Somewhere Over the Rainbow, I've Lost My Damn Mind: A Manic's Mood Chart (27 page)

I totally understand that I’m starting from the bottom of the totem pole once again, but this BMD will flare up, and when it comes out, it’s usually just to my parents, but why should they have all the fun (I’ll leave out the tears for you all, though)? Of course, I’ll go along with the joke and everything, but there is a small part of me that would like to let them know what I’m thinking.

“
Never mind the fact that I, a mere two years ago, was the up-and-coming talent, on my way to the top of a company of over 300K employees. Or that I’ve managed a $5 million annual module, which is a third of the total sales revenue this company brought in last year. I wasn’t driving an X5 (Big Body Beamer) or approved for a $300K home loan. Just ignore the fact that I was overtaking the top performing module in Silicon Valley. I wasn’t looking at returning to school at a little-known university on the West Coast: Stanford (maybe you’ve heard of it, or at least seen their tree mascot). No, no, I wanted to leave all of this entirely behind to come and answer your phones. Where’s the transfer button again?”

Of course I’d never say this, but it would feel really good. Don’t get me wrong; I’m very proud of myself for getting this far. I mean, in those same two years, I’ve been hospitalized twice (in a psych ward, that’s like double jeopardy or something), fought depression off twice, was lucky enough to overcome suicidal thoughts and intentions, and have picked myself up off the ground more times than I’d like to count. But I can’t tell them any of this, not necessarily because I’m afraid that I’d lose any opportunity for a potential job (this is what I always thought before) but because I don’t feel I should need to tell them.

For the longest time, I cared too much about what others thought of me, before and after my episodes. Recently, I was telling my parents what a tough time I’m having. I’m not sure if it is a combination of moving to a new city, starting a new career (well, attempting to), dealing with finding healthcare (practically impossible, thanks, preexisting condition), and not giving myself time to recover. Six days after I got out of the hospital, I was back in class. Can anyone say teacher’s pet?

I don’t have the answer to any of this, and I’m not real sure if anyone does. But I refuse to quit. I’m not sure where I’ll end up, but I have to keep grinding. If I stop caring, then eventually no one will care; that’s the furthest thing from what I want.

. . . I just reread this entry and realized it makes very little sense. I’d better keep an eye on that . . .

Session

JP: I think the most telling part of this entry isn’t the structure of it, but rather when you listed the possible reasons why you were having a tough time. It seems like your ambition, which is usually seen as a positive attribute, can hurt you by pushing when you probably need to settle down. Does this sound right?

DT: Definitely. It’s something I struggle with constantly. I know I have the talent, skill, work ethic, drive and ambition to be successful in the corporate environment, so I pushed too hard to get back. I mean, I enjoyed it as well and took pride in my work and career. I saw it as a direct reflection of myself and as something I felt I could control more than anything; I felt I had no excuse for failure. Now, that seems to get me in trouble because of the BMD variable. I simply can’t do what I used to be so good at.

JP: Whether you realize it or not, ambitiousness is still a good quality to have. Now you just have to learn to adjust to accommodate bipolar disorder. Finding activities that are rewarding in different ways to replace those you mentioned above can be a good start.

KEY TERMS:
ARMAGEDDON, JUDAS, MANIA, CURE

Submitted on 6/10/11

Orange

As I’ve mentioned, there is no cure for BMD, but the lithium does seem to help. So far, so good. Seeing as how lithium is not the cure, my mania still decides to come out and play every once in a while. One of these times happened last week, when mania decided to take my mind on a little journey. While I may not have physically left the present, my mind was undoubtedly at Armageddon.

In case some of you have forgotten what you learned from church or wherever, I’ll review the story of Armageddon real quick. Despite Hollywood’s best efforts to redefine Armageddon, it’s an actual geographic place and not a frickin’ giant asteroid no one is able to see until we have like two weeks till impact (yet the Hubble Telescope is capable of looking back into time; yeah, my ass, Hollywood). It’s on a hill in Israel known as Megiddo and overlooks the Jezreel Valley (I totally had to look that up) where the Antichrist gathers the world’s rulers for battle. Basically the end of time, if you’re a real pessimist.

Well, to sum up the introduction here, my mania sent me to this hill, and while there I was fighting the Antichrist, due to the fact that I was a soldier of the light in episode uno (that kind of thing carries over from manic experience to manic experience). JC is coming down from heaven to save the day, and my mania puts the present-day me right in the middle of this situation, and my dialogue goes something like this:

“
JC! Where the hell have you been, man? We’ve been getting slaughtered down here, literally. Look at all the bodies, it’s not good. I mean, how are you so late? It’s not like you don’t have the best seat in the house or anything. You’re God’s son and you were
up
in heaven; I’m really confused about how you missed all of this going on down here. I mean, honestly, how couldn’t you know what was going on? What gives? We obviously need a ton of help here with this asshole.

“
What? You overslept?!? OK, who was supposed to wake up Jesus?

“
Judas? Really, man? I mean, given the past and everything, you think you’d be on top of something important like this. You really screwed us here again, didn’t ya, bud?

“
Wait, JC, all you brought was a sword? You’re kidding, right?

“
Oh, you were running behind because of Judas, so you only had time to grab a sword, huh? That’s just great. Well, let’s just hope the Antichrist doesn’t have a shield or anything.

“
CHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGE!!!!!”

