BEING BIPOLAR, Part Ten: Anatomy of a Depressive Episode

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.  It's never meant to be a regular feature of The Knight Shift.  It comes along whenever "the time is nigh" for another installment is called for.  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 kind 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).

 

For the past three years and nearly four months I have been a peer support specialist employed by a state department of mental health.  That's supposed to mean that as someone "in recovery" from mental illness, that I'm in a unique position to help others who likewise must deal with having emotional and behavioral disorders.

I wish that I could tell you that this means that I have a handle on my own diagnosis.  But over the course of nearly a year now that assumption has been solidly put to rest.  Because I've discovered that in many ways I'm the same way I am now that I was six years ago, when I first left my old hometown of Reidsville, North Carolina and began looking for a new home.  That was supposed to have been a fresh start for me (and my dog Tammy).  And for awhile, when we initially set out, there was that breath of fresh air that comes with expanding one's horizons.  With casting destiny to the winds of the Lord.  And then came a year after setting out, and a situation that triggered my bipolar disorder as it had never had been before and what led to friends having me live with them until I could get my mind situated again. That was five years ago and I'm no less thankful for them and what they did for me.

Maybe it was "the plague" that triggered me this time.  Nothing has been the same since COVID-19 came (and I was hit with it this past December, I'm pretty sure I caught it when some friends and I went to see Spider-Man: No Way Home because they came down with COVID also).  I worked from home for more than six months and it changed me.  Made me consider and reconsider my life.  I got the "vaccine" early on, because my job puts me at the forefront of public health (namely visiting patients at their homes among other things) and in the year and a half since then I've come to wonder if that was such a wise thing to have done (it's not being called the "clot shot" for nothing, but I digress).

Back to being a peer support specialist and being in recovery.  The more I have recovered, the more I have found that I still have a long way to go toward that.  It's a lot like "the Hell Curve" that I first described in 2011: I'm forever getting closer to that Y line of total recovery, but never going to cross it or even touch it.  I realized that even before last September, and the day my neighbors found me dancing in the rain in my sweatsuit and socks and trying to open other people's car doors.  I don't remember that at all.  Neither do I remember the next day and being found lying face-down next to the road beside my house, my face beaten up like hamburger from the fall onto the asphalt.  Eleven months later and I still can't wink my right eye without feeling some residual pain.  None of that, I remember transpiring.  It was all because of a medication reaction between my "current" meds and one that I have since stopped using.

I lost very nearly a solid month of work because of that incident, which encompassed one week spent in a mental health facility while I was detoxing.  It led to some changes of my work: changes I haven't been crazy about (no pun intended, or is it?).

Long story short, this past week and a half or so I've had a depressive episode that wrecked havoc with me in nearly every aspect.  Were it not for taking care of Tammy, my miniature dachshund, there is no telling what I would have been compelled to do during this time.  Depression sucks the vigor and vitality out of a person.  Takes away nearly every interest including the desire for eating (and sometimes not even getting up to use the restroom, which is no problem if you're not ingesting food anyway).

Today the episode finally began to abate.  I must thank many friends on Facebook who I reached out to, who have been lifting me up in their prayers.  I hope that I can be just as much there for them when they need my own prayers.  I have pretty much wasted an entire weekend except for this afternoon.  So I thought, maybe since it's fresh in mind I could do another Being Bipolar installment (it's only been THREE YEARS since the last one!).

This depressive episode crept up on me.  In hindsight I can see that it was bedeviling me for almost the past two weeks.  It's been so severe, and I was so subconsciously holding it at bay, that I didn't realize it was happening until two days ago.  During this episode I was robbed of any interest apart from the meanest of caring for myself and my dog.  I was eating candy bars for breakfast and nothing else for lunch or dinner.  I fed and watered Tammy but I didn't feel like playing with her.  She "gets" me when I'm like this.  When I curl up on the sofa, unable to move, she curls right up next to me.  Tammy understands me even if no one else does.  I'm pretty sure that I lost some weight during this time.  When I went to see a doctor this past week I had lost seven pounds since the previous visit about two months ago.

My hygiene has suffered.  I went two days without showering for work.  It didn't seem to matter.  I just didn't care.  I brushed my teeth, but that's mostly out of dire habit.  Something ground into me about seven years ago when I realized what depression was doing to my dental care.  I haven't lost any teeth and I don't intend to.  So whenever I eat or drink something I'm inclined to brush immediately afterward or at least as soon as possible (which has become a religious ritual after getting home from work, before I even take Tammy outside).

I have been trying to cook better for myself (thanks in no small part to the encouragement of a good friend, hello Heather!).  A week and a half ago I visited the nearby grocery store and pharmacy to pick up two prescriptions and I had no other interest in shopping for anything else.  Well, I take that back.  I did purchase a box of Froot Loops, and that was "dinner" for a few days.  But again, my overall desire for a good meal had evaporated.

Interest in fun things and activities crashes and burns.  All that's left are the ashen remnants of something that once moved you.  I've been stoked about the current season of Stranger Things lately.  Especially the music.  I had been listening to the soundtrack and reveling in the return of "my kind" of music.  But interest in any music has gone away during this episode.  I've tried to make myself watch stuff like The LEGO Movie, a film that I usually adore, but that failed to move me too.

Depression has caused me to lose interest in my work.  Has led me to seeing it as all a vain effort.  I haven't been able to help others, in the way that I usually can and have loved doing.  I drove a patient to a physician's appointment this past week and I was barely talking at all, when usually we are readily engaged in conversation.  He could sense that there was something wrong, and he told me as much.  It has caused me to forget tasks, has made me indifferent during phone calls to patients.  It's ironic, that I work in a mental health office and my own mental health has caused that work to suffer.  But then again, my life has been filled with a lot of cruel irony.

This coming Wednesday would have been the twentieth anniversary of my getting married.  A marriage that was destroyed in vast part by my bipolar disorder.  I still can't make sense of that.  It was something I was committed to as much as anyone could commit to something.  And it wasn't enough.  Why did God let me have something that was going to wreck such havoc on an institution that He Himself created?  That has been a thought that has run rampant through my mind during this time.  I suppose that no matter how happy I might be, I'm going to forever be running that through my mind.  It hasn't been made any easier because of this latest episode.  And the proximity to the date has only made it worse.

Strangely, my faith in God this time is something I'm not doubting.  A quality that I must ascribe to not only my friends' prayers, but to all the other times I've had depression.  In its lesser moments I can find myself able to pray, and to solicit prayer.  I don't doubt God, even when it seems the depression is something cruel He lets happen.  I have to remind myself that being a Christian does not mean an escape from pain: something I wish I had known during the first few decades as a believer.

I would be remiss if I did not mention, that there have been moments during this latest episode when I have not wanted to be here any more.  When I've actually prayed to God to please let me die.  But that's a different thing from having full-fledged suicidal ideation.  Something I've come to learn increasingly during my work with those with mental illness.  It's almost okay, maybe perfectly "normal", to have thoughts about not wanting to be alive any more.  It becomes something else entirely though, when those thoughts turn toward contemplating getting a knife to open one's veins, or ingest a whole bunch of drugs and hope that they will lull one into an eternal slumber.  I will admit, that I have tried the latter at least twice.  Both times failed, thankfully.

