How have my definitions of success or progress evolved over time?
I’m an oldest daughter, and I grew up where only “my best” was the expectation, except “my best” was also straight A’s. I was to be well rounded in sports, academics, extracurriculars and to go to college, get married, and raise a family. I stayed the course, and I did all the things that looking back put self-care on an out-of-reach back burner. I was married and running my solo law office when I learned of my husband’s infidelity and BOOM, my sanity escaped me while I experienced my first manic episode in my early 30’s. After that and after the horrendous hospitalizations and traumatic journey that followed, my definition of success was reduced to simply breath.
Breathing.
It took over a decade for me to come to terms with the diagnosis of Bipolar 1. A diagnosis that I was given, while still manic and psychotic, in the first mental ward. I had to work to redefine success, happiness, and who I was in this new paradigm. Now, success is many things, both big and small like:
– Remembering to take my medicine.
– Staying in the present moment, with gratitude that I am still here to live it.
How has learning to ask for help strengthened me?
Because I struggled to understand what Bipolar 1 is in the first place, I was vulnerable for a long time. I had multiple solitary, manic, and psychotic experiences, traumas, and hospitalizations of help that I did not ask for. I sought help that was what I wanted to hear, but that led me astray, in an alternate diagnosis of “adjustment disorder,” and in tapering off my medication with a plan of taking a “rescue cocktail” that would quickly kick mania to the curb if symptoms arose. It turned out there wasn’t time for this to have a snowball’s chance in hell – of course. And I had the worst manic, psychotic episode of all, including getting arrested.
I learned the help you want and ask for, is not always the help you need.
As an attorney, I was the usually the one helping. For me, it was a long process to form a new trusted circle. It took years to build and rebuild relationships that I needed. It was learning to ask for help from the people I can safely trust that strengthened me.
I learned not just to ask, but to discern first who to ask.
How do I reframe difficult days so they do not erase my progress?
I lived the first decades of my life mentally healthy and stable. In the “before” time, I had illnesses like cold or flu or conditions that were alleviated overnight with over-the-counter medication or an outpatient surgery. I see now that I was blissfully unaware of what it was to suffer from mental illness.
It isn’t just difficult days. For me, it’s been a difficult process and journey, being struck with Bipolar 1 as if struck by lightning. I would have preferred lightning. There are countless moments where mania and mental illness, and wearing that badge, have felt insurmountable. I anchor myself with my breath. I wrote A Sea of Lego & Lavender, my memoir, and sharing my story helps me both reframe and move forward with my new life.
For me, any day short of becoming fully manic is still on the okay scale. That’s my main reframe, redefining okay. Each day I wake up with any symptoms less than fully manic is okay, and I hold space for all of it. I hold onto the hope that treatment and medication will secure me an extended remission or at least lessen the severity of whatever other episodes may come.
What routines help me feel supported and safe?
I like but don’t love too much routine. So, for me, it’s sticking to some strong self-care practices that help. But also, not panicking if they’re not strictly adhered to literally every day, 365.
What’s now essential for me are – sleep seven or more hours, medications, healthy food, exercise, keeping my service dog nearby and caring for her, low stress work, creative outlets, meditation, intention setting, yoga, writing and maintaining relationships with my husband, friends, and family.
My husband and I left Los Angeles for Colombia for a lower cost of living and to be near family. That led to the same in Argentina, and now again in Spain. When I was younger, I was an exchange student to Australia and studied in Florence, Italy during college. I loved it. Now, a lower stress, lower cost life abroad with an overlay of the healthy routines is what keeps me feeling not only supported and safe, but what has led to me feeling more me than any time since my diagnosis.
To keep vigilant, I pretend mania is an evil villain, and my routines are its kryptonite. Yep. Sometimes I think this helps the most because it’s also fun.