I’ve read that many people who suffer from mania have some issues giving it up. That they will quit their meds in the hope of again feeling the rush from mania. I can see myself falling into this frame of mind at times. I do love my mania because it’s taken me places that no one else in this world has ever been before. I have seen things that I didn’t think were possible to see, and to say I could give all of that up and not want it back is crazy. I just have to learn that like most things in life, moderation is the determining factor in how good or how bad things can get with my mania. Easier said than done, I’m afraid.

Session

JP: How long will one of these manic experiences last, like the one you are explaining in this entry?

DT: It depends on my mood at the time, what I’m doing, how much I’m enjoying the ride, and what’s going on in the experience. The Armageddon experience above only lasted about thirty seconds, but I was driving at the time, so that factor played heavily in the length of time.

JP: Driving while manic? That can’t be real safe.

DT: Sometimes I’m just along for the ride, JP; holding on and simply trying to make it back.

RED

(ELEVATED SEVERE MOODS, SIGNIFICANT IMPAIRMENT,

UNABLE TO WORK)

KEY TERMS:
DOCUMENTARY, FLOBOTS, d01roK, “BUGS”

Submitted on 6/18/09

Red

I can be absolutely dumbfounded from time to time, and one of those occurrences happened today when I tried to purchase a documentary from a Best Buy near The Nasty. Now, I’m not trying to point fingers or make any assumptions about the intellect of our neighbors to the South, but I was in Kentucky at this time. I will also state for the record that I did not attempt to visit any other nearby Best Buys to research this event, due to the fact that I just gave up. To be fair, I wasn’t exactly looking for the meaning of life or anything as important as that. I simply wanted to find a documentary called
The Devil and Daniel Johnston
which is about a singer-songwriter and artist diagnosed with BMD. I know, look at me, actually taking a proactive approach to learning more about this crazy ride I’m on. Let me paint you a picture with my prose paintbrush.

OK, I know the last line about prose painting is corny, but at first I thought it sounded cool. In any case, let me get back to my story: So I was looking online for some BMD documentaries or whatnot and found this documentary that looked really interesting,
The Devil and Daniel Johnston
. Well, interesting compared to my other options, which incorporated Van Gogh, Patty Duke, Margot Kidder, and Stephen Fry. While at some point I’ll probably try to watch them all, I was really into the Daniel Johnston one because he’s a musician, and music usually plays a pretty big role in my mania.

So I’m driving to this Best Buy and I’m jamming to Flobots (could quite possibly be my new fave) and maybe getting a little manic. I wouldn’t say anything too crazy, just my heart racing, blood pressure up, dancing in the car, singing (or my attempt at it) and enjoying the ride. I end up at this Kentucky Best Buy and spend the next ten minutes looking for a DVD documentary section, with no luck, mind you. I mean, I could find the final season of
Knight Rider
and
Hip Hop Abs 8
, but let’s not do something crazy and include a few documentary movies there.

I’m not trying to say that if they had a documentary section of DVDs, they’d make any money from it, but I mean, I do feel that at least some people out there are interested in the world beyond flat abs and cars that talk. Then again, this is the country in which someone funded the movie
Idiocracy
, so what can you expect? OK, I’ll stop going off on my tangent as it may be I’m still a little manic and going off over absolutely nothing, but I feel I have a point here; probably not a good one but a point nonetheless.

Seeing how over the past couple of days, I’ve been as close to “normal” as I think I can be, I thought I’d talk a little about my manic episode back in the mountains last year. I figured I’d start out with why I sign off each entry with the name d01roK, seeing how that really isn’t my name, and I think it’s a pretty good place to start. Please be warned that my memory of my episode encompasses only about two hours from a span of around three weeks, so the details may be a little fuzzy. I did keep my gournal, but you can imagine how that turned out. You’ll understand once we start getting into what was going on during the episode (hint: all over the damn place).

Anyway, during my episode, I had some experiences in which I was convinced that I was part of some universal battle between good and evil. You may want to ask me: was it like being stuck in the movie
Spaceballs
?
My reply is yes, except it was nothing like it because that would have been amazing. Mel Brooks is a genius. Don’t believe me?
Blazing Saddles
and
Young Frankenstein
;
‘nuff said.

So this battle going on in my mind would somehow translate in the real world in the following form:

I had chosen to be on the good side during my walk (another story) and now was some sort of soldier/guardian/protector of the light or good (stay with me; I know). During my initiation into this role, I think (I repeat, the details are a little fuzzy) I was convinced I was going through some sort of universal test to prove my worth. Part of this test was that I would feel like I was always being watched or stalked, like the evil/dark/opposition/ whatever my enemy was would be keeping “bugs” on me, trying to prove I was a fraud and didn’t deserve to be called good.

In order to prove this wasn’t so and I wasn’t scared of them, I started a YouTube account. The screen name I came up with was d01roK--almost as if it was my new manic identity--to add favorites to my profile that would portray what I was feeling at the time. I was trying to prove that I was worth the role I had been given. Essentially, I knew what was going on, and this was my way of outsmarting and outmaneuvering the enemy. Maybe at some point I’ll try to tackle the meaning behind the videos, but let’s just say they’re pretty random, ranging from the “Handlebars” music video to the Lipton Iced Tea commercial with Rocky Balboa. Also throw in there some Penn & Teller with the American flag burning. Really weird stuff.