Also thankfully, the episode seems to finally be abating, and maybe writing these words out is aiding toward that.  More irony: I've lamented in the past week or so that I haven't been able to write anymore, and here I am, composing a new blog post.  Not just blogging but really pouring my heart and soul into this new installment of Being Bipolar.  Maybe if I can write this, perhaps other things that I've thought I'd lost will come back.  Writing is a gift that I first realized I had when Mrs. Rutledge in my freshman year of high school told me I had.  I've been trying to use, develop and hone that gift ever since.  Manic depression over the past two decades and more took a LOT out of me toward that.  Maybe writing this post means I still have it.  Maybe I can write more.  Perhaps even work anew on that book that Dad wanted me to write.  Dad was proud of me.  I was very fortunate to have had him in my life.  I want to finish writing that book, and dedicate it to his memory.

And, that's all that I know to write about this latest bout with bipolar depression.  It is my "dark fountain": a term I have been it from the very beginning, when it first erupted in the spring of 2000.  Its black waters trying to swallow and drown me, and I doing everything that can be done to keep my head above its currents.  Maybe writing about it this time will help to stop the fountain, if only for a little while.

Maybe doing this will help others also, who are going through their own times of depression.

If so, please know: you are not alone.  There IS help.  Your local mental health department is one resource.  So are groups like National Alliance on Mental Illness, or NAMI (nami.org).  If you are in a severe crisis, you can call 911.  It's okay, it really IS an emergency.  And as of yesterday there is a simple three digit number - 988 - that you can call to get help from a national suicide help line.

And if you need a friend to talk to, I'll do my best to be here for you.  My e-mail is theknightshift@gmail.com.  I've communicated with quite a few people over the years that Being Bipolar has been a feature on this blog.  I'll do what I can to be here for you, too.

 

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Bipolar Disorder: Research proves that... it wasn't a choice

Note:  This blog hasn't been the same lately.  I don't know if I should keep going or not.  What do you think?

The night before...

The recent state of this blog is reflecting my personal life, and it has nothing to do with just turning 40.

40 is the biblical number of completion.  Moses was 40 when he fled Egypt and it was 40 years later when he returned to lead his people to freedom.  It was 40 years after that when the children of Israel arose to take the land promised them.

Jesus was in the wilderness for 40 days, fasting and being tempted by Satan.  Only after that did He begin His ministry.  Noah and his family endured rain for 40 days and 40 nights.  No doubt there are other examples.

(I haven't seen the Noah movie.  I don't plan to either.  When I heard there were Ents in it, and Noah tries to kill his granddaughter, I knew it wouldn't get my hard-earned money.)

Many people would turn 40 with dread.  It didn't even register with me.  I guess one of the reasons is that I'm just happy to have survived my 30s: a decade that very nearly killed me.  I'm not kidding.  It certainly did see my life almost destroyed in too many other ways.

For the past few months things have gone very horrible in my personal life and I'm struggling to understand the whys and the hows of it.  I'm no closer to understanding.  God isn't providing any wisdom, but I guess He doesn't have to to begin with, does He?

Last week though, He did provide something that, well... it has come as both a great relief and a saddening understanding.

It was a friend with a far more brilliant mind than most who passed along the news to me.  I'm glad she did.  In the week since I've studied everything I can about these findings and more than I can express in words, I have felt a tremendous burden lifted from my heart and soul.

Last week new research was published by a team at the University of Michigan, having to do with bipolar disorder.  Which has been the biggest bane of my existence, for far longer than I initially realized.  My bipolar intensified severely beginning more than ten years ago and if it hadn't been for counseling and coming across the right combination of medication, I would probably be dead.

The researchers at University of Michigan took skin samples from volunteers who did not have bipolar, and an equal number from those who are afflicted with bipolar.  Those skin cells were induced to become stem cells and with further coaxing, made to develop into neural tissue (something that never ceases to amaze me).  For the first time, the behavior and function of bipolar disorder neural cells could be examined at length.

Neurons of Bipolar Disorder individual
(photo credit: Univesity of Michigan)

The findings were extraordinary.  The neurons of those with bipolar disorder were found to function radically different from those of "normal" people.  For one thing, they communicate with each other drastically different from mainstream neurons: at times uncontrollably.  Signals can often spin out of control.  There are more genes which express themselves into receptors for calcium ions, needed by cells to send signals to each other.  There are far more synapses and dentrites present than those of non-bipolar individuals.  It is now believed that bipolar neurons are already activated at the embryonic stage and continue to affect brain development throughout an individual's life, manifesting especially in the early years and young adult phase.  Additionally, the researchers discovered how lithium "calms" the neural activity down, though its effectiveness can differ from individual to individual.

Another group of researchers a few weeks earlier announced that 3 genes have been found which are associated with bipolar disorder.  Between that and the study of bipolar neurons, it is truly an exciting time for bipolar disorder research.

It's stuff like this that makes me thankful for modern medical research.  And this is only the beginning.  At last, science is starting to have an understanding of bipolar disorder and how it may be treated.  In the future, treatment may be possible for those with bipolar on an individual basis, instead of trying one drug cocktail after another attempting to control it.

But even so... I have a mixed reaction to all of this.

Because now I know that there wasn't a choice. There was never a choice.  None at all.

I was going to have bipolar disorder.  I was going to have bipolar disorder.

For those in the future, there may well be effective treatment for bipolar disorder.  But for me, it is too late.

From before I was ever born, the chromosomes were poisoning the well.  The neurons were working their mischief.  Subtly altering how my brain was developing.  Making seemingly inconsequential shifts in my brain's structure.  Setting up a time bomb set to explode years down the road.

It was going to happen no matter what.  We know without any doubt now.

My grandmother, we are now certain, had bipolar disorder.  Her father before her suffered mental illness and we also now believe it was bipolar.  My grandmother had two children and each of those have two children.  Neither my father or aunt have bipolar.  Nor do my sister or my two cousins have bipolar.  Instead the genetic roulette wheel landed on your friend and humble narrator, Robert Christopher Knight.

I guess if it had to be someone, I should be glad that it was on me.  Bipolar disorder is something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.  If somebody had to lose the dice roll, I would volunteer myself rather than see anyone else suffer.

I have bipolar disorder and from the earliest possible point, it was something I was doomed to be hit with.  There is a sense of relief and vindication (as one commenter on this blog put it) in knowing at last that this wasn't a "character flaw".  One of the things that being bipolar has taught me is that the mind and soul are two VERY separate things.  There is the flesh, there is the mind, and there is the soul.

My heart and soul are untouchable by bipolar.  But this fallen world can - and has - done plenty of damage to my body and mind.

It was a disability that was poised to strike without my having a say in the matter.  Another thing that bipolar disorder has taught me is to have a much deeper humility and appreciation for those things that I do have, because there are many people who are worse off than I will probably ever be.  You can't understand a disability until you yourself have one... and I pray that nobody else would have to suffer a disability.  Especially this one.

I am relieved.  I am thankful for the new research.  And at the same time I have a sense of grief.

Bipolar disorder, I see now, has always been there and making me "different" from others.  Bipolar disorder has destroyed opportunities which I regret were missed.  It has cost me friendships.  It cost me my marriage.  And lately it has come very close to completely derailing my freelance writing career.

And apart from a regimen of medication (which sometimes is not completely effective) and regular counseling, I never stood a chance to not lose all of those things.  Things that were very precious and dear to me.  And still are.

But again, if a person, especially a person in my family, had to be hit with bipolar and suffer the consequences of everything associated with it, I would rather it have been me and not them.

And yet, I can't bring myself to rail against God for any of that.

Have I cried out to Him before because of this?  Absolutely.  But this is something that I just can't find a reason to charge Him with anything.

Because if He knows that I have this and was always going to have bipolar disorder, then I have to trust that He understands completely, and even better than I possibly could.

