I took my Adderall too late in the day yesterday and didn’t sleep last night. I absolutely hate this medication. It’s so much work. On the one hand, if I don’t take it, I feel better physiologically. My sleeping patterns are regular, my brain fog lifts, my heart doesn’t race and cause me anxiety, I’m not cognitively wiped out at any point during the day, and I eat. But if I don’t take it, concentrating is difficult, everything takes twice as long to process in my mind, and I tend to make more detail-oriented mistakes. As a result, my work is compromised and the things I enjoy doing outside of work take too much effort. It’s a constant trade off.
But it isn’t just my Adderall. I also hate taking my Lamictal and now Wellbutrin…and they don’t give me any side effects. I realized that what I truly hate about taking these medications is the daily reminder that I have Bipolar Disorder. Every day when I walk to the sink, I open one cupboard and grab a glass and I open the other and see all my pill bottles. Without fail, as I reach in to grab the pills, I hear that voice in my head: “You are Crazy!” “You are Weak!” “You are Broken!”
Most of the time, the voice is fleeting and the running water makes me have to pee, so I’m distracted. But other days are harder. On other days, I tend to just avoid the experience all together. Those are my weaker days when I’m more prone to believe the voice and allow it to define who I am. I’ll walk away and believe that I am crazy because my perception in situations is sometimes off. I’ll believe that I am weak because I sometimes lose control of my emotions. I’ll believe that I am broken because my brain functions differently than other people. And on those days, I do give up and I just stay in bed. However, on my stronger days, or on the days Marc expresses disappointment twoard me for not taking my medicine again, I head over to the sink with my own voice. On those days, I take that glass and I fill it with water. I open the pill bottles and place the blue one, the white one and the bigger blue one in the palm of my hand. And on those days, I pop them in my mouth and I swallow them. And I do so with these thoughts instead.
I am not weak. I have confronted every obstacle my mood disorder and ADD have thrown my way over the past 30 years. I have controlled my anger to a level where I can maintain relationships. I have learned how to laugh. I am learning to slow my thoughts down and as a result, I have stopped losing my keys and cooking on high as though medium and low don’t even exist. I have figured out my triggers and cope with them. I can now recognize the onset of my mania and depression and am better able to manage them. I am better able to communicate in a healthy and effective manner and most importantly, I have finally learned to offer myself grace to have a reaction. Right, wrong or indifferent. And the very fact that I have met life goals while doing all of that makes me a candidate for the next Marvel movie.
I am not crazy. There is an abundance of evidence-based research that the government, academic institutions, and privately funded groups have invested in to try and understand the conditions I have. They have done this just as they have for heart disease, diabetes, autism, cancer, etc. Listen, I don’t want to have emotions that bounce up and down outside of the realm of normal. I don’t want to have racing thoughts all the time. And I certainly don’t want to spend time and effort managing these symptoms or the medications that help control them. But I do. A part of my body doesn’t function properly. These are medical conditions. They are not fabricated. They are not my fault. And they are definitely not a reflection of who I am.
I am not Broken. According to God, I am fearfully and wonderfully made and that ALL things work for good for those who are called according to His purpose. For every negative aspect of having a ‘mental illness’ or two, there are 100 positives. When my levels trend on the side of mania, I laugh and others laugh with me. I also have a wonderfully fantastic sense of adventure and experience life fantastically. When my levels trend on the side of depression, I self-reflect and grow and eventually come out with deeper understandings and more empathy for others. I feel things deeply and I appreciate beauty so much more vividly. I cling to faith and it brings me peace. I am creative and fun and insightful and different. And do you know what? I shine…just as bright as those firetruck lights that used to show up when I cooked. 🙂
Giving Up: – Well, it is simply NEVER an option! I may rest sometimes, but I will always get back up.
The bottom line is this: Managing my Bipolar and ADD is hard. But managing ANY of the health conditions or trials or tribulations that we all endure as human beings is hard. All of history teaches us what hard is and what is required to overcome it. It also teaches us the phenomenal things we can accomplish when we do. Hard requires strength and perseverance, forgiveness and grace. It requires grit and a huge dose of humor. It requires that you make your way to the sink every morning and tell that voice to Piss Off! But before you do, just remember this: Don’t pee first. Sometimes it’s the distractions in life that help us through our hardest days.
What is Normal Anyway? 