Trying To Describe A Mixed Episode

Mixed episodes, sometimes called agitated depression or dysphoric (hypo)mania, is the very worst mental state that I have ever experienced. I would like to share with the community what it feels like to be in a mixed ep. I wrote this as I was in my last mixed episode...

Mostly the agitation and irritability are way off usual... really struggling not to blow up over tiny things that don't matter. Repetitive bird calls and stuff are normally no problem for me, but they're driving me nuts at the moment, making me squirm...

I don't normally do the whole leg pumping thing - you know when you're sitting and rocking your leg up and down without your toes leaving the ground? Been doing that lots...

And sleep's a bitch... got maybe 3 hours last night, and feel wired af... I'm feeling very low and tired. Exhausted actually. But, confusing as all hell, I've got all this energy bouncing around inside me, waiting to explode. I feel like I could run a marathon, and at the same time want to sleep until the universe goes cold...

It's a paradox wrapped in an enigma, covered in lead sinkers, shoved into a rubber hose, and used to bash the crap out of my head. It's 4 guys with phone books and heavy rods, beating the crap out of me...

I am using everything I've got to try to concentrate, to focus. It's more difficult than at any other time in my life, but when I'm in a mixer, I find I need to try and stay focused, otherwise I lose my shit...

I'm not normally a control freak. Usually if I'm depressed or hypomanic or a bit anxious, I just ride it through, use acceptance, get all Zen and manage pretty well. I am able to allow the symptoms to exist within me, but to sort of sidestep them in a way that keeps me sane...

But not with mixers. I can't ignore or accept or ride through them without tons of effort to control things. I know that mixed episodes are one of the most dangerous mental states to be in, so I am very careful to stay as much in control as possible...

Oh, and hypersexual? Yeah, off the charts...

There are all these racing thoughts, but at the same time there is that whole cotton wool dissociation going on too. I can't really describe it. I'm both too close to my thoughts, and infinitely far away from them, if that makes any kind of sense to you...

I keep having to ask people to repeat what they said to me, as I often can't hear them for all the internal chatter of my thoughts going on. I've got guilt trips and old wounds trying to tear at me, and lots of negative self talk, but that's something I'm used to dealing with, so I've got that biatch under control...

It's a mental state filled with contradictions, and those contradictions are playing tug-of-war with my brain, pulling it this way and that in a mad frenzy that feels like nothing I feel in any other state...

I've got lots of floaters in my eyes. It's an unfortunate genetic condition one of my parents gifted me with. I have protein strands inside the gluggy part of my eye that clump together, and they throw shadows onto my retina. If you've ever seen water under a microscope, with all of those shadowy partly see-through stringy and clumpy things, that's the way my vision looks all the time, especially in bright light. My brain is pretty good at applying a filter and ignoring them most of the time, but when I'm in a mixer, that filter goes on the fritz, and I see all of the floaters moving around and jerking and settling across all of my vision constantly, and it's frustrating as all crap. Makes me want to gouge my eyes out...

Yeah... mixers... they suck ass...