Anything you say can and will be used against you

The stigma of mental illness is still very real and common. Comments on forums expressing hatred towards those with a particular illness abound. But I can't say I blame them considering the vampiristic (yes I am saying that is a word) way in which they can drain a person. My idealist self sees this and thinks of the movie Warm Bodies - if we just treat them with love, treat them like a real person, then they would start acting like one. Right? Well, it's not that simple. Partly, probably because they will just push you away when you do that.

A wife may lovingly reach her hand out to her husband when he is having a difficult time, only to have her hand slapped away with a threat to never do that again. And then he will probably hate himself even more because he feels like he can't control himself, his emotions. It's everybody else's fault. She shouldn't have done that. How could she attack him like that? Everything feels like an attack.

He craves validation to fill the black hole of despair that occupies his being. He doesn't understand why everything keeps happening to him, why it hurts so much, why everyone is always attacking him. The slightest amount of criticism can completely derail him. He thinks he is reaching out to others in a positive way but the void he carries inside obscures his vision to what is really happening and only perpetuates his abandonment issues when people exit his life time and time again.

They say it's like having no skin. There have been studies showing that intense emotions last up to 20% longer in someone with BPD. They don't just burn bridges; they line them with C4 and then blow them up. A common phrase is "I hate you, don't leave me"

She thinks she is a good friend, but can't see objectively what she is really doing, even though deep down she really knows. Armed with all of the ammunition of spiteful words spewed in her direction over the years, she shoots it all at her next victim with rapid force. After a particularly volatile explosion, only now does she begin to see the pattern of destruction following her wake. To her very core she wants to change. But she is still afraid.

tell your truth or trust a lie; if this is low I'm looking for the high; without the low there ain't a high

This is my current favorite song.
I'm going to be honest. I am kind of stuck right now. So many things keep happening to remind me that I know nothing; nothing about relationships particularly. Or grammar because I doubt I am using semicolons properly or if I ever will really know how to, but I digress.

You know in science when you learn how gases fill the volume of the container they occupy, or something like that? I've been thinking about how (actually I just thought of this) my personality or identity has a similar quality. I don't know if everyone is like this, or if I am more particularly due to the way I was raised.
It's usually a form of criticism that I will let upset my entire opinion of my existence. I don't want it to be that way, but it happens. Then I can only see the negative. I'm realizing I have everything I need, all the tools to help me, but I just need to overcome my fear and realize that everyone else struggles too and that it's okay to mess up.

My dad told me recently that he is like a volcano and needs to erupt in order to feel better and basically that I just need to be okay with it. At the time, and still many other times to come I'm sure, I was not okay with it. I was really upset because nothing gets resolved, and I'm just supposed to be okay with getting hot lava spewed all over me unpredictably. But that's life right?

I saw a picture of my friend's hand on Instagram after she got burned by oil when she was making coconut shrimp. It looked so painful I could only imagine how bad it hurt. It reminded me of when I was making some korean food and frying it in oil. It started exploding right when I leaned down to turn off the pot. It exploded all over my face and right into my eyes. It was pretty traumatic; my cousins were there and I ran into the bathroom with one of my cousin's fiancee and she helped me rinse it out of my eyes. I could hear screaming in the other room and exploding sounds as the oil kept reacting to the thawing rice cakes. (We R Smrt) I went to the doctor later to check and make sure my eyes weren't messed up or anything and he was shocked by my outlandish tale and the fact that I had absolutely no sign of that incident occuring except for the fact that my sweater was covered in oil. It truly was a miracle and in my opinion God's way of telling me that He has my back and is always there for me, even when I do dumb things. I never really thought of it this way before but I feel like hopefully the metaphor can be extended to the metaphor of my volcanic dad. I know I have baggage and scars, but I also know that God is looking out for me, and protecting me, and for all of us. I don't like hurting, but I don't want to dwell on it any more than I have to, since all that does is magnify the problems.

Now I'm beginning a new fight, a fight to live. To be okay with who I am. 

The City Never Looked So Bright

I think I finally figured out what I really want to do with my life. It's going to require a lot more school but that is okay.  I like school.

I have realized that venting my feelings and frustrations to my family is too much like handing them a knife and saying, "here *pointing between shoulder blades* the blade will slide in nicely right about here and give it a nice thrust for me, will ya?" So I'm done expecting them to act or feel any differently and I'm just not going to outfit their operations anymore.

Also, moving by yourself is really hard, but it is satisfying when you can claim that you moved a bed and a couch all by yourself.

Opportunities

I love this clip from Evan Almighty. It is so true. I think that is what I was trying to explain in my last post.  We gain those things through opportunities.

I've also been watching a show called Red Band Society. A quote from it really resonated with me: "Luck isn't getting what you want, it's surviving the things you don't"

Lately I haven't been writing a whole lot. I used to write my feelings in my journal constantly, but last week I read a book about emotions and specifically with my personality type how that kind of writing essentially is fueling the fire. I am realizing that I am in control but I have to start believing that I am and not letting my emotions run my life.  So I'm going to start a new experiment and work on shifting my focus to my actions, goals, and accomplishments.  We have a body and a soul. Our body is what makes us weak at times. Lately I find myself feeling guilty for continually giving in to cravings that I know won't help my body, or I won't do something that I know I need to or should in order to feel better simply because I don't feel like it, but doing it is what will make me feel better so now I am basically writing a Nike commercial.

La-di-da

No So.... I am realizing that everything I learn, well not everything, but a lot of things - is through the opposite of what I thought. But it is helping me to realize who I really am.