I have to trust that God didn't allow this to happen without some purpose.  What that purpose is, I have no idea.  I may never have any understanding of it.

I trust that God knows all of this, and that in His own time He brings healing.  He brings restoration.  He brings wisdom.

And He brings hope.

I have a hope now that those yet to come will never have to go through what I have because of bipolar disorder.  If I can play any part in that, however small, then I will consider that to be the greatest honor that one can have in this life.  I may have had no choice in being hit with bipolar disorder, but I can and do choose to do what I can to help others who have this devastating mental illness.

Actually, come to think of it... that isn't really a choice at all, either.

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Clawing my way back from bipolar depression

In light of the e-mails that came asking if things were okay on this end, I'm feeling led to address why I've been absent for the better part of the past two weeks.

There's really no other way to put it: I got hit with a bipolar depressive episode.  The worst that I have had to go through in a very long time.  And it absolutely robbed me of my desire to write or to post anything at all.  Apart from a few Twitters or Tweets or whatever they're called, my activity online was a fair reflection of my activity in real life: pretty much nil.

I've written about bipolar depression before, but this latest bout refreshed in my mind how horrible this condition is and how I would never, ever wish it upon any person.  One moment, you're feeling high on life.  And the next, totally without warning, your interest in everything flatlines.

I could not be interested in this blog.  I could not be interested in the news.  I could not be interested in Star Wars.  I could not be interested in the music of "Weird Al" Yankovic... and as Homer Simpson once observed, "He who is tired of Weird Al is tired of life."

I was not living, but only existing.  Bipolar depression is like a torturously-long drawn-out death: you want to live, but you don't know how to live.  You don't know how to want to know how to live.

There were entire days during the past two weeks when I wanted to die and get it over with.  To welcome Heaven or oblivion, because either would be better than the hell I was going through.  Once upon a time I might have considered taking steps toward ending my life and putting a stop to the pain.

In fact, one person I know, did just that in recent days.  A very good, sweet and devout Christian person.  I don't know if she had bipolar but she was suffering from an agony that nobody can possibly understand without experiencing it personally.

Sometimes I wonder if someday, that might be me too.  If the pain will become too much to bear and my cries to God seem so unheard and neglected that I feel no other alternative than to "opt out".  Because I didn't consider doing that these past weeks, but there certainly were times when I asked Him to just let there be an end to it all.

I know it's not "me".  I know it's the bipolar.  I know it doesn't last forever.  It didn't this time and it won't next time either.  And my prayer is that everyone who goes through any kind of mental illness might realize that and hold onto it during their times in the valley.

Were it not for the honor of being in a best friend's wedding last weekend, my girlfriend's presence and encouragements, and a few other things, I wouldn't have been able to get out of this house at all.  Okay, Tammy the Pup still needed walking a few times a day, so there was that.

Thankfully the episode is retreating.  My interest in life is returning.  Kristen tells me often that I won't have this problem so severely after we're married (parse that as one will, heh-heh...) and Lord willing that will be sooner than later.  My desire to write is coming back and I'm going to try to make up for some stuff in the next few days (not the least of which will be a review of Man of Steel: a film which I am increasingly of the mind is the best superhero movie made to date).

Okay, back to work I go...

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Today's DILBERT a must-read for people with bipolar (like me!)

Dear Scott Adams:

Today's edition of your comic strip Dilbert is one of the most encouraging - and one of the funniest - cartoons that I've come across in a long time. As a person with bipolar disorder and on behalf of many others who must deal with having a mental illness, thank you for giving us something to laugh and smile about :-)

I think after reading this, I'm gonna begin referring to most other people as "normals" and myself as... how does "meta-human" sound? :-)

Sincerely,
Chris Knight

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Ed Stetzer on Christians, churches and mental illness

This past weekend Matthew Warren - the son of Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church and author of The Purpose Driven Life - took his own life after struggling for years with mental illness.  In the wake of this tragedy there has already been considerable reflection by many among the body of Christ about mental illness and what our reaction should be to it.

Ed Stetzer, the president of LifeWay Research, has a very good guest essay on CNN.com.  Titled "My Take: How churches can respond to mental illness", Stetzer relates his own experiences with Christians plagued with such conditions and how churches should and should not approach it.  From his article...

The first time I dealt with mental illness in church was with a man named Jim. I was young and idealistic - a new pastor serving in upstate New York. Jim was a godsend to us. He wanted to help, and his energy was immeasurable. He'd visit with me, sing spontaneously, pray regularly and was always ready to help.

Until he was gone.

For days and sometimes weeks at a time, he would struggle with darkness and depression. During this time, he would withdraw from societal interaction and do practically nothing but read Psalms and pray for hours on end. I later learned that this behavior is symptomatic of what is often called bipolar disorder or, in years before, manic depression.

I prayed with Jim. We talked often about the need for him to take his medicine, but he kept asking God to fix him. Eventually, at his lowest point and filled with despair, he took his own life.

As a young pastor unacquainted with how to deal with these events, I found myself searching for answers. I realized two things:

First, people with mental illness are often attracted to religion and the church, either to receive help in a safe environment or to live out the worst impulses of their mental illness.

Second, most congregations, sadly, have few resources for help.

Stetzer has much more to say about Christians and mental illness, but you'll have to click on over to read it all :-)

As a Christian with bipolar disorder, I can readily identify with Jim and his story.  In fact, everything he went through is something I have also had to endure except for taking my own life... and believe you me, I have felt like wanting to do that more times than I can count.  I've even been hospitalized more than once because of that. It does not mean that I or anyone else is weak or bad or beyond the forgiveness of God.  What it does mean is that we know a pain that is more excruciating and self-destructive than can be known by anyone without bipolar or other mental illness and we just want the pain to stop.  It IS that horrible a thing to live the rest of your life with.  Sometimes I honestly don't know how I've made it this far but if it's at all within my power, I want to use this blog to encourage others and help them find the strength to keep going.  Followers of Christ have it no easier to endure this than anyone else and sometimes I wonder if the spiritual expectations of ourselves might even make the pain worse.  Stetzer's article is a brief but brilliant resource from which to begin meditating upon being Christian and being affected by mental illness.

(Speaking of bipolar, I currently have four installments of Being Bipolar on the front burners... but I can't figure out which one to run with first!  Maybe the write-up I've been doing about what it's like to have one-on-one counseling.  Or the one about bipolar disorder and loved ones who are affected by your having it.  Or about drugs... yeah maybe the drugs one.  Drugs are cool.  No not like that...)

A very big tip o' the hat to Mark McGinnis for finding this article!  Be sure to visit the blog that Mark and his spousal overunit Dalerie maintain :-)

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SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK hits hard and triumphs wildly for this bipolar viewer!

Last night I finally saw Silver Linings Playbook, the movie that came out late last year with Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro and Chris Tucker. My girlfriend Kristen watched it with me. In retrospect this was not a movie that I could have watched alone and she really was the only person that I could have watched it with.

Silver Linings Playbook is a movie that everyone who has ever suffered from bipolar disorder should see. It is a movie that everyone who has ever had a bipolar person in their life should see. It is a movie that every possible kind of person that I know of, should see. It was not only the best movie that I've seen in a theater since The Artist last year, it is also the movie that I am finding myself wishing more and more could have been made long ago and one that I will absolutely be watching again and again and again.

This is the definitive film about mental illness for our generation. About what it is to have to live with it day after day after day. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest depicted mental illness but that was for the most part a device examining what it means to be an individual against "the machine". Silver Linings Playbook honestly and brutally depicts what mental illness is: a disease that must be endured. By many, many people. By people like me.

