“There is no knowledge that is not power”
-Ralph Waldo Emerson (Mortal Kombat)
TRIGGER WARNING: Dark, depressive concepts are discussed here. If you do not wish to learn these things about me, or if you do not believe you can handle reading about severe depression, please turn away now. I will not be offended if you don't read this blog post.
For the past four years, I was told I had Major Depressive Disorder. To me, this made a lot of sense. I was depressed a lot, so the title rang true to me. It's funny – I would only ever seek help when I was depressed. Not when I felt good, or even great.
This is the case for thousands of people in the world who have mental health disorders. They only seek help during the downward spiral. Unfortunately, there are disorders which have two sides to their coin: depressive AND manic.
For me, I thought that my manic episodes were what “normal people” felt like. I just thought of those times as non-depressed periods. But it turns out that there was much more going on in my wilderness of a brain.
Recently, I admitted myself for a stay in my local hospital, having what I could only describe as a mental breakdown. I was so depressed, and I had let my living environment become messier and messier. I was buried deep inside my lack of serotonin, and I could tell that it was getting worse.
It had been months since I drank alcohol. I have never battled alcoholism, thankfully, but since changing to taking Prozac a year ago I had opted to simply not drink any more than the occasional 1 alcoholic beverage. But then I was at a staff party after a pretty rough summer. I decided to let loose and have a few. I only had 4 drinks, spread over about 4.5 hours. But because my body wasn't used to processing alcohol while on Prozac, I became absolutely sloshed. I was having a lovely time, until I wasn't. I went back into a room to be by myself, and began to cry. Hard.
My brain went to a very dark place in that moment. One that it had never gone to before, to this extent. I knew in that moment that I was no longer safe to myself.
I'm fortunate; I have amazing friends. I asked two of my friends at the party to drive me to the hospital's emergency room, and they didn't even bat an eyelash. I'm not someone who attempts to hide their mental health from their friends and family, so they had a decent idea of what was happening.
We got to the hospital, and started the registration process. And then I had to say what was wrong. Out loud. So I used the term I had learned in therapy. “S.I.”
For those unfamiliar, S.I. stands for suicidal ideation. Like most things in life, it comes on a spectrum. In its mildest form, it is simply fleeting, passing thoughts that you don't even acknowledge. You do this with hundreds of thoughts every day. As a child, I had these thoughts all the time. But I assumed everybody had them. Turns out, I was incorrect.
The next tier would be conscious thoughts, but without a specified plan. In this phase, you consciously tell yourself that you aren't worth fixing, and that things would be better if you weren't around. At least, that's what my brain defaults to when I am occasionally in that phase.
The final tier is ideation with a specific plan. Inside of this, there are two levels: one where you WANT to enact that plan, and one where you DO NOT want to enact that plan. Luckily, on this drunken night, I DID NOT want to enact the plan. But there was definitely a plan. So I'm fortunate that I sought help, instead of hiding.
Over the course of the following week, I stayed as an inpatient in the hospital, while the doctor put me on a new medication. They wanted to closely monitor how I reacted to it, and also make sure I was safe. These health-care professionals are incredible human beings. I couldn't possibly have been in better hands.
When I started taking the new medication (Abilify) as an add-on to my Prozac, I slowly started to recover. I felt normal for the first time in a very long time. However, the longer I was on the Abilify and Prozac combined, the more my mood started becoming extremely “up”, and it was beginning to become apparent that I was past the point I was supposed to be.
Bipolar is a scary term to hear. I know people who live successful lives with this condition, and they are incredible humans. But to be told that you have likely been misdiagnosed and that you are most likely “Bipolar 2”.....that is quite the thing to be told. I was currently in the “up” state of bipolar, known as “mania”.
Antidepressants and Bipolar Disorder do NOT mix well. I had been on low doses of antidepressants for 4 years at this point. When someone with Bipolar takes an antidepressant, they tend to just aggravate your two extremes. But again, I never sought help during the manic episodes, because I felt fantastic, and over-empowered. When I'm in that state, I sleep between 2 and 4 hours per night. But I'm not tired whatsoever. This does take a toll on the body, however, and I eventually crash into a depressive episode.
My Prozac has been cut in half. I am now on Quetiapine to manage my sleep. The Abilify is going to slowly be increased, as it is meant for Bipolar Disorder when used in larger doses. Eventually they will likely take me off the Prozac, once the Abilify is at a high dose. My mania has finally subsided. But unlike normal, I did not crash into depression. I feel stable and grounded. Centered between my two extremes. My sleep is slowly improving. I'm in a great place. My partner and a couple friends cleaned my entire home before I had came home from the hospital. It was embarrassing, but needed. I love them all dearly, and don't know what I would have done without them; especially my partner.
So why am I putting this story onto the internet and sharing it with you? Well, if even just one person reads this, and thinks “maybe that's me”, I hope it inspires them to be tested. Just because you have been given a diagnosis, does not mean it's correct.
Keep breathing. Let's end the stigma.
Take care,
Stephen