There is a saying in yoga practice when doing inversion asanas (upside down poses): inversions help you to see your world upside down in practice so you know how to deal better with upside down moments in life.
Let’s just say that I’ve been doing a lot of inversions lately.
Hello, I am the self-titled Bipolar Baker… And welcome to my sweet upside down word.
I was only recently diagnosed, as of May 9th, 2013… Not even a week now. And yet, it feels like I have lived with this disease all my life. I’m already comfortable with its company. My official diagnosis is Bipolar I, rapid cycling, with mixed mania, and Anxiety Disorder. Sounds like fun, right? Actually, it is quite fun…
When I’m in my mania, I am a hoot! I am the social butterfly, the Carrie in the city, the instant best friend you just met. I am super over productive: writing a 1,450 word paper for school in three hours- in APA format, with citations and five references, without an outline; baking 48 cupcakes from scratch, with homemade raspberry soufflé icing, individually wrapped in lace and prepped for the bridal shower that is less than ten hours away which I then co-host with flair (constantly having to remind myself, of course, that I am NOT the center of attention for the next two hours… A difficult feat for me). I am the organizer of clothes into color coordinated rows by type from left to right, separated by specific hangers into three sections- pants, tops, and dresses/skirts, even coordinating my underthings in their drawers by color.
Color rules my world most days. I get caught up in feeling the deep, cellular green of the late spring-leaves inside my head. I watch the wispy feather white clouds drift in slow motion across the infinite Carolina blue sky. I study the amber and coal and hematite hairs on my dog’s coat as he lays beside me, head on my thigh. I see colors as moods, and as auras. It is my gift and my burden as an empath, only adding to the complexity of my mind. In my mania I see starbursts of yellow and honey gold following little children, chasing their worries away… Luckily, the downs don’t stay as long… “The Crash” I have named it… The free fall after the mania. It is quick and steady: a ride down the steep side of the roller coaster, G-forces pulling at my heart, then a quick upturn to baseline, stomach churning, to wait for another incline, steady again climbing up up up. On grey days baking and my yoga pull me up. I have never found baking difficult, which is how I know it is my “out” when I have crashed. It is the one sweet thing I can lose my mind in, both figuratively and literally. My yoga practice I revel in… Morning yoga to invigorate, day yoga to stay motivated, evening yoga to be thoughtful, and night yoga to burn off the stored energy that wasn’t released in the day. Usually the night yoga involves the inversions- head stands, bridge pose, arm stands, wheel pose… Feet high above my heart to remind me: be grounded in the air, let that which is real rise above your wounded heart, and let your heart rise above your head.
Again, this is simply the walkway, the entry to my world. I hope you can join me for a few, or maybe just one spin... Either way, I hope it's a sweet ride.
i’m supposed to write each day, with the mundane thoughts of things i did yesterday, not in order, just as they come to me.
took my mom to get her taxes done, bought her a crown for her birthday (tomorrow) at the dollar store and took a picture of her standing on the porch wearing it - she’s so freaking adorable. sent that pic to my friend Scoop who mentioned she’s a small human so how am i tall? which led to me realize i have no clue how tall my dad is nor can i ask him since we aren’t speaking anymore.
we had taco tuesday, i made margaritas on ice - and am just now this very moment trying to justify calling sauza on the rocks with a splash of limeade a “margarita”, but meh.
my kid woke up happy, which was huge because the night before was SO windy and i was up from midnight to 130am listening to it, thinking of my mom who would say “babies are restless with the wind” and how much i haaaaaated windy nights when they* were little. *i’m trying very hard to use the they/them pronouns, it’s still not natural but i want to be respectful of their decision, even tho i’m still not sure i fully understand the need for a pronoun change for bisexuality, i can however relate it to my last name changing when i got married and how vital that was to my identity, so i wonder if they want to change their name as well?
i didn’t write yesterday, tired from the night before. i’m doing well with my sleep, i think. bed between 1030/11 and up easily at 8/830. i’m going to have a super hard time in the fall when they both go back to school (stepson included in the they there). i worry that it will be too taxing on my kid, that waking up at 8 for an 830 class is easy, even waking up at 730 for an 8am class is easier, but having to get up again at 650/7 to put on a uniform, be awake, eat, drive to school for 750 attendance ... iiiiiii don’t want to do that.
i made a messy bun.. this has become a new thing i do since i hate my long hair and want it chopped but i’m one of those people who hasn’t left the house for anything social or personal since march 13th 2020 and getting my hairs did isn’t worth it. i’m mad about that - i feel like i am one of the last bastions holding out in desperation, alone.
i put on pants. this is a joke, but it’s also very serious. the daily habits that people do when they don’t have a broken brain still baffle me. Scoop said “self awareness doesn’t alway lead to self understanding” and dammit he’s right.
bff invited me to come and walk with me today, but it’s probably too late in the morning now, she is up with the sun to take care of her kids and her husband and go to work, and i am left in bed here at 853 trying figure out what pants to wear.
3.3.21
My epiphany for today: if you have a zillion hair thingys, and use them, you have a bad haircut... If you are, however, five years old, this is baseline norm. ...this is not counting the 1,800+ plastic hairband ties (separated by color in pill boxes- a mommy mania moment)...
Poe Forrest
He spoke for me. I speak for him. A quote I live by now.
I promise I will try...