(As an aside, Chris Tucker's character is like many who I have known during bouts in the mental hospital. But there is no way, no how that he could have gotten out like that once, much less twice. Trust me, I've tried...)

Pat - Bradley Cooper's character - in Silver Linings Playbook? That's me. So help me God, it really did feel like I was watching myself up on that screen at times (minus the garbage bag). There is so much about Silver Linings Playbook that resonates with me. Why? Because there was so much of myself that Pat goes through in this movie, it's not even funny. And after just one viewing I can't possibly count all the things that he and I have in common...

The hospitalizations. The meds (there is only ONE drug which Pat talks about having that I have never been on). The wife leaving. Being without a home and getting taken in by Mom and Dad. The restraining order to stay 500 feet away from your spouse's home and place of work. The late-night manic episodes. The late-night manic episodes (I meant to emphasize that). The law enforcement officers having to come to your house (several times). Thinking that you can go off your medication when you really can't. Believing that you can reconcile... maybe being obsessed about it... with your estranged spouse. Writing the letters. The reminders - like the one that played at Pat's wedding - which bring back the memories and the pain much MUCH harder than anyone without bipolar can begin to imagine. Having people in public watch you with manic depression and not caring a damn what they think. The horrible weight gain that the medication can cause and yes Seroquel did make me feel foggy and bloated (I went off of it in November of 2011 and have since lost more than 50 pounds). Wondering how the hell you can possibly have anything at all like a normal life.

Heck just as Pat does, I had something taped to the wall next to my bed in the hospital to serve as a source of encouragement. It wasn't "Excelsior" like what he did though. My first hospitalization was in the spring of 2000. At the time I drew the cartoon character The Tick reminding me that "You're not going crazy... You're going SANE in a crazy world!" I still have that drawing somewhere too.

Pat is a substitute history teacher. I have a history degree and have substitute taught. He has a very strange psychiatrist. I have a therapist and a psychiatrist (make whatever of that which you will). The entire neighborhood knows about Pat's mental illness. All two of this blog's readers know about my mental illness.

You wanna know something? I thought that Pat's struggle with bipolar was dead-on accurate. But I also found myself thinking "Why couldn't I have had it as easy as he does?"

Real mental illness is no motion picture. It's an unrelenting and unforgiving fact of life. Believe that if you believe nothing else that I'm writing here.

And it's weird, but true: the last time I was in a psychiatric hospital, in June of 2009, a counselor there told me that I was seeing the darkness but that God had to... had to... have a silver lining for me. Just as Pat talks about often.

But you wanna know what else about Silver Linings Playbook resonated with me? It's the love that Pat finds with Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence, and I see now how she won that Oscar last week). Now to be sure, Kristen does not have a mental illness. But she is beautiful. And she is an amazing dancer. She has taught me how to dance as much to life's music as on the studio floor. How to look beyond my own past, my own failures. How to love and be loved. How to let go of things holding me down and to look forward to the future.

Some have written that Silver Linings Playbook is just "wishful thinking". That it's a story with too happy an ending. That it's a "storybook" ending even.

Silver Linings Playbook ends with our bipolar hero happy and optimistic, with his beautiful and talented dancer girlfriend in his arms.

Maybe some of you think that's not a very real ending to a story...



...but there are some of us who have our own Silver Linings Playbook. And it does end happily ever after!

Silver Linings Playbook is possibly the movie that in all the years I've had this blog, I would most want its readers to go and see for themselves. You will laugh and you will cry. You will wince with pain as you see what Pat and Tiffany and the people in their lives go through. And in the end, you will applaud. And I'll pretty much promise that you'll come out of the theater a better person for it.

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Yes, it can really be like this...

Bipolar Bear, whose entire appearance in the animated series The Tick was for a whopping 8 seconds (series premiere The Tick vs. The Idea Men, 1994):

Heh-heh, love it! I've thought since the beginning that The Tick was one of the most intelligent, cerebral and funny shows to ever come out of animation. Nothing of the past decade and a half comes even close. The Nineties seriously was the height of the animated series as an art form and The Tick embodies everything that was good and pure about that era.

Speaking of bipolar disorder, I currently have three new pieces for Being Bipolar on the burner... and I can't figure out which one to run with next. Recent events complicated matters in terms of issue appropriateness, if anyone's curious. I'm hoping to have a new one up real soon.

And no, I don't mind laughing about my own mental illness. Not at all. When you're in a spot like me, you have to. But even so, I'm thankful for The Tick to have made it funny as only it could :-)

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It's funny because it's true

I am NOT an uncommitted voter.

I've been committed 3 times...
and I'm still not crazy enough
to vote for Obama or Romney!

 

(I don't mind at all laughing at my own mental illness. Especially if I can use it to laugh at the stuff that really deserves it.)

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Kristen's Korner: "My Bipolar Boyfriend"

Yesterday evening the lovely and effervescent Kristen told me that she had composed a lil' something for this blog. I had no idea she was working on this, but after reading it I couldn't help but think that she expressed some things about bipolar disorder better than I have and maybe ever could. And she wants to write more stuff for this site, too! So expect more out of Kristen's Korner from here on out.

So without further ado...

"My Bipolar Boyfriend"

First, I’d like to thank Chris for letting me borrow his blog. I don’t have the time nor the patience to keep up a blog of my own, but I do (on occasion) feel led to write, and requested a venue to share my thoughts.

Second, I’ll introduce myself. My name is Kristen Bradford. You’ve perhaps seen my name referenced in Chris’ entries, or even seen pictures of me on here in the past year. I am proud to have earned the role of “Chris Knight’s girlfriend.” He is my first boyfriend - the only serious relationship I’ve ever had in my 27 years of life, and I can honestly say I have never been so happy before.

Now that I’ve gotten the housekeeping things out of the way, it’s time to delve into what I want to talk about... bipolar disorder.

Those of you who have been reading The Knight Shift for some time will know that Chris has not kept his mental condition a secret. In fact, he wants you to know about it. We were barely in the “open communication” stage on eHarmony when he revealed his condition to me. At the time, although I had heard of it, I didn’t really know much about it. Fourteen months later, I am still struggling to understand what bipolar is... although I never truly will, since I don’t have it.

***
I am one of those people that likes to help others. Whether it’s a friend who needs someone to listen, or a veteran’s disability case I’m working at my job, I want to do whatever I can for others. So it’s been difficult for me this past year, because although Chris has become the person I am the closest to, I can’t always fix things. Sometimes he calls me in the midst of a bipolar episode. All I want to do is comfort him and help him feel better, yet I may fail in doing so. Those are the times that I feel inadequate as a girlfriend, wishing I could do more.

But I am slowly learning that I can’t just fix bipolar. Chris is always going to have it (unless, God-willing, a cure is discovered). Nothing I say or do will make it go away. Chris may be a person of reason, but bipolar doesn’t deal with reason. He has to battle his mind, a mind that wants to trap him in either a state of depression or mania. I cannot fully comprehend what that must be like, and honestly I don’t think I want to know.

All I can do is be there for him. If he needs to talk - even at 3 in the morning - he knows I’ll be there to answer the phone. I’m not going to fix his condition, but I am someone he can lean on when he needs it.

What makes this difficult on the loved ones surrounding someone with bipolar? First, you never know when an episode will strike. Although medicine does wonders, it isn’t a cure. Episodes still happen (but luckily, they do pass). It’s especially hard for me, though, when Chris is at his home and I’m at mine - about an hour and half away - and I can’t physically be there for him during an episode. Sometimes episodes will put a monkey wrench in plans that have been made. But that can happen with any type of illness - even the common cold or a stomach flu. I am trying to remind myself that although there may not be much projected outward (since it’s a purely internal disorder), that doesn’t negate the fact that it is a medical condition that may require time apart until Chris feels better.

