university, moods and medication

Today I found out that I've been accepted to university to study psychology. Look out, world, Silla's a student now.

I'm going to talk about mood minding. Because once a bipolar person gets put on medication, that's not the end of the story.

One thing that is very useful is a mood chart. There are lots of them online, and they track things like your mood (give it a number), anxiety, irritability, sleep, medication, external influences and etcetera. You pick what you need to track most and track it. I have my own version, so I can track patterns.

Because medication doesn't mean you'll be fixed forever. Unfortunately, bipolar doesn't go away. Once bipolar is treated the moods aren't as extreme and you have periods of stability but sometimes breakthrough episodes happen. Sometimes meds don't work so well anymore and need to be adjusted. Sometimes life stressors can push you out of your safe mood zone. All three have happened to me recently. (All at once, ouch.) That's where mood charts come in handy. With one, you can track how things affect your mood, what makes it go up, down, anywhere. You can figure out what triggers you. You can see if there are any patterns. Sometimes your mood will cycle at certain times of the year. April is a month where my mood ramps up. January I'm prone to crashing. If I'm not careful to stay on top of my medication while going through a lot of stress I'll wind up manic. I know this thanks to charting and I can take steps to protect myself during this time.

Minding your mood takes work, but it's worth it if you can help avoid major mood episodes.

The other thing I can talk about is medication adherence. It is common for someone with bipolar disorder to go off their meds. For many reasons. It sucks having to take pills every day, the side effects range from uncomfortable to horrendous - weight gain and absent sex drive and slowed cognitive abilities are some of the worst. Also sometimes the medication is working and you're feeling fine so you think you don't have to take meds anymore. This happens with non-bipolar people as well, once you start feeling better you stop taking the medication even if the doctor ordered you to finish the bottle. And sometimes the medication flattens you out so much that it sucks and all you want is to find a little mania again. Hypomania is addictive - who wouldn't want to feel like they ruled the world?

I've gone off meds several times. Once I thought I was better and didn't need to take as much medication. I really should have discussed that with my psychiatrist first. Once in the first few months after I was diagnosed, I felt horrible. The medication made me stupid and tired all the time. I hated it. So I stopped taking it. Unfortunately, not too long after I stopped the medication, I was manic again. Once I was patient enough to stay on the medication I found that pretty much all of the side effects calmed down or went away. But I didn't learn, either. I'd gone off meds just before Christmas and then I crashed on New Years' Eve and wound up hospitalized. Now, ever since I've moved (super stress) I've been hypomanic. It is still hard for me to keep myself on the medication I should be taking. I like the hyperproductivity and the staying up all night and the super confidence. I admit that. But I've also learned that it's impossible to have your cake and eat it too. If I decide to mess with my medication to find some hypomania, it's going to escalate into mania, and then crash. What goes up must come down and oftentimes a high will bring on a low.

Medication sucks. You have to remember to take it, and it has side effects that you hate and you feel like it stigmatizes you and you want to be better, but when it comes down to it, if you want to lead the life you want you probably have to be stable. So it becomes a tradeoff.

I just got into university. It took a lot of work, and there is so much I want to learn and so much I want to do with my life. I could give in to the part of me that wants to go off my medication so I can be on fire again. Giving into that would put everything I've worked for at risk. In mania, people spend and lose fortunes, alienate their loved ones, throw dreams away on a whim.

When I'm on medication, even when I'm not in an episode, I still get fire. I get the same fire and pain and ups and downs that everyone gets. A world of mercurial moods and firey ups and dark dark downs and upheaval and drama is available to me. It's seductive, the power of it. But I'm not willing to throw my life away with the consequences of it. I remember the frightening power of mania, the heavy, suicidal depression, the dark and screaming mixed episodes. It's not as glamourous as my head tries to convince me it remembers.

Keeping myself on an even keel takes work. It sucks sometimes. But I can harness my moods and my powerful emotions and use them to create something wonderful. Me, just me, medicated and dedicated.

Is bipolar a curse, or a blessing? I don't know. All I know is it's a part of my life and if I take care of it, it won't kill me.