' grave and hit US 158 and headed west.  Why west?  Because my best friend from college Weird Ed asked me to join him for a special nationwide screening of the original Ghostbusters and he was wearing his self-made Ghostbusters uniform.  If that was not an omen, I don't know what was.  Afterward Tammy and I spent an extra day near Asheville and tried figuring out where the heck to go to from there.  Keeping west seemed as good an idea as any...

A photo that speaks for itself.

There's no need to recount everything that happened over the following year.  The meandering path across America.  The many cities, including some towns I had never heard of before (ahhhh Emporia, Kansas: you will forever have a special place in my heart).  Places I had long wanted to see with my own eyes (the Grand Canyon, Dealey Plaza, the Very Large Array, three presidential libraries, the Gateway Arch...).  Native cuisines that had only been spoken of in awed whispers.  Seeing the Pacific Ocean for the very first time on Thanksgiving Day.  Climates I had never endured or enjoyed...

And the people.  So many amazing and unforgettable individuals.  And if Tom in Albuquerque is reading this, I will forever remember the hearty whiff of Sir Walter Raleigh tobacco from your smoking pipe.  That made me wonder if the timing of it was from God, letting me know that Dad was watching over me from afar.

We were on the road for very nearly a full year.  Including four months when I tried settling in San Diego.  Until the rest of my life it is a journey that will define me in no small part.

And then my life went straight to hell.

"You can't go home again."

Betrayal is something I've never handled well.  Maybe I never will.  And after returning briefly to the Reidsville area there came two betrayals from people I had long trusted.  And it very nearly destroyed me.

I had come back from across America seemingly empty handed.  But still hopeful.  Then the first betrayal, by some of my own family.  People who I had counted on to have my back with encouragement and prayer and telling me, as Dad was fond of saying, "Always think positive!"

Instead they gave me criticism and berating and telling me, in so many words, that I was hopeless.  And in a moment's flash I knew: they had to be disattached from.  I loved them and always will love them in a sense.  But it was my own life to find meaning from.  Not theirs.  And to hell with the "assisted living because you're incompetent"!

But then came the second betrayal.  The reason I returned when I did was that a longtime friend had set up an offer for a career far from Reidsville.  It was an opportunity I jumped on!  And then it turned out that my friend was leading me down a road of his own real delusions.  There was going to be no offer at all.

And then there really was nothing.  I had run out of the last drops of hope, of money, of reason to live.  I had even let down Tammy: something I had never wanted to do.  And I thought that she deserved better than a loser like me.

It was in Reidsville, in a hotel room, that I attempted to end my life.  And there's no shame in admitting that.  Not when it figures into what came later.

Had it not been for Weird Ed and his wife, God only knows what would have happened.  They came all the way from their home to where I was staying. We packed up my belongings and placed some in my rented storage unit and after that I screamed into the night at God.  Demanding an answer from Him.  Looking up into the dark sky and proclaiming that He had betrayed me, had lied to me.  Had forgotten me.  Or had let me believe that He had led me to take a leap of faith and there was nothing to come of it.

There had been two betrayals already.  Then betrayal by God.  And that was the worst of the three.

Ed and another friend had been conferring by phone.  They decided that I couldn't be alone.  That I needed to be somewhere.  That I needed time to seriously figure out how to straighten my life out.  Because there were matters in addition to the bipolar disorder that I hadn't faced yet.  One of those diagnosed a few months later was severe complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  And maybe another that hasn't been formally recognized but we're pretty sure is a condition present.

Like I said, betrayal by people I had trusted and by God who I had trusted most of all.  And... what was left?  There was no going back to to Reidsville.  Later I was told that one of my friends had asked the police there to check on me and they told her "Chris has a reputation" among law enforcement there for being sick of mind.  So much for them.  "A prophet in his hometown..." applies to more than real prophets, apparently.

