Well, I did say I was going to talk about my life with Bipolar every now and then. So I figured why not start with a nice list? After years of living with this crap, you learn to twist your life a little to manage, which can lead to some interesting results. Forgive me if my format seems a little goofy though. Internet is down in camp so I’m secretly doing this from my phone so…nobody tell my officers. Shhh……
1: You Learn to Manage Time Expertly
Think of it this way. When you are depressed, most, if not all of your time, you’re trying not to let the sadness and hopelessness of everything consume you. But you’re also extremely tired since you’ve been fighting the depressed period for so long. So at the end, you spend lots of time juggling personal, work, family and friends life all at the same time. And you get really, really good at that.
One time, I had to go back to camp by 11, so I had to make the decision between taking a 15 min cab or two hours of train and buses. I realized how fast my thought process was between spending more time at home resting and paying out of pocket to get to camp on time or just leave then and there and lose over 1 1/2 hour of rest. That same thought process has been ingrained in my daily life, so I hardly ever am late for meetings and stuff. Sometimes, I’m even an hour early. So…yay bipolar?
2: You Become The Doctor Sometimes.
The Doctor is the titular character from BBC’s Doctor Who. If you don’t know who that is, you should feel somewhat ashamed of yourself and go watch the show. A short version of that is The Doctor is a Time Lord, an alien that can regenerate into a new body every time he dies for 12 times. So we have the latest (Capaldi is current, just that he’s season isn’t in yet), Matt Smith’s 11th Doctor, a old man (very, very old. 1400 years old) in a young body, and William Hartnell’s 1st Doctor, a young man in a old body.
And Christopher Eccleston and David Tennent’s 9th and 10th Doctors, my favorite being Chris’s, have this overwhelming burden and sadness from carrying the burden of the genocide of their own race, yet continue to try to keep themselves upbeat throughout their lives. They also get angry with a kind of spine shivering anger when provoked, same with Matt’s Doctor.
After living with bipolar for a long time, your personality sort of resembles The Doctor at times. When mania takes over, you’re high as a kite. Limitless energy that can shoot through the roof and run around doing things. And when you’re depressed, you get quiet and pensive about life and the feeling is insanely similar to ‘having lived too long’, while in mania it feels more like ‘living not long enough’ since you’re enjoying life and worried about the prospect of death the eventual depression brings. The scariest part is of course, the anger.
I got righteously angry once when I stumbled upon a group of hooligans picking on a young teen boy. I stepped in, and the boy pretty much ran so I was left to fend off 5 buffed dude. That was about 6 months ago I guess? I was in the throes of depression then, and was pretty damn angry. Like The Doctor, I have no fear of death from doing the right thing, and I was also pretty damn sure that there was no way I’d lose. I can’t remember exactly what I said, but it was along the line of, “If you want to fight me with just five of you, you should bring another fifty more so I can have a warm-up.”. Pretty cheesy if you asked me, but it worked. The hooligans thought twice about this fad dude standing in front of them without missing a beat a left with a few choice curses. And that brings me to the next and last short point…
3: You Become Insanely Good at Surviving
Paranoia is a nice little gift in the package of BD. But due to being paranoid about everything for almost 24/7 for most of my life, I’ve learnt to fend for myself quite nicely. I’ve picked up armed and unarmed martial arts and am quite good at it. I have a jackknife with me all the time. Picked up uncountable knowledge in wilderness survival and diplomatic speak. Not to mention I’ve absolutely no fear of death (but still fear of height, spider etc.) which really gives me an edge in tense situations. So, recap, “If you want to fight me with just five of you, you should bring another fifty more so I can have a warm-up.”
This had been one weird ass post -_-.
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