What is [insert diagnosis here] like for you? No dictionary definitions please

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@DefiantPanda wrote:

I actually think the general population views manic depression in teh same vein as depression and anxiety and doesn't actually associate it with other mental illnesses that include psychosis like schizoaffective disorder and schizophrenia and therefore doesn't attach the same stigma to it. That's the impression I get anyway. Correct me if I'm wrong here.

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@DefiantPanda that's not my experience at all...

Being Schizoaffective means for me: being able to tune myself in to different frequencies, the ability to see things that other's cannot like faces in the sand/dirt. They come to me with their various expressions on their faces and they forecast the day/night ahead. Also I feel in colours. Being diagnoised wasn't such a big deal to me because my dad has it. Having said all that, there is also an evil element like the noises/scratching after 6pm.. That's when the psychosis is whispering the same things over and over in my head and i get the paranoia. The paranoia get's me into trouble. Makes me play the same songs on repeat like i'm prepping for war; Carmina Burana.. then i'm ready for anything and i'm pacing or staring because i have to

Being bipolar to me means:

• almost always having erratic sleep patterns (writing this at 3am);
• finding it impossible to rely on myself or be reliable for others;
• long periods sitting blankly in chairs unable to move or sleeping up to 20 hours a day;
• highly wired creative times where I work for up to 18 hours straight, collapse and start again;
• fear of the next slump into depression and how long it might last;
• fear of going too far into excitable states and making crazy life decisions that hurt myself and others;
• paranoia about what I've said or done and how others may perceive me almost every day of my life.

This is just some of it. It means a lot more than going up and down to me. It affects my mental and physical wellbeing in so many ways.

Dear Nikolai,

as you know it is contrary to the rules for me to give you advice about your condition. But, given that I have all of the disorders that you mention, and more, I can talk about myself.

For years I did not know what was wrong with me or how to cope. I had been convinced that I had an illness and that there was nothing I could do except take medication.

I took medication but it never worked for me, not on its own. I decided to go to therapy and really listen to my therapist's advise to review my life and think of my childhood. Had there been any problems such as trauma? I did this and found that slowly slowly I was on the road to recovery. The moods and symptoms were there but I could function well because my psyche was no longer aching, my sould was being repaired, my consciousness was being cleaned of all that poison that stays inside and causes havoc.

I don't know about your condition, and therefore I cannot speak of it, but if you have endured trauma of any kind, or if something happened in your past to traumatise you, that is PTSD and, just like in my case, it would not hurt to find out if this is the real problem. Medication alone could not help me more than suppress everything temporarily. For Post Traumatic Stree Disorder Therapy was really good for me. But it is difficult, painful and takes a lot fo courage to go back and revisit traumatic experiences. But in the end well worth it.

For me, bipolar is like going to a rodeo for the first time in your life, and the dude who was meant to be riding the meanest bucking bull around couldn't make it, and suddenly you find yourself on the back of that huge sweating stinky beast (the bull, not the dude... giggle...)

The crowd roars as the gates fly open. For 10 amazing seconds, you hold on for dear life as you are tossed this way and that, wildly, randomly, uncontrollably. You think that you have worked out what you are doing, and you start to really enjoy it. The exhilaration you feel is better than any drug you or anyone else has ever tried. You look at the crowd. You smile. You wave.

And then you are thrown into the dust with a bone-jarring hit of reality. You wake up to see a bunch of worried clowns looking down at you...

Great idea for a thread, @mrkotter. Thanks for starting it... 🙂

@Silenus the bull riding is such a great metaphor. It really works for me.

My lived experience. Then repeat. Again.