I’m also learning that bipolar is nobody’s fault. It’s not my fault if he gets depressed or recalls a bad memory - I just may happen to be there when it happens. It doesn’t mean I caused it (which is taking me a while to understand). And it’s certainly not Chris’ fault. Chris is a genuine, decent, and honest person that I am thankful to have in my life. He is one of the kindest people I have ever met. But because of bipolar, he has done things in his past - and even a few things since we started dating - that can be attributed to the bipolar, not him. I cannot blame him for a mind he can’t always control. He is always apologetic, regretting what has happened, but I know the true Chris inside is not the person that bipolar may portray him to be.

That’s what I want people to recognize - bipolar doesn’t define a person. It is, unfortunately, a part of the person that has it. It’s like Bruce Banner and the Hulk. The Hulk is inside Bruce, but Bruce can’t control when he turns green or what havoc he may cause afterward. But the Hulk doesn’t define Bruce Banner - Bruce is an intelligent scientist who uses his talents to help others (anyone watch “The Avengers” this summer?). But there are times he gets angry, and the Hulk emerges - ready to smash! Can Bruce Banner be blamed for what the Hulk does?

***
What do I want readers to take away from this?

-Remember that bipolar disorder isn’t an easy thing to deal with - for the person suffering OR the loved ones surrounding.


-You have to learn patience. It may take a while to find the right medicine to manage the condition, and episodes can be difficult but do pass.


-Don’t give up. If you have bipolar (or any mental condition, for that matter), remind yourself that it can’t keep you down forever. Rely on your support system, your counselor, your medicine. You are not alone. And to those who know someone with a mental condition - please don’t give up either. Don’t give up on that loved one. It’s not going to be an easy road to walk, but you may be the only support they have.

I know that life has its ups and downs, and may be moreso with Chris and I, as he goes through life managing his disorder. But I wouldn’t take any other road than the one I’m on. We all have our burdens to bear - Chris just has one that is more difficult (yet less visual to others) than most people. Despite the bipolar, he can still have a normal life. And I’m honored to be part of it, and know we will get through whatever challenges may arise down the road.

Bipolar may not be easy to live with or have a cure... but it is controllable, and doesn't have to stop those affected by it from enjoying life. Chris and I are certainly enjoying ours.

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BEING BIPOLAR, Part 6: Back In The Saddle Again

This is the sixth installment of an ongoing and admittedly irregular series on The Knight Shift about what it is like to have the mental illness called bipolar disorder. I am attempting this endeavor with candor, with honesty, and at times with humor. If you're a new-ish reader of this blog you may wish to read the previous entries of Being Bipolar and check out the video supplements along with them. You don't have to go back into previous essays in order to "get" what I'm writing about this time, but you are certainly invited to read them at your convenience :-)

So it's been awhile since I did an installment of Being Bipolar. Like, more than a year.

Much has happened since then. Mom passed away. There have been other family and friends that have also left us. But also, many new family and friends have come into my life as well.

I've been able to do the first bit of serious traveling that I could enjoy in a long time. I finally have that female miniature dachshund that I've been threatening to possess.

The second most important thing that's happened is that God brought a very wonderful, sweet, godly and beautiful woman who I am madly in love with into my life... and for some reason or another she seems to be madly in love with me too.

Most important, is that I can see now how everything that I have gone through has drawn me closer to God than I've ever been before.

Are there regrets? Yes, absolutely. Regrets that I can't doubt I will continue to carry with me until the end of my days in this broken world.

But I have also seen God's wonderful hand at work, that He has always been holding me. I would have to say that one reason for the absence of writing about the bipolar has been that, I was able to let go of some things that were beyond my control. Things that I was desperately trying to fix and could not. And I had to finally acknowledge to myself and to Him that "God, I can't do anymore. I've done all I can. This is Yours to handle. Take it."

I had to reach a point of complete physical, emotional and spiritual exhaustion from my own efforts, and do what I should have done months earlier: lay that burden down before God, not knowing or even caring what He might do with it.

How could I have possibly known that He was preparing me to have so many good things?

In spite of it all, I was able at last to forgive myself for the wrongs I had done and for the things which went wrong that I could not have prevented and yet carried the burden of. And when I did that I was able, for the first time in my life, to experience the utmost joy of the grace of God.

I would go through it all again, if I had to, to reach the place where I am now with Him. With where He has put me. With where He is taking me still.

What have I been doing for much of this last year and more? Beholding His mighty hand.

I would say that all things considered, this past year has seen me able to be happier than I've ever been at all before.

And still lurking in the background of it all is the mental illness that nearly two years ago I publicly disclosed that I have.

From One Never-Ending Battle...

In one way or another, bipolar disorder has factored into nearly every major aspect of my life and way too many smaller ones. In fact, even as I write this I am experiencing a bipolar depressive episode. It makes putting my thoughts together and being motivated to write much more difficult than it would be for me under "normal" circumstance. It's one of the reasons why I haven't composed a Being Bipolar post all this time: so many false starts that I couldn't push myself through to complete.

It might be different this time though. I'm on a new medication for one thing. I'm still taking a daily dose of the other drug: the only drug we've found among the wild plethora of pharmaceuticals across this past decade which has allowed me to keep the bipolar in check. The new drug... which I am still getting accustomed to... allows me to be more productive during the depressive episodes especially. It's letting me be more physically fit as well. The previous drug I was on caused a weight increase that... well, was pretty heinous for a guy of my build, not to mention bringing about considerable lethargy. I have lost around fifty pounds since going off of that rotten stuff this past November. Physically I'm in the best shape that I've been in years. My newfound hobby of ballroom dancing might have something to do with that too, but anyway...

My mood is drastically more stable than it was over a year ago. Sometimes I've wondered if it might have been a good thing to wait this long before another Being Bipolar. In the short term you can't see much change one way or another. Only in retrospect, when you're able to study the data over a prolonged period of time, can you be confidently assured that yes, you really are observing yourself getting better.

There are new strategies that I have discovered and developed since last time that help me keep the bipolar in check. I'm going to be talking about some of those during a future installment. One of them, well... let's just say that it would be totally cool with me if a certain piece of software could get ported to the iPad so I could take my "therapy" wherever I go.

And then, there is the matter of my having gone public about bipolar disorder. Ever since I began this series and because of the coverage it received from Fox 8 WGHP, many people have written me to express tremendous amounts of appreciation and gratitude. Very often it comes from individuals who also must contend with bipolar disorder, either themselves or because they have to watch a loved one suffer from it. To have heard from so many, to be shown in some small way that this has made a positive impact in the lives of others, has been some of the best therapy I can imagine.

Revealing my bipolar disorder and choosing to chronicle my battle through this blog has turned into all kinds of curious blessing. And it has brought a huge sense of liberation with it. I'm no longer having to hide something that shouldn't be hidden away to begin with. Instead I'm free to confront it, to be bold in attacking it. This was something that I was born with, had no choice in being afflicted with it... but I'll do whatever it takes to control it.

Maybe that's why God let Mom pass when she did. One close friend told me after the funeral that Mom was able to see me take back my own mind and my own life. If so, then I will have to count that as one more "wink from God" among the many that have happened these long several months.

