With Every Up Comes a Down. I Went Manic Again.

Part 1 of 2

I’m grateful to be back! I haven’t posted a blog since May of this year, 2025. I have bipolar disorder, and I became tired and exhausted from all the meds I am on to treat it. I have been on the same medicines for years and wanted to see if I could go down on one or more of them to help how I was feeling. I was tired all day, taking 2-hour naps, and still going to bed by 8:30p.m. I was getting nine or 10 hours of sleep at night, and yet I would still nap once, even twice, during the day.

With direction from my psychiatrist, I tried going down on one of my mood stabilizers in hopes that it would help. I went down a bit every three weeks for 12 weeks. That was four reductions of the high dose I was taking. My psychiatrist and I would talk weekly. He would ask me if I felt manic, and I would say, “No.”  I felt happy, super energetic, and stable, I thought. I had so much energy, I felt like a 35-year-old again. I am 57. I truly thought the change in me was from the newfound energy I was experiencing from my lack of medication and not being so tired. I began running five errands in a day and thought that it was fantastic and something everyone with energy did.  

One day I woke up and began cleaning out drawers and closets. That’s when my family and I saw it. I was definitely manic. Doing those things are my tell-tale signs of mania. I have been there before. People think this type of energy and behavior sounds great, but for me it comes with severe anxiety and rage. I wanted to drive my car as fast as I could into a brick wall. Again, under strict care of my psychologist, my meds were raised once again, almost to the level I started at. With every up comes a down.

Before my medicine kicked in at the higher dose again, I became very depressed. Again, having bad thoughts, I had my husband sit with me while I was in the shower to be sure I wouldn’t hurt myself. Those scary thoughts came, not because I wanted to hurt myself, but because I wanted to stop feeling like I was feeling. Unfortunately, my solutions would have killed me. I am very honest about what I am feeling, so I can get the help I need from my doctor and the support I so desperately need from my family. I am always grateful for the love, support, and help of my family and close friends.

I want to be well. I have been suffering from this illness since I was a child, undiagnosed at that time. I knew something was wrong when I held a sharp steak knife to my wrist at the age of nine. I didn’t cut myself because I was afraid it would hurt. By the age of 24, I was sitting, rocking back and forth, and hysterically crying in my dark walk-in closet. I was praying God would take me. My husband, Greg, was terrified, because neither of us knew why I was acting that way. He was afraid I would try and end my life, so he took me to the emergency room. After describing my symptoms, a doctor came to me with a book, pointed to the page, and said, “Read this.” I said, “That sound just like me!” And just like that I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

The doctor said my condition was treatable with medicine. I was not upset with my diagnosis, because I was so relieved to hear it could be treated. My husband and I have been married 37 years. He says if I fall apart while I am diligently taking my medicine, he will stay. If I stop taking my medicine and fall apart, he will leave. It’s a hard enough illness to handle when a person cooperates.

This blog is long enough. I will post about the results of this bipolar episode in my next blog. I hope you will be back to read it in the near future.

Mental Illness is no joke.

If you would like to read more about my mental illness experience, please read my book titled,

A Miracle a Day, One Day at a Time; Hope After Traumatic Brain Injury

https://store.bookbaby.com/book/a-miracle-a-day-one-day-at-a-time