Arrangements were made.  Tammy and I arrived at the home of a friend.  And we stayed awhile.  I thought that was the end of the journey.  That it had been an utter failure.  And when ideations still came to end it all, it was hard to resist those temptations.  I should have given up every hope and surrendered to the realization that my leap of faith had been brought to a wretched and wasted end.

I could not have been more wrong.

The Odyssey: The Second Half

Year One of this "journey of self-discovery" was a physical and spiritual one.  Year Two was even more intensely spiritual.  And it was one that forced me to address my mental state of being as never before.

For sake of confidentiality, most of the details will have to remain spotty at best.  Suffice it to say, my dear friends and hosts became encouragers and tenders to my immediate needs.  Were it not for them, I likely would not be alive writing these words: so deep was the despair I had fallen into.  And it wasn't very long before they began pointing me to resources that would become as magic waters to a soul parched for reason and meaning.

What kind of resources?  One of them was the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).  For the first time in my life, I found myself in a support group meeting.  Going into that Sunday school classroom at a nearby church, I felt weak and intimidated.  But I showed up again the following week.  And the next.  And the next.  A few months later the facilitators were telling me that I had become like a whole 'nother person in the short time I had been coming.  NAMI has since led to new friends coming into my life and a profound kinship with those who are in the same boat as I.  There is even a leadership committee that I have come to serve on.

And then there was "the clubhouse".

It's such a peculiar notion that I had never heard of before and it demands an explanation.  Clubhouse International is a global network of local "clubhouses", each of which presents a model of social interaction and sense of community for people with a variety of mental illnesses.  It's not a place of residence, although it can help members find apartments (and nice ones at that).  But it is place where such can come together during the day and stay busy with... well, a wazoo of activities.  They are not only all across America and Canada but throughout the world.  At the one I was shown there were two kitchens (one for meals and one for breakfast and as a snack bar), a clerical unit where members can use math and organizational skills, so many more.  And there was a video production unit to make a daily in-house news show.

That's a real samurai sword, and she knows
how to use it too!

I applied and was accepted and became a member and threw myself into it and began having fun of a sort as I had forgotten could be had.  Especially with the video work.  Although I can't show it here, for one Friday the 13th I made an opening and closing for that day's show using movie footage of Jason Vorhees and clips of members and staff recoiling in terror as Johnny Cash's "Ain't No Grave" played on the soundtrack.  During the week of Halloween it was making a Stranger Things-style intro with some of the members and staff''s names who were at the clubhouse.  Another day had me crashing a helicopter on the front lawn of the place.

Ummmmm... yeah, I went a little wild with having a full-blown video facility on-site and a captive audience five days a week!  There were also opportunities to return to my roots as a reporter: covering social events beyond the clubhouse itself, and one occasion involving the house being plunged into darkness after a truck crashed into a transformer down the street.  Wherever there was action for the members and staff, I was there with my trusty iPhone and an iPad Pro to edit all the footage on.

It also must not go without saying that the friendships made at the clubhouse I have become a participant of, are many and already very precious.  These are people who have impacted my own life in profoundly astonishing ways, and I can only hope that my own may have made some mark on their own.  That would be a great honor.

It's a place of fellowship and it offered stability.  It gave me a creative outlet.  It let me be distracted from my own mind and despair.  And that's what was needed.  And in the meantime I was led to a new therapist, and a psychiatrist who helped me maintain my mediation regimen and "tweak" it a bit.

That was Year Two in a nutshell.  And in a peculiar way, it was a mirror of sorts of Year One.  Except that I remained in one place instead of being "will of the wind" across America.  And despite what had become a profound lack of faith in Him, I am beginning to see that God was using those two years to heal me.  To prepare me.  To point me toward something greater...

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

What happened next is gonna come across as creepy and maybe even dipping precariously into the dark side of the supernatural.  Feel free to judge me if you so wish.  But had it not been done, the blossoming of the ensuing time could not have been provoked into being.