Most of this probably sounds remarkably easy to someone who doesn't have a mental illness. It has been anything but. I'm not deluding myself into believing that I will ever totally conquer bipolar. It's something I have to take responsibility for every day. Sometimes more than that. And I'm going to have to keep taking responsibility for it all the rest of my life.

I wish that I could have had my condition this much under control years ago. It would have no doubt kept me from getting hurt. It would have kept me from hurting many other people. My life would have probably turned out to have been radically more successful than it has been.

...To Another

Yes, what if I had been able to address my condition far more early?

What if I had never suffered bipolar disorder at all?

I'm going to share my asking "What if...?" because I have wondered about it. Have and even now been many times tormented by those questions.

Being able to enjoy life for the first time without bipolar wrecking havoc with it, has in some ways wrought a suffering almost as bad as the bipolar itself.

There is a second front in the war for my mind. One that in recent months I've found myself fighting as fiercely as against the bipolar: doing my best to not dwell upon what might have been.

I don't do "fake". I don't believe in "fake". If there has been any purpose at all to the strange weird path that my life has taken, it is to strive toward that virtue which the Bard articulated in Hamlet: "To thine own self be true". I am an ongoing experiment of the human condition, just as you are along with everyone else in this world. If a mental illness is what I have been dealt, then I will be honest about it, about all of it. I am not perfect and I'll never claim to be perfect. Whatever mistakes I make along the way, I'll own up to them if I haven't done so already.

Some people have tried to seriously convince me to take a stab at politics again. I doubt now that will ever happen. Too many people want an "ideal" candidate... and that's not me. Coming out with bipolar disorder has no doubt disqualified me from a lot of opportunities: maybe not officially, but in other ways.

I'm okay with that. I try to be okay with that anyway. On most days it works. And others...

What would my life have been without my own mind turning against itself? What opportunities could have opened up, absent the bipolar?

What if I could have been a successful writer, or filmmaker, or lawyer, or scientist? My interests are vast and sundry. My mind enjoys contemplating so many fields of study and yet has been kept in one way or another from pursuing them as much as I... as I... would have wanted.

What if I had been able to already be the husband I always wanted to be?

What if I could have been a father already?

"What if...?"

Two words that plague me when I'm alone at night. And most of the time those are followed by another word: "Why?"

"Why, God? Why did You let me have this?"

He never tells me anything but the same thing again and again: "My grace is sufficient."

But what if I could live my life all over again, only this time without the bipolar?

There was an episode of Lost where the survivors still on the island were propelled backward in time, to a night when they could have potentially changed the course of their fortunes. Locke knew that, but he refused to do it. It would have saved him a lot of pain, Sawyer reminded him. "No, I needed that pain," Locke replied, "To get to where I am now."

Maybe I needed all of this pain too. Including the pain of a mental illness that I would not wish upon a worst enemy. Maybe what I consider to be a good life wouldn't be the best life that I could have had accompanying that pain.

Kristen reminds me that if that had been for the way I've had to live with bipolar, we might have never met at all. She doesn't have to tell me the rest: that I would have missed having that happiness. Neither would I have possibly been drawn into the deepest and most wonderful relationship that I have with God today, without letting myself discover His grace and mercy at the end of that suffering.

I can't know what might have been. My heart knows that. My head... is learning it too.

I shouldn't regret where life would have taken me without the bipolar. I can only look forward to what will come of my life now that I have it under control, now that I'm learning with each new day how to make sure that it never again hurts me or those closest to me.

Fighting against my mind while also fighting against my doubts. And trusting God to not let me fall along the way.

I don't know if some people would consider that to be a "good" life. But it's certainly not a boring one. And from where I'm sitting tonight, depressive episode and all, looking back on where I've been and what I've gone through... it gives me a tingle to think about what God might yet have for me.

Maybe someday, long years from now, I won't have to ask "What if...?" or "Why?" anymore. On that far-flung day, the only thing I want to be telling God is, "What a great ride that was!"

Coming Attractions

Well, now that I've finally got Being Bipolar back up and running again, what can be expected in the near future?

More videos, no doubt. Heck, I still haven't made one with my iPad (and there's a wazoo of video apps on it that are begging to be employed!). Most of the times that I've tried to write about bipolar this past year were about the normal (more or less) routine that I go through to manage it. I'm able to do that now, and at least one thing I want to elucidate upon might arouse some chuckling from you, Dear Reader.

I also am feeling led to write about what bipolar disorder does to the ones that you love. Something that I have ample experience in regard to (unfortunately). But I've promised myself that I'm going to delve into this no matter how heartbreaking or painful it may be. One person already wrote to tell me that this series helped him to understand his wife's bipolar. Who knows: maybe this can save some relationships out there. If it does then I can't take credit for it. The work is ours, but the results are God's.

One thing that I knew but didn't realize how pervasive it is, is how many creative and artistic types out there are afflicted with bipolar. Okay, my own creativity has taken a hit too from this thing, but I'm gonna do my darndest to write about that and how I've been striving to get it back. I think it might be working 'cuz for the first time in awhile I've some new short film ideas. A few writing projects, too. So if producing this series is aiding me in finding my Muse again, so much the better for me. And I'm more than happy to use that to help others as well.

So keep your earballs and eyedrums wide open, 'cuz we're gonna hurtle even deeper into this blogger's strange and twisted mind! I can't promise you'll exit at a gift shop, but I'll do my best to educate, enlighten and entertain along the way. Sorta like Jerry Lewis! At least before he got canned.

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Genes found with links to schizophrenia and bipolar disorder

For those wondering about this blog's Being Bipolar series, I haven't stopped it at all. Just been trying to figure out what to write about next: something that I've changed my mind about something around 18 or 19 times now. 'Course, having bipolar disorder can sometimes be the worst impediment to writing about it, ironically. Hoping to write the next installment sometime this week or next.

In the meantime though, new research has been published about a possible cause of bipolar disorder, as well as schizophrenia...

Broad sweeps of the human genome have exposed genetic mutations that boost the risk of the devastating yet baffling diseases of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, according to two studies published Sunday.

The independent studies, each conducted by a consortium of about 200 scientists, also found significant genetic overlap between the debilitating mental disorders.

Schizophrenia patients typically hear voices that are not real, tend toward paranoia and suffer from disorganized speech and thinking. The condition is thought to affect about one percent of adults worldwide.

Previously known as manic depression, bipolar disorder is characterised by hard-to-control mood swings that veer back-and-forth between depression and euphoria, and afflicts a similar percentage of the population.

The biological profile of both conditions remain almost entirely unknown. Doctors seek to hold them in check with powerful drugs.

Scientists have long observed that each syndromes tends to run in families, suggesting a powerful inherited component.

(snip)

For the study on bipolar disorder, also appearing in Nature Genetics, a team led by Pamela Sklar of Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York first looked at the genomes of 7,481 patients and 9,250 healthy individuals.

A second sweep focusing on 34 DNA suspects involved some 2,500 other patients and 42,500 controls.

The study confirmed a significant link with a gene, CACNA1C, that also has been previously associated with schizophrenia.

It also uncovered a new gene variant at another location, known as ODZ4, that suggests neurochemical channels in the brain activated by calcium play a role in boosting the risk of developing the disease.

For both studies, scientists hope that learning more about pathways in the brain affected by the diseases can lead to a better understanding of the causes and drugs to ease or block the symptoms.

I would seriously like to have somebody put the genes of my own family under the microscope. As I've said before on this blog, the symptoms of bipolar disorder run in my family, even though so far as I know I'm the first to be medically diagnosed with the condition. I've got it and my grandmother and her father probably had it (though my own Dad has never exhibited the symptoms, thankfully).

