A reader asked me to delve a little deeper into my mental health status after reading yesterday’s post. Understandable. I’ve been pretty quiet about how I’ve been doing for some time. Honestly, I haven’t been quite trusting of some folks who stalk my blog, which is why I haven’t said much, but I’m not going to let a few ugly seeds ruin something positive, so here it goes.

The Lithium I was on for about a year and a half seemed to be doing pretty well, I guess, but I actually had nothing to compare it to. I went from being on Prozac, which worked great in my post-partum and breastfeeding craziness phase, to popping Lithium without a break in between. The Prozac was working up until a few months after I stopped breastfeeding, but it appeared as though as soon as April was done with the boob, I went manic. I couldn’t sleep. I did crazy things. I almost got a divorce. Right then, I feel like it should have dawned on me (or at least one of my medical professionals) that perhaps with the hormone change, the mania was actually a result of the antidepressant doing its job a little too well.

In retrospect, I probably should have weaned off the Prozac before trying anything else. The Lithium did okay, but I had trouble with it. It got the mania under control, but I got depressed. The opposite effect. The Lithium did its job a little too well. So what made logical sense to a doctor? Treat the depression in addition to the mania. See where this is going? Oh, well, since I was showing signs of both mania and depression, I must be bipolar, right? Well, maybe. It’s possible that was a correct diagnosis. Except that the Lithium depressed me and half the medications used to treat the depression side of the bipolar disorder had horrible effects, and two almost killed me. My doc was puzzled because even on the lowest doses they would knock me out completely. Considering that sort of thing has to do with metabolism (which I have a very high one when it comes down to food and health), it looked like I had an incredibly sluggish one, which didn’t seem right to her.

The woman who was managing my medication happened to be one of the best in the state, if not the country. One very smart woman for sure. But something that I think was missed was that what if, what if, I was diagnosed incorrectly to begin with.

I found out in the fall that Ann (name changed) was retiring. She gave me a list of referrals. For months I stared at that list. Looked them up on the internet. Tried to figure out what I was going to do. There was something that was bothering me about the whole situation. I looked up everything I could about bipolar disorder, depression, mild psychosis, PPD, treatment, and reflected on my own postpartum and life-long situation. An acquaintance died. I had some shocking realizations hit me regarding dance, my situation, and why I was unhappy with my life. And I realized that although it appeared that I was on the “correct dose” of Lithium and Seroquel, I didn’t really feel happy, just blah most of the time. Going through the motions.

I’m smart enough to know that something wasn’t quite right, and so I started questioning my treatment. I also started making major changes. I decided to go back to school. I quit teaching. I ended running my Friday night event. James and I admitted that the world of dance had destroyed our marriage and our ability to function as a couple, so hit with the choice of divorcing or leaving the dance world, we decided that our life together was far more important. And then, two months ago, a few days before Thanksgiving, I had this horrible pain in my lower abdomen that was more excruciating than natural childbirth.

I wasn’t sick. No organs were failing. There appeared to be no source for the pain- just the horrible, crippling pain. I don’t ever go to the doctor for anything other than my regular med check ups. This wasn’t fake or a hypochondriac moment.

I decided then and there that the reason I hadn’t called someone on my doctor referral list because I felt that deep down, something wasn’t right about either my diagnosis, the medication, or both. One thing that rang true the entire time I have received treatment for a mental disorder was the fact that with the exception of handful of incorrect-drug-induced moments, I have always been able to think clearly and rationally. That’s not always indicative of truly having bipolar disorder. All of my worst “bipolar moments” actually happened ON medication. I have had ups and downs my entire life, but nothing compared to the moments of mental haze that were a direct result of medication gone horribly wrong.

In other words, I have a feeling that one I had gotten past the postpartum depression, the very medication that was supposed make me “sane” was the thing making me unhealthy. And I was concerned that my abdominal pain attack was a result of a buildup of medication in my system.

Right after the horrible pain in my abdomen, I started backing off the Seroquel one pill at a time, slowly. When I reached a certain dose, I stayed there for at least a week. When I was down to one small pill, I began backing off of the Lithium a tiny bit at a time. Not too long ago, I took my last Lithium. Not once did James or I notice my sanity starting to shake. In fact, I have felt quite “normal” for a change, except now I have energy again, I can wake up the moment my alarm goes off, and I feel like I can summon up some emotion again.

And before anyone chastises me for weaning off meds without doctor supervision, rest assured I DID go see a doctor about both the stabbing pain in my abdomen and made her aware of my choice to stop all prescription drugs. In addition to her, I went to see a doctor and make an appointment to start neurofeedback. She is also aware of my situation and has doctors to recommend should I start showing signs of needing to be back on some kind of medicaiton.

I’m no idiot. I am fully aware that just because I feel better off medication does not mean that it will always be the best decision. However, because I’m not an idiot, I also have realized that medication may not have been the best route for me once I was done with the Prozac. My depression was possibly situational rather than due to some horrible chemical imbalance, and massive changes in my life have proved so far that it is likely I can live a balanced life with normal ups and downs in a healthy manner seeking treatment other than Lithium and other drugs.