Again, I must be vague.  But for sake of this chronicle: the "voices in my mind" that would not leave me in peace... the screams and laughter which held me hostage to the past griefs of my life... had become debilitating.  They barely let me sleep.  Were making it impossible to even consider finding work.  Were destroying all hope of peace for my spirit.

Last July, my therapist at the time made a suggestion.  That I should perform a kind of ritual that would serve to sever away the hauntings from my mind.  It was a drastic and daring and radical idea. And I considered the possibility of taking it several steps further.  Instead of doing it "here", I would do it "there".  In Reidsville.  Where it had all started.  The heart meat of the matter.  And now I would be driving a stake through that heart.

Thursday afternoon after this past Labor Day, on the drive to the clubhouse, I realized it was time to end it once and for all.

I packed some things and told my friends that "I'm going to finish this."  They knew what I was referring to.  And I got into the car and headed off into the night for the long, long drive to Reidsville.  It took awhile to get there, on highways I had not intended to embark upon so soon again.

What happened when I arrived in Reidsville needs not be revealed.  I doubt it ever will be for a public audience.  That it was shortly before a midnight when I came to the place of reckoning wasn't my intention.  But there it was: the pitch black of a moonless night, as dark as it gets, in a cemetery.  And had a passing sheriff's deputy seen what was occuring he or she might have thought that it was some work of a lone Satanist or practicer of voodoo.

It took almost half an hour to perform the final part of the reason I had come all that way.  Then with the ritual ended I gathered the materials and returned to the car.  Just before turning the key I sent a text:

"It is done."

So began the trip back to my own life.

When I finally arrived back, I had the first solid sleep that I had known in over a year.  What had come before and wouldn't leave me alone had been buried and left behind.  To quote Kylo Ren: "Let the past die.  Kill it if you have to."

A lot of people might have hated The Last Jedi, but the former Ben Solo's words are going to always hold special meaning for me.  Because he was right.  It wasn't a "supernatural" thing that I did that night.  But in a very real way, it was a magic of the mind that had to be performed.

And it worked.

One Month Later...

I applied for a job, and it was a good one.  And I nailed that sucker!

For six months I was working for a major company.  How major?  You've already most likely dealt with it (no it's NOT the IRS!).  And by the end of my time there the supervisors were telling me that my performance was excellent.  There was hinting that I had a future ahead of me as a management-type.

It wasn't long after starting the job that I got a house of my very own, for the first time in my life.  Even as I write these words, my miniature dachshund Tammy is snoozing contentedly beneath her favorite blanket atop my bed.  There is a kitchen and two bedrooms and the bills get paid and the lawn gets mowed and... well, more or less what most people with houses do (unless you're Donald Trump and your current house has a permanent staff for those sorts of things).

Then came what I have to believe is what God had been preparing me for  during all of those hurt-filled previous years.

The Advocate

"Peer advocate".  That's what the position read.  To apply for the job a person had to be at least eighteen years old and in treatment at least a year for a diagnosed mental illness.  If experience was the critical factor, mine had been an education in the School of Attrition and I'd bloody well earned at least a Masters degree.

So I applied... and the shock of my life was when for some reason they chose me to offer it to!

What does a peer advocate do?  As part of a nonprofit organization, I meet with others who have mental illness.  It could be bipolar disorder, as myself.  Or those with schizophrenia, or borderline personality disorder, or PTSD or a myriad of other conditions.  Some of those situations may be complicated by the presence of struggling with substance abuse.  And I meet them in their homes, in group places like the clubhouse I was taking part in, maybe even places of incarceration after brushes with the law.  But there is no judging.  Because I know what it's like to be judged on account of my own illness.  And I am there to encourage them.  To speak for them if needed.  To show them that they do NOT have to be content with a mere existence of indifference and meds.  That they can have life, and life abundant.  Their conditions may be a part of their life, but they never have to define that life for them.