The optimistic part of me really wants this to lead to more effective medication for bipolar and schizophrenia. It might take decades. In fact, it most likely will. But I'd love to within my lifetime be able to see that nobody would ever again have to endure the hell that this particular brand of mental illness has put me and my loved one through.

Reading about this research, I can't but feel excited :-)

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Awright, here's what's REALLY been going on lately...

Apparently some quarters are rumormongerin' that this blog has been hacked, that I'm in the hospital, that I'm really missing, stuff like that. Which makes me giggle quite a bit, that my blogging is so closely watched that when I'm absent from it, it becomes cause for alarm :-P

Okay well, as much as the mischievous little "id" creature deep within my nature loves that sort of thing, I'm gonna come clean and be honest about what's really been going on behind the scenes here. It's the sort of business that in recent past I would have kept to myself, but since in the past year I've gone so much on record about it...

The truth is, that for the past few weeks I have been experiencing an episode of bipolar depression. And it has sucked darn nearly all of the passion and motivation out of me.

I've been writing for almost a year now about what it means to have bipolar disorder. And if this was "regular" depression I might yet be able to make something in spite of that, because I've had clinical depression and know what that's like. Bipolar depression however is an entirely different beast. This latest episode struck a little less than a month ago (so far as I can tell) and I'm still fighting it. Not much that can be done except that like a hurricane, to just ride it out.

(But even with it, I can at least write about that if I can't write about anything else... because that's how I roll :-)

When you're going through a bipolar depressive episode, you lose your passion and feeling for everything. You can function outwardly, if you absolutely must. But it is a tremendous struggle to do that and it sucks out what little drive and determination you have left to you. You aren't left with a life: you are made to endure anti-life. Existence in the negative range. Sometimes the only feeling you have is feeling like you want God to just let you die and not have to go through this hell for any moment longer.

Happily though... and I know this more than ever before... these times do pass. This episode will pass. I know that I'm not really wanting to die. Heck, this is the first time in my life that I've had a chance to enjoy a normal life like most people get to have! I am not going to take that for granted and I am not going to let it slip because of a temporary relapse of a medical condition!

So that's where I've been: working through this episode, trusting God to bring me through this just as He has brought me through all the others.

But while I have brought myself to the browser (which has been acting wonky lately, enough that it has made blogging unreliable until just the past few days), I'll also address some things which have piled up. First thing is: I thought last week's Doctor Who episode, "Let's Kill Hitler", was the most brain-warping single episode in the show's entire history (I watched it with my girlfriend and we were screaming in stunned disbelief the entire time). I'm keeping a wary eye out on Hurricane Katia: at this point it could go anywhere but my gut is that it might blow on out to sea (though I've been wrong before). Oh yeah, and in the past few days I've had an epiphanous thought about the nature of the church, and when I'm finished mulling it over I'll post something about that.

(And I might have had an idea or two for a new film, which would be my first in awhile... and I'm extremely looking forward to getting back into that saddle again :-)

Anyhoo, there y'all go. I'm good. Just having a bipolar depressive episode that I felt led to write a report about and submit it into the pile of material already accumulating on this blog about it. As always, parse it as you will.

And Lord willing, I shall be back to full bloggin' strength soon :-)

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BEING BIPOLAR: Video Log 9 - Lonely

Making a new video supplement wasn't something that I'd had in mind to do late last night, but... just had some things on my mind that I felt led to share.

This is the first Being Bipolar video that I've made with my iPad. Still playing around with figuring everything out, but that's why the aspect ratio is more vertical than horizontal with this segment. Next time I'll know better :-)

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Fox 8's The Buckley Report follows up on me BEING BIPOLAR

Just before this past Christmas, Bob Buckley from Fox 8 WGHP interviewed me for a segment of the Emmy-winning The Buckley Report, dealing with my coming out about having bipolar disorder on this blog. Here's the link to that first story. A couple'o weeks ago he and Fox 8 photojournalist Chris Weaver (who also has an Emmy notched on his belt!) came back and filmed a follow-up story about the direction that I've taken since then: the Being Bipolar series, and the video supplements that I've used to chronicle and document what it's like to have a bipolar episode.

Well, it just aired on this evening's Fox 8 News 10:00 News and lo and behold it's already on the Fox 8 website!

Here's the direct link to the segment.

And look! Embeddable video thingy!

 

Good job Bob and Chris! Hope that this snags y'all another Emmy or two :-)

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Hauntings and hopes

I can't understand why it is so...

Why it is that some people, can choose to get drunk, or get high on some kind of drug, and the substance abuse causes them to veer out of control and to do horrible things to the ones closest to them. And yet if they want it, more often than not they do find forgiveness and reconciliation and restoration if they hit rock bottom and come to their senses and acknowledge that they have to stop and take responsibility for their actions.

I've known lots of people who have been in that kind of situation, and I have seen God bring them back to the ones they love.

And then, there are those who have a mental illness... like bipolar... and it leads to actions that are just as destructive, because the person is just as uncontrollable. But as in my own case, there was never any substance abuse. There was no choosing to put a bottle to my lips, or to shoot dope into my veins or to smoke a joint or inhale a line of coke.

I thought that I was playing by all the rules of keeping my body and my mind physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight. Not because I felt like I had to, but because I was utterly and sincerely wanting to.

And still, my own mind turned against me and tried to destroy me. In defiance of everything that I held precious and sacred.

There are moments when I almost wish that it could have been as easy as liquor or heroin. Because EVERYONE actually UNDERSTANDS those things. They can see them. They see loved ones drinking or shooting up. They see that it's a tangible choice and somehow, somehow that makes the damage and destruction that substance abuse causes FORGIVABLE.

There is no choice in mental illness. There is nothing that any of us with it choose to bring into our bodies that causes us to lose control of our thoughts and our emotions. There is nothing for others to witness with their own eyes apart from the hurt and suffering that we too often do cause. Others can't possibly see the agony that we are suffering: from a medical condition that can't be diagnosed with a stained slide or drawn blood.

Even marijuana shows up in a urine sample. If only bipolar disorder could be found as easily. That would be something: to have solid evidence that people can see and recognize that it's not something that's imaginary or just "in my head".

The person who I have been writing about in recent days - the one who said that I must "pay the consequences" of my bipolar - apparently believes that I really am a monster and a wicked man who never had faith in Christ and... I guess this person really does hate me now.

And it won't stop haunting me.

I keep praying to God, asking Him for... well, to be honest, at this point I don't know what to ask Him for. I know He's there. But He is still so silent. And once more I don't know if He can't hear me and the reason for that is because my mind is too damaged and broken for Him to hear my cries. There are times when I find myself thinking "Chris, if people who knew you best can't hear what you are trying to tell them, why should God hear you?"

If I didn't have Christ in my life, I wouldn't have to feel like this. I could escape that sense of predicament with drink or with drugs or with lust.

But instead I do know that I have Christ... and because of that I have been made to feel that as long as I have breath in my lungs on this earth that I will always be an unforgivable monster, driven away from so many who I have cared for in my life.

That is not the life of the Christian that I had thought it would be. That isn't what I hoped it would be at all.

My sole sliver of comfort at this hour is what one dear friend told me yesterday:

"If being a Christian was easy... everyone would do it!"

(Thanks for that, Nicole. It has helped to get me through more than you know.)

Yes, I do have more than a few friends and family who have been extremely supportive in their encouragements and their prayers. I just, cannot be thankful enough for God putting them in my life. If He is silent, then I have to cling to the belief that He did provide that aid and assistance. More than I'll ever feel that I deserve. I hope that I can be just as much an encouragement to others, if and when the times comes for that.