Something that I thought was right but turned out wrong. It made me lose faith in myself for a while but now I am realizing that it is important to go through things like that to realize how to stand on your own, what your own weaknesses are.

A lot of things lately feel like self fulfilling prophecies. Everyone else (doctors and counselors)  was telling me how I feel and I was believing and feeling so confused and not even knowing what I felt anymore. Though they will probably just tell me I am in denial... I'm kind of losing faith in doctors to be honest because, um these medications are making me have breakdowns every single day.

Basically I am Cameron Fry from Ferris Buehler's day off without the swearing.
Look it up on YouTube if you need a refresher.

My dad kept texting me to go on a hike today. I was laying in bed fighting it. I didn't want to get out of bed. I think I even told him that I thought I was dying. My brain felt like it was the ball in a pinball machine.

I finally went though. It was nothing short of exactly what I needed.

Okay let's be honest. There has been swearing.

But it has made me realize that I can trust myself and my own instincts if I listen hard enough.

Also the spirit.

 

You can't wait to live until you feel better, you will start feeling better once you start living.

The many manic mood swings of manda

Hi I don't have Internet at my new place so I'm doing this from my phone. Not too much more than 24 hours have passed since my parents picked me up from the hospital. I missed comic con, had my cousin respond vaguely to my new roommates about when I would be moving in, and also missed my friend's wedding among other things. I didn't plan this so well.  Haha.

They are probably going to up my meds again since I went on a little shopping spree today. I was all over the place again with my counselor; I'm always so aloof to that but now I see how frustrating it must be. I also wanted to do all of the things, make all of the art projects, and rearrange my room six times. The only way I can explain it is like a ray of sunlight bursting through the clouds, escaping through wherever it can, but also like a snowball gaining mass amidst an Avalanche. I'm still a little bit in denial but it is also like a missing puzzle piece snapping into place that I have been searching for my whole life.

Doctor: how long do your relationships usually last?
Me: 2 months every time with one exception
Doctor: *scribbles notes* (since this blog is about dating mostly I had to throw that in there)

13 days inpatient in a psychiatric hospital. I never thought I would end up there, but I feel pretty good about saying it will be a turning point. It felt so surreal. They admitted me into the acute wing where they house the 'milieu.' Think what you have seen in the movies when they portray a mental hospital. Pretty accurate. It was kind of dark and sad and they kept asking me if I felt safe. I almost cracked a joke about the other patients. But they don't take sarcasm so well in this place I later learned. Don't even think about joking about hurting yourself. Sometimes I say really dumb things. That landed me in a room with a camera and close observation.

When I was little I liked to play marbles. I put them in a Glad container and wrote on the lid.  "I'm glad to have all my marbles" I laughed about that as I sat there in blue scrubs in a room with a twin bed in the middle and a drain in the floor. I asked the tech if she was bringing me a straight jacket. She didn't think that was funny. The walls aren't padded either in case you were wondering. Luckily that was just one day. They moved me to the "moon unit"  (mood)  the next day and it was brighter and had the best view of the city and sunsets that looked like Lebanon. And weekend movie nights and popcorn. And hilarious people.  Who knew depressed people laughed so much.

Back to the marbles. I always wondered what it would feel like to lose your mind. I'm sure there are different ways, but in my case it was like my brain decided to make its own version of heroin and cocaine. It was fun being in touch with the universe, perceiving everything on a new level, seeing sounds and hearing colors. Poetry flowing out of me. Delusions of grandeur. My thoughts were delicious, visual, and then completely out of control. And then I couldn't feel my face. I remember thinking 'this is it, I've officially lost it' and then 'I can't live like this'  I knew I had to go to the hospital.

My car was parked in front of my cousins house for almost two weeks. Other cousins live in the basement and when they asked her why my car was there she just vaguely replied "she ran out of gas"  my mom was helping my unpack my room and she picked up something and started laughing. I asked her what was so funny and she said "you ran out of gas Hahaha"  so now I am laughing because I guess you could say I just ran out of gas literally and figuratively. Maybe it's just funny to me.

The diagnosis took them a lot longer than I thought it would. At first they thought it was a personality disorder, then an identity crisis, abandonment issues, watches too much adventure time and British television, etc. Really they should have just asked my high school friends, it would have saved them a lot of time. I always have to take things to the extreme somehow though. Proclaim my individuality, be a bit of a rebel, howl at the moon, do some cartwheels, etc. So this is my fun story about how I got diagnosed finally with bipolar disorder.

And additionally my story continues with how medication screwed me up and I realized that my mania was brought to you in part by mate (that argentine drink - inordinate amounts of caffeine) and the tipping point of the most stressors a person can handle in one year as well as probably a life. So I have now undiagnosed myself and am embracing my uniqueness (or what the doctors call crazy)  and working on the emotional control in healthy ways.

Such is the passage of time

I haven't written on here in a while, well I have but have deleted things. I read an article on NPR about how editing your life stories can help you be happier though.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/01/01/258674011/editing-your-lifes-stories-can-create-happier-endings (yeah mom I read something from NPR, don't hate - it was for school actually haha)
 I'm procrastinating some reading right now. It's nice working this late, things are slow and quiet. My roommate is out of town for nearly two weeks so I have the house to myself. I have some trepidation about a third roommate moving in on the 25th but I'm sure it will be fine.  I always want to say something meaningful but I'm not sure what when it comes down to it.  Lately I feel I am just existing.  It's hard to believe how fast time seems to go. I'm graduating this summer. I don't feel ready.  I'm turning 25 and I don't know what I want to do with my life. Ha ha.