My job as a peer advocate?  There is not a single night that I go to bed dreading waking up in the morning and going into the office.  And that office is loaded with amazing people who have become not just colleagues and professional laborers, but are already becoming sincere friends.  My own personal office is coming.  There just needs to be some shuffling around of furniture and whatnot.  I'm looking forward to it because there is one bad-a$$ poster from the movie Doctor Strange that is going up on the wall (and a Star Wars LEGO set for my desk).

What do I love most about this job?  The understanding that with each new day, I can go in and have a chance to make a difference for the better in just one person's life.  Maybe even more than one.  And it can be in countless capacities.  Like, the idea hit to begin a therapeutic approach using role-playing games... and that is now a project I'm spearheading.  And that's a lot of fun!

Helping people.  That is what God knew was what I wanted to do most with my life.  Whether it be with writing or teaching or now, being an advocate and supporter of those who also must live each day with mental illness.

And speaking of God...

Reconciling with the Father

I really hope and pray that the past short months have been what finally lets my faith rest in joy and comfort, and never have to waver as it has for so very long.

Maybe my faith had to die, that it could be raised anew.  There would be some symmetry there, would it not?  It's not a determining factor, I know that.  But being led to the job of being a peer advocate is one that calls to the fore every bit of experience that has been accumulated for nearly two decades: the bad and the good.  I know what it's like to be alone and suffering and in the dark places.  Now I get to help others never have to go through that by themselves.  I get to be someone who I wish had been there for me all along.  Maybe God was shaping me to be that kind of person.  It gets to draw upon my education.  My creativity.  My very wacky sense of humor!  Sometimes I wonder if it's all a dream.  Because until now I could not have imagined such a place to be and a purpose to have.

It has renewed my faith in God.  Now, please understand: my faith is still NOT perfect.  It never will be.  Not on this side of the veil anyway.  And there are still issues from my past that I contend with.  But for the first time in my life, since become a Christian all those years ago as a college student... it's like my walk with Christ is one of peace and fortitude.

Want to know something silly?  Well, it seems silly to some no doubt.  But I'm considering being baptised again (yes, I meant to spell it that way: "baptize" seems so jagged and forced with that lousy "z" in the word).  Not as a means of salvation (which I will never believe it can be) or as a sign of first commitment to Christ.  But it would symbolize my "new" new life.  The life that only now am I getting to have.  The shot at happiness and purpose that had not been possible before.

Which brings us to some retrospective.

They Were Wrong

Yes.  They were wrong.  As wrong as anyone could be.  Those who wanted me to stay put.  Who wanted to put me in some cheap apartment for the rest of my life.  Who thought that I was going to be helpless and now I understand that they wanted me to be helpless.  And what they desired for me, had I not rebelled against them, would have been a torturous and meaningless existence that would have ended in dying a life without any joy or purpose whatsoever.

It wasn't with the exact words at all, but my choice was a "screw you!" to them.  I broke away from them.  Took a chance.  Made a leap of faith.  Went off into the unknown.

No, it didn't end as I had thought it would.  But it did bring me to where I am today.  In a home of my own.  In a job that I love.  A real life of meaning and purpose.  Without that rebellion it would have never come to be.  And my little friend and traveling companion Tammy is with me too and crazy as ever!  All I could hope and pray for now is for God to bring a wonderful woman into my life... but my closest friends insist that it's coming.  I like to believe so, anyway.

God brought me here, and I will praise Him for that.  And I will revel in this life and the freedom that has never been had before.  I know of no other way to put it, than the final line of dialogue from the classic film (no not that cruddy remake) Papillon.  Kindly pardon the lingo but:

Why Am I Telling You This?

Because now I am a peer advocate.  And Lord knows, there are lots of my peers out there.  My kind.  My peeps.  My friends and family spread across the width and breadth of the Earth, though we may never meet.