So I'm not alone. I'm never alone.

But even so, I am haunted with longing for forgiveness and reconciliation which, I am finally beginning to doubt will ever come in this lifetime.

Today is Easter Sunday. The day we remember that our Lord and Savior arose from the tomb. Today, I will and do choose to cast my cares and worries at His feet, just as my transgressions were laid at the cross and have been forgiven for all time.

Because that is all I can do now. Just, trust in the Lord. Trust Him with everything. Trusting that He does understand the pain and the loss... because there is nothing common to man which He did not already go through on our behalf.

I will trust Him. Because He is faithful... even when so much in this life is not.

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It would be easier if I were NOT following Christ...

Well, that's what it feels like at times.

In the most recent installment of Being Bipolar I shared how I lost my faith in God because of some things that should never happen to anyone. And then over the course of many years how I found God again and came to have a relationship with Christ. That has been almost fifteen years ago and I am thankful that more times than not, I do appreciate that I have done my best to seek after Christ with all my heart, with all my soul and with all of my strength and, yes, with all of my mind.

Two nights ago I opened up and shared the hurt that I was feeling about a person who had been close to me telling me that I had to "pay the consequences" because of bipolar disorder: a mental illness and medical condition that I am only recently come to recognize that I have been struggling with for the duration of my entire life. It's something that I was born with and will die with and that I very often can't wait to die and be free of at last.

And I guess that it hurts most especially, because I know that I have been seeking Christ and because I did believe that this other person, was doing likewise in their own life. I desperately needed to believe that this person who I had cared for and still do care for, had that much in common with me: Christ, Who is enough to overcome all our failings and shortcomings.

I needed to believe that because I do need Christ and His grace. Because I am nothing without Him.

But what if I hadn't been a follower of Christ?

I can't help but think that, I would be having a much easier time right now.

Because without Christ, there would be no love for this person at all. Without Christ, I could be more than content to simply "move on" as this individual and others have been telling me that I should. Without Christ, I know without a doubt that I could absolutely just keep going on living my life for my own sake, without any regard or second thought about any other person. Without Christ, I could be selfish.

Without Christ, I would be free to not have the care and love that is so ingrained into my nature and that I have never been able to disassociate myself from.

Without Christ, I'm sure that according to the measure of the world, that I would have enjoyed more comfort and success than I have ever been able to achieve before.

But I have chosen to follow Christ. And that does entail having to endure and be subject to trial and tribulation and torment. And of those, the worst has been - as I said previously - being thought of as a monster and a person who didn't follow Christ at all.

I suppose, this is part of the cost. None of the people who most led me to Christ ever told me that it would be this hard. Did I take following Him too seriously? Did I take following Him not seriously enough?

Is it that, as I have pondered before already, my mental illness keeps Him from hearing my prayers? Has He ever heard my crying out to Him? Can He hear me, at all?

If I were not following Christ, I would not have such thoughts occupying my mind, night and day. Just as if I had no mental illness, I could have been a man ten times better than I could ever be, according to some.

But, I do have Christ. And I guess because of that, I have something that is painful and messy and brings wretched grief and so very often doesn't seem to make sense at all...

I have a life.

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Bipolar depressive episode: The next day...

Why am I writing about having bipolar disorder? Well, for one thing: I have it. And since this blog is about me and my thoughts and comments and adventures, the honest and genuine thing to do is to chronicle when my thoughts go full-tilt whacko beyond my control.

And I'm a writer. I write about what I know. This year marks the twentieth anniversary of me writing for publication. It sure didn't occur to me back then that someday I'd be running a fairly popular blog (I think the total number of websites on the Internet in 1991 were something like five or six) and that my most heartfelt topic was having a mental illness. But as a wiser person than I told me years ago: "Life is what God does to you when you're busy making plans".

And as I've said before: if what I'm doing now, can save others from any bit of the suffering and heartache that I have had to endure (and that others have had to endure because of me) then, this effort will have been well worth doing.

But a more personal reason is that, writing about having bipolar disorder is, in a very curious way, allowing me to fulfill my childhood ambition of... being a scientist.

What did little Chris Knight want to be when he grew up? An astronomer. A physicist. A biologist. A geologist. A geneticist. All of them at once! Especially astronomy: that's always been one of my bigger interests.

Unfortunately I had something called "discalculia" and it is to mathematics as dyslexia is to reading: it's a math disability. And math is the lingua franca of all science. Ironically it now appears that my having a mental illness all this time was one of the bigger reasons why my math skills have sucked so bad! I've been doing some experiments in the past few months and... well let's just say that for the firs time in my life I can comprehend quadratic equations. But I digress...

So I have a mental illness. A medical condition. And, I have chosen to document what it is like to have it, in an objective fashion but also what I like to believe will be characteristically my own... and that's part and parcel of having myself as the subject of study.

So more than twenty-four hours after the bipolar depressive episode that I wrote about in my last post, I am now feeling better. I am functional again, for however long it might last (and I pray it will last a long time). Most of last night I was unable to sleep because my thoughts were racing so fast, and the medication I am taking was unable in this case to quiet it down. I napped from 5 a.m. until 12 this afternoon, because my brain got too exhausted to keep up.

So right now I'm in a blissful state of creativity and productivity, and I'm about to go into Adobe Photoshop to work on something that I've had an idea for. A new product, you might say (that I might wind up selling through this blog soon).

I have mentioned her before on this blog, but now's as good a time as any to do it again: a few months ago I learned about Kay Redfield Jamison. She's a clinical psychologist who also suffers from bipolar disorder, and she has become renowned as one of the world's leading authorities on the subject. I found this page of quotes by Dr. Jamison, in which she articulates what it's like to have bipolar disorder. It's well worth a read if you're at all interested in what it means to live with this. I plan to finally read her books sometime soon, particularly An Unquiet Mind, which is all about her life with bipolar.

Hey, maybe someday y'all will see me writing a book about having this disease. Then I can hit the lecture circuit and Dr. Phil and all that jazz :-P

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Having another bipolar depressive episode

And once more I understand why some people are driven to commit suicide because of bipolar disorder. Because, death does seem a much preferable thing to what can only be called "anti-life".

I have been trying to compose the next installment of Being Bipolar. My mind has arrested me from doing that and from having interest in most of the other things that I enjoy in my life. My thoughts are on a seemingly non-stop cycle of nothingness, if that makes any sense.

So what am I doing to alleviate it? I've taken my medication and I've spent some time just trying to let my thoughts run their course (because eventually it does peter out enough to let me be productive again). Other than that, there's not much else that can be done.

I'm leaving Wednesday afternoon, for a short trip. Gonna be at that same film festival in Asheville that I attended last year. Knowing that something like that is on the horizon to look forward to, does help and it helps tremendously. If I know I have something to get excited about, it's like my mind can build up some momentum toward that, enough to be able to focus on that and escape the racing thoughts for a short while.

But in the meantime, I'm stuck with my thoughts holding me captive in a state of not living, not caring, not being empathetic or sympathetic to anyone or anything. I am currently alive and un-live.

And not for the first time, not for the last time, I am wondering why God would allow this to happen to anybody.

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BEING BIPOLAR: Video Log 8: Depressive Episode #2, "Stop Thinking About Nothing"

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BEING BIPOLAR: Video Log 7 - God, Happiness, Yoda, ATLAS SHRUGGED, Weird Al, and Charlie Sheen

And I hope to have Part 6 of Being Bipolar up by the weekend :-)

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