Share your story so others know they are not alone
You know that feeling of foreboding?... I mean, if you're bipolar or depressive or anxious or have panic attacks you get that feeling, like, the other shoe is gonna drop... Any minute now. I'm there. I think. I don't know. I wish there was a guide book for the emotional roller coaster that is my life. Not your life or her life but MY life. I wish I could look into the future and see Yes Dammit, I'm headed in the right direction... You'll see, you'll get there. But no. No book. No instruction manual. I split our account two weeks ago, into a hers and his. It was my first step at "detachment with love" they call it. I took my name off all the credit cards, which I already regret... What if I need to buy medicine or pay for a copay?... I suppose I will have to figure that out. Right now, I'm paying for myself and my daughter to live without fear of not having money. So. Yeah. No credit cards. Dammit. I was High as a kite on Friday, not sure why. Probably just the excess built up passive aggressive anger coming out in a ball of misplaced energy. I was singing and laughing and felt like I was in a good place. I don't know where i am now. This bipolar thing for me was pretty stable there for a long time, but the past month or two I've been rapid cycling ... Like sometimes morning to afternoon cycling. So strange to have the Black thoughts at ten am, then be Rainbows at two. I don't get it. I suppose there will be years of learning ahead. For everything. Learning how to lean on myself and still love him. Learning how to cultivate a relationship between my daughter and her father, but not allowing her to get hurt. I'm inpatient. Learning should come to you like math facts - 2x2=4. Got it. Done. Never changes. This learning curve is so long and twisted and it dives off cliffs and parachutes to rolling greens then skids you off to an iceberg. But no map. No instructions. And that other shoe- it's hovering. My break downs are minor compared to losing my ever loving fucking mind two years ago. But no less scary. A panic attack three (3?) weeks ago was enough to rattle me for days. I don't wish them on anyone. I felt it coming, like now. I felt it in my skin, in my ears... It was humming, right there in my brain. The vibration that stirs all the shakes and tears and cuts off my voice. I felt it coming. I tried, honest, I did... I washed my hands and face. I plugged in, loud as I could get it. I sat on the floor- what can I see? what can I feel? what can I smell? what can I taste? Grounding. And it didn't matter. The wave swept me up, the whole stick of a human I've become, and tossed me over its shoulder into the rolling ocean ... No lifeguard. No raft. Just deep, drowning, tumultuous waves of ... Of what? It wasn't truly sadness. It was this odd combination of relief and terror. Finally, FINALLY it was here and I could drown. Who wishes that they could drown?... I suppose only those of us that are most scared of the water. Because if we come up for air We've won.
Reblog
i've been encouraged to write more. i will do my best. i'm starting late tonite, but i promise to try to get back and write more tomorrow. i will have to test how long i can handle typing - long story, torn ligament, right wrist. have to go put the kiddo down to bed.
wishing everyone else bunny dreams too.
blessings
namaste
so... today i have learned the following:
-that Lamictal sucks. it takes away my high, it makes my nose stuffy and makes me eat like a pregnant heiffer... that which i am not.
-that GAK must be made with Elmers glue... seriously. it wont work with the cheap stuff.
-that homemade playdoh is a ZILLION times easier to make than Gak, and the kiddo loves it more.
-that i like my highs. i get some *winks* and go to sleep late, sleep through the night, and wake up early at 630 refreshed, and can make-coffee-unfriend-120-FB-peeps-clean-the-bedroom-unmake-the-bed-put-the-blankets-and-pillows-in-the-wash-and-dryer-feed-the-frog-surf-pinterest-for-twenty-yoga-plans-and-scrub-the-toilets all within about an hour...
but when i take that d@mn Lamictal i freakin CRASH. it was at 10 i finally took it, b/c i knew, i just KNEW it would kill my high. and it did. at 1220 i was telling kiddo to go watch some tv on the ipad and Mommee is taking a nap. i slept for a whopping 30 minutes (who can sleep with a kid in the house, alone anyway?). this is an evil drug. hate it hate it hate it. three hours later, it finally wears off - "drivers, start your engines!... and they're off!"
i come out of the fog and make s'mores for the kiddo, drag her to the grocery store, pick up the four things i need, head over to the drug store for a return, go home, mangle the Gak recipe, and make three batches of play doh stuff. and i realize i am brilliant- as i think of a zillion new yoga classes i can totally teach, invent a new seat cover for the kiddo so she doesnt burn her arse off in this heat, and plan out next years garden in our new home (which, of course, we havent actually bought yet... but i digress... ). life is good - well, except for the whole stuffy nose thing, STILL.
again -i hate the Lamictal. its worse than the Seroquel, which is going away next week (commence countdown- night 8... tonite). i cant tell if the other one, the Risperdal -i hate spelling that- if its working or if its the one that chops me down. although, i can totally pinpoint the two hour half life of the Lamictal... so im blaming it. the good doc says that the hives are a sun sensitivity from both meds, and that my aches and pains are from the highs -HA! i laugh at the thought. tooooooooo baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad. i like my highs. i said that. oh well - i DO.
what else?... ... ...
OH -i dislike immensely the saying that "you should do what you dislike doing first..". only a-holes do this, i have decided. i cleaned the upstairs bathroom- like, scrub-the-doorknobs-and-lightswitches-with-a-toothbrush cleaned. i LIKE doing them - they are small, i know where everything goes, and it is DONE and i move on. even the master bedroom is okay. it is the dining room/office and living room i DESPISE. there is just NOT enough room, and too much CR@P. they are still not done. neither is the laundry to put away (not even WASH, just put away!) or the sewing (yes, i mend things... when i want to be cheap... ).
i have a brilliant idea again... i salvaged a tv stand from a front yard curb, and i am going to repurpose it as a scrap corner! whahoo!!! cant wait. it is a project for my niece and i for the summer. cant wait to pick out colors- i am thinking tiffany blue and black. love that. and i love blue, and black. this also will be in my new house, in my new office and craft room. oh - i do so love a good fantasy.
okay. rant closed.
Welcome to my sweet upside down world.
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