And with these few (?) mean and inadequate words, I am going to be someone to you that I never got to have in my own life.  I am going to tell you that it's going to be okay.  I'm going to tell you that your life is far from over.  I'm going to tell you that you can make it.  That nothing is impossible for you (except break the speed of light... but maybe someone reading these words can figure that out someday).  That you do not have to be relegated to the class of person best left abandoned and forgotten, as some wanted to do with me.

I started out with a soul trapped within a mind turned against itself.  And for one brilliant season, got to soar like fabled Icarus.  And yet, I escaped his own fate and did not fall back to drown.  Whether by the grace of God or the people placed dearest in my life or the resources that were found, I was able to soar even further and higher.

If it can be that way for me, it can be that way for you.  It really can be.  But you gotta hold on.  You gotta keep going.  As George Michael once sang, you "gotta have faith-uh faith-uh faith-uh"!

You can't give up.  Even in your darkest times in the valley.  During those moments when the pain or numbness or both become the most overwhelming. Remember, it's always darkest before the dawn.  Or dawness before the light.  Or something like that.

I nearly gave up.  Too many times.  As I write these words I can't readily number the times I was hospitalized.  Only once was it voluntarily.  The rest were against my will because it was thought that I was a danger to myself.  Never a danger to others.  Just to myself.  Neither can I recall all of the times that I came close to ending my life.  How "the line" didn't get crossed all of the way, I will never know.  By all rights I shouldn't be here.

And yet here I am.  With happiness.  And with the chance for more happiness.  The most I've ever been able to know.

And if you are reading these words and are in the valley and can't see a way out and have surrendered to feeling that it's all hopeless, well... I'm here to tell you that it's a damn lie.  That you deserve to be happy.  It may not be the path that you thought it would be by.  Hey, it wasn't the path that I thought would be the one to happiness, either!  But looking back upon it all, for all the grief pain and betrayal and frustration and screaming at God even, well...

I wouldn't change a thing about it.  The pain turned out to be good.  As John Locke said in an episode of Lost, when asked why he didn't change the past when he and the other survivors had been taken back in time: "No, I needed that pain.  Got me to where I am now."

We are more than our successes.  We are more than our strengths.  We are also our weaknesses.  And it is by our weaknesses that we grow stronger.  We grow bolder.

We become those who get to help others who are going through the same pain we have known.  It is a responsibility that few could ever bear.  Maybe God lets us have it because He knows we can take it.  Because someone has to take it.

Want to know a secret?  The world isn't controlled by presidents, or kings, or generals, or tycoons or tyrants of big tech.  Who are the secret masters of the Earth?  It is the humble and meek.  The ones who show kindness and compassion to others with each new day.  THEY are the ones for whom the world endures and is held up by.  THEY are the ones who God has trusted to lift and edify those who might need and accept encouragement.

And if you are one whom mental illness has also wrought a terrible havoc upon your life, well... who is to say that you are not one of those either?  You might as well believe that you are.  Because I certainly do, without any shred of doubt.

What Happens Now?

The mission of Being Bipolar is now that of an altered trajectory.  Whereas before I was writing as one struggling to describe bipolar disorder out of a measure of self-pity, now it is as one who is accepting and even embracing the purpose God has given me through it.  Does that mean it's not going to plague my thoughts?  Nope, not at all.  As I write these words, I am going through a bipolar mixed-episode that's throwing me back and forth from mania to depression.

(What is a mixed episode like?  Try to envision Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street fighting each other in Thunderdome from that Mad Max movie.)

Starting Being Bipolar was a desperate attempt to win back some broken relationships.  It failed for the most part.  Then it became about trying to have a place in this world.  I don't know if that worked so hot either.  Now it is going to be a proactive mission to help others.  And I am hoping and praying that it might do that in ways it didn't before.

So, if you are one of those who this post has resonated with, I thank you for bearing me with me.  And I would very much appreciate it if you could have an open mind and heart toward those who you may know, who struggle with something that none of them would dare wish upon yourself.  If you cannot do that for me, please do that for them.

For that, I would be uttermostly grateful.

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