I’m still learning about my diagnosis. From what I gather, a [hypo]manic episode needs to last for a particular amount of time (I believe three days), but I swear that it all happened yesterday—although I have had anxious dreams over the last few nights, so maybe those could be attributed? I’m not sure. But yesterday, I woke up on my own at 5:00, and while I was physically tired, I was mentally awake. All week, I’ve been waiting for the online classroom for my next course to open up (hmmmmm, maybe that’s something) so that I could get as far ahead in the class as I could. And when I checked the school website, I saw that I had access, so I got into Blackboard and started working on classwork.
In the span of 10 hours, I took care of my kids, loaded up the car with their things so that they could spend the weekend with their Grandpa, posted a welcome message and acknowledgments of the faculty and program expectations in the online classroom, skimmed a couple of assigned chapters, posted my initial discussion responses for the first two weeks, wrote a paper that’s due a week from tomorrow, and blurted out a blog post on the fly.
Near the end of all of that, I could feel my energy draining. Like I used it all in one go.... One ten-hour go... But I still had plans with my boyfriend and my girlfriend. Hell, I was already at my boyfriend’s house doing ALL THE THINGS while he was at school (he gives me the OK to come over before he’s home, and while I’m *pretty sure* that’s an open invitation, I don’t take advantage of that and ask 1-3 times in advance to be absolutely sure that it’s cool because dudeface has a life outside of me), so I needed to hold it together.
We had low-key plans though, just hanging out on the couch while he played Alien: Isolation (he hates scary stuff, but he knows I love it, so he decided to get this game so that I can watch him, and we jump together, and it’s cute) or some other video game. So I could take that time to reenergize before our dinner plans with our girlfriend, because I also needed to have it together for when I later stayed the night over at her house.
But I lost it at dinner when the boyfriend was on his soapbox (which is honestly one of the things I love about him) and then said a thing like, “If marriage is only gonna end in divorce, then what’s the point?” It sound bizarre out of context, but I started feeling overly empathetic because he had a failed marriage, and I couldn’t fix the things and couldn’t fully reconcile that and couldn’t stop emoting and had to excuse myself to the restroom so that I didn’t look visibly upset. And I came back and made even worse eye contact than I normally do and played with my phone while they talked about an anime until it was time to go.
Girlfriend and I went out for froyo afterwards, and I explained what was going on in my head. I know that I could have said it at dinner, but I knew that the boyfriend was going home soon, so I didn’t want to make a Big Thing only to follow that up with, “Well, byyyye!” That, and I know he means well, and I totally reach out to him when I need to a majority of the time, but I recognize that he doesn’t entirely know what to do with a broken me. And that’s okay because I appreciate the effort, and effort is really all I want out of anyone. But anyway. I told the girlfriend about it all, and she agreed with me that it sounds like I was coming down from a manic episode. Except it’s hypomania, so instead of throwing down money I don’t have on a thing I don’t need as a for instance, I do productive things like get two weeks ahead in a class that wasn’t even to start for three more days.
And it was back to feeling the way that I have been in the past, prior to the mood stabilizer: If I stay in motion, I’m fine. If we can keep the conversation going, the jokes going, everything moving forward—I’m fine. I’ma call it emotional inertia. Because when it stops, I’m stagnant. Because I woke up this morning feeling kind of pointless. Except not entirely, so I guess that’s not the right word. I didn’t have suicidal ideations or self-harming thoughts of any kind, but I looked at the last message from the boyfriend. “I love you.” And I wanted to write back, “But fucking why?” Except that I’d already written back, “I love you too,” last night, and he had only been asleep for a couple of hours when I had the thought.
It’s hard to pick yourself up when you’re down. I was on my phone for an hour and a half while lying next to the girlfriend, but I didn’t want to wake her because I knew that she was waking up soon and didn’t want her to lose out on sleep. So I occupied my mind as best as I could, and then I made the choice to at least try today. I can’t help how I feel, but I can help what I do.
And it was around that time that I came across a cute and surprisingly fitting posting of The Rock saying that it’s gonna be okay. So I shared that on my Facebook page because I need that, and I don’t know who else does. And I’m gonna share it here too.
Do what you can.
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