2009/08/16

the merry go round

The merry go round isn't so merry once you've ridden it enough times.

I'm not sleeping again. Lather, rinse, repeat. I wonder what it has in store for me this time. Because that's how they start - all of the sudden I'm seeing 5 am again. Which means more 5 am blogging.

How to survive a possible mania (all lessons learned by me):
Do not eat chocolate covered coffee beans. Worst idea ever.
Turn off the TV. And the internet, unless you're writing in a really cool blog.
Turn out the lights. Lie down.
Take your medication.
Talk to the doctor if it seems to be continuing.
Make sure you have a doctor to talk to.
Don't: work too hard, push yourself further, stop taking your meds (for the love of pete don't stop the meds)
Eat. (I'm bad at this one.)
Hope your medication works and pray.

Really, surviving mania is just something that I learn as I go along. In May I spent pretty much the entire month hypomanic. It felt amazing. I was kicking ass.

But pride goeth before the fall. There's always a down.

And to admit it, I'm pretty scared of manic episodes. I'm just as scared of mania than I am of crashing. Mania bowls you over and catches you and drags you out to sea like a wave. I don't swim all that well.

Sometimes it feels like all your defenses are breached. You've tried so hard to keep yourself healthy, and then mania swoops in and takes you to crazyland. No, not candyland. That would be nice. Crazyland. Things were good and then all of the sudden you're head over heels, swept out to sea, everything is too fast and you're going too fast and things don't make sense and one minute you're king of the world and the next minute you're running because you're sure the FBI is after you. And everything is weird and disjointed when you try and remember it later. And embarrassing. I am horribly embarrassed by some of the things I've done while manic. And it scares me because it's so easy to pass from hypomania into mania without realizing it.

Last May I held myself right at the brink all month and got a lot of stuff done and kicked some ass. But then, there was the crash. Sunrise, sunset and all that.

A lot of times I hate this. It really sucks that your brain chemistry can throw you this way and that way. I hate having no control over it.

I don't know if I should embrace it? Take 5 am and make it my own? Run 24 hours without sleep and not care? I think that's probably bad.

So what do I do? I'll go through the checklist above. I'll try my damndest to stay away from the tide. And if it takes me, I'll see you on the other side.

At least I don't feel like making muffins this time.