Feelings

Trusting feelings.  I am not sure this is something I do well.  Right now I am feeling uncomfortable so much so I feel nauseous.  I want to believe that I do not date because I do not want to hurt others or that I do not let people close to me because I do not want to hurt them.  A good friend pointed out to me that maybe I do not want to be hurt.  I disagreed with him but it has become blatantly clear to me that he is right.  I feel nauseous because I feel intimidated by someone.  Not sure why but I do.  This is not a feeling I am familiar with and one that I do not care for.  I typically run on the higher side of bipolar which means I stay on the side of grandiosity and self confidence and sometimes overly self confident and grandiose.  Well grandiosity is always overly if you are grandiose.  Anyway I have a big uncomfortable stress ball in the pit of my stomach.  I see now that I do not want to have to explain myself to people or feel vulnerable which puts myself in a position to be hurt.  For a long time now I have made sure I have not been in that position and now I feel like I am just because I am trying to feel my feelings instead of hiding behind them.  Normally I would just say something really sarcastic and hurtful so that person could not touch me and I do not want to do that anymore.  I am finished hiding.  It gets really lonely doing that.

As far as trusting my feelings I never really know which ones are the real ones so to speak.  I know when I feel good I need to watch how good I feel and the things that I am doing when I feel like that.  I know when I am not hungry for the day or overly tired I might be depressed but there are so many feelings in between that are there and they get covered up by the stronger ones.  Feeling is one of the most difficult things I have had to do on this journey with the BP disorder that I am hoping to get a handle on.  Right now I feel like I have no creativity I am just here and not having fun.  Yesterday someone said to me smile and I cried because I can not always smile but people are not used to me being normal so as much as I do not know what to do with me they do not know what to do with me either.  That makes me feel lonely because there are not many that understand what I am talking about.  Pain is something I have covered up for at least a year or so now so I know that I am due to go the other direction soon.  I just pray that the ride will not be that horrible.

The small symptoms of BP.

I have heard many say they are symptomatic with the big ups and downs.  I have noticed that I am symptomatic when I feel the slight changes in my moods.  The reason I say this is that I forever try to stop the symptoms when they start and recognizing when they start is the hard part.  I see the big dips in mood however it is when I feel the small ones that I need to pay attention to.  For instance today I could feel myself getting tired and sleepy then all the sudden getting restless (not sitting still).  The other night I was annoyed and irritated because I was hungry I was ready to bite someones head off.  These are the times that I need to be aware of- not because it is not normal to have these things go on it is that if I do not attend to them they get out of control for me.  I can get hungry but not stay hungry because if I do my mood takes a turn for the worst.  Not that people do not get irritable and restless then tired but if they change every 15 min or so there might be a problem.  It's all about learning about me.  The patterns is what teach me the most.  If I really look and am truly honest with myself I can see the problem before the problem starts.  The time to stop the fire is when it starts not when the fire truck have put it out already.

Anger or Rage?

Justified anger or unadulterated bipolar rage?  Not sure some understand what a stigma it creates when someone says something like" hes is really lucky I did not go bipolar on him".  I am not sure but I am not so flip about my anger and when I am I need to make sure it is not rage.  There is a difference between anger and rage.  I do not know about anyone else but 'going bipolar " is not a choice for me.  It is not a conscious decision I make. Flipping out is not fun and I do not take it lightly.  Mind you there are times that somethings I I do when that happens can be laughed at after I get through it.  For example, taking the staff at the hospital for a ride.  But to say I was bipolar when I go off gives the disease too much power over me and minimizes my responsibility in my actions.  Rage or anger I am still responsible for my actions on a daily basis.  I need to have humility in my life and be able to laugh in the right places.  I also really need to be careful what kind of message I am sending.  If I do not want to be treated with a stigma then I should not act like I should be treated with a stigma!  Please let me know your thought.