The years of therapy and medication helped. But I am not of the mindset that they are the best route for someone who is otherwise healthy. It appeared as though it reached a point where the drugs were becoming the problem rather than the solution. There may be a point again where they become necessary, but for now I am relieved to feel like my old self and happy to be living a life according to what I want rather than taking care of everyone else’s needs and wants first.

My blog has been published only since the PPD hit, thus my readers have only known me on medication. Of course I probably seem crazy to the public. You have nothing to compare me to. But the people who have known me would most likely tell you that while I’ve definitely struggled with depression, I actually have a good head on my shoulders. In other words, one of your favorite crazy bloggers is quite possibly, in fact, surprisingly sane.

Current Mood: Cool

I think I would hate to write a book centered around myself, ironically. But it would have to be directly attached to being horribly, psychotically bipolar because sadly, that is who I am. I am not particularly schooled in the world of Health Activism (donuts, anyone?), nor my community (I live in da’ hood! Drop to the floor, y’all! Gunshots!), so I think I’m going to (blah) stick with imagining a book about my life and condition.

Here we go. The titles.

• “Confessions of a Perfect Persona.” This might make sense if you met me. I usually seem like I have it all together, being a typical over-achiever oldest child, and I’m usually fairly well put-together. It’s only until you stumble across my blog or spend time getting to know me that the truth comes barfing out like bad Chinese food.
• “The Truth About Wife and Mommy.” This title made me shudder. I hate the truth, yet there’s nothing I can do about it.
• “Sarcastic Wit: A Bipolar Survivor’s Guide.” Self explanatory. You all know me well enough by now to get this.
• “Bipolar Ain’t Got Nothing on Me.” This is somewhat of a lie. It has everything to do with everything in my life. But I try to escape it constantly.
• “Into the Great Wide Open.” I imagine this would focus on those moments where the mania or the depression begins to let go and I feel like I can breathe again. Getting reacquainted with the world is always both elating and a little sad.

So those are the off-the-top-of-my-head book names without actually including my best ones, only because they’re books in progress and I’m not going to spill the beans before they’re finished… and that could take years!

As far as a book jacket comes to mind, I immediately imagined a fog-pale blue theme, and a woman sitting with her knees to her chest, back to us, on a wooden dock facing some great unknown. Probably water, but unseen because of the fog. The woman is naked with a small, draping sheet wrapped around her hips. Everything is that monochromatic pale fog blue, even the woman, except for her bare skin, which is covered in thinly etched light red writing… words that describe the person on the inside. Her dark hair is wet, her hands bracing her head in distress.

I have a feeling this wouldn’t start out incredibly uplifting, but i hope that by the end it would be.

This post was written as part of NHBPM – 30 healthposts in 30 days: http://bit.ly/vU0g9J

Current Mood: Playful

Did you ever look at your life and wonder how the hell you got where you’re at, how the heck you became such a pushover/doormat when you used to be so strong, how you could be so mentally unsound when you’re so damn smart? Yeah, me too.

We’ve been trying for the better part of a year to find a second drug to accompany the Lithium in my daily pill dose. Everything I’ve tried has caused some kind of (major) negative reaction. Stupidly, my body is just ridiculously sensitive to medication. I mean, I’m the person who takes half the dose of any over-the-counter medication because the full dose knocks me out. Imagine what it feels like to have your brains turned into scrambled eggs and your body gone manic for a couple days while you desperately back off the dose of some powerful drug and have wait for the remnants to leave your system. It’s a nightmare.

If I could take the 1200mg of the Lithium, I would probably be better off, but unfortunately, every time I’ve upped the dose I’ve run into Lithium poisoning, which is just one of the most disgusting feelings I’ve ever encountered. If I could sum up my life in a list of pills, it’d go something like this: Fluoxetine (Prozac), Wellbutrin, Lithium, Resperidone, Abilify, Seroquel, Geodon, Oxcarbazepine, am I missing one or five? Probably.

My psychiatrist has explained that while the mania (my primary symptom of the bipolar disorder) is, for the most part, under control, the Lithium isn’t targeting the depression enough, or perhaps it isn’t getting rid of the mania enough to keep my mind from falling hard into the trap of depression- it’s impossible to really know. Where there is either mania or depression in my psyche, its counterpart will always breakthrough with a vengeance eventually. Lithium does wonders, but it’s limited, especially since my body cannot handle the most therapeutic dose.

I’ve been through the whole round of atypical antipsychotics used to combat bipolar depression (the same drugs used to fight major depressive disorder and- ugh- schizophrenia) and moved onto the world of anti-convulsants, drugs sometimes used in addition to Lithium to control mania. The last drug I tried a few weeks ago was one of those. It did its job a little too well because before I knew it, James was threatening me with the crisis center and calling the psychiatrist extremely concerned for my well-being. I couldn’t even see it really, but I plummeted into horrible depression that stuck even after I stopped taking the Oxcarbazepine.

Enter “try Seroquel again”. Round two. I think, unfortunately, it was kind of a desperate situation in the worst kind of way. Being suicidal doesn’t mean you’re planning it. I just means you’re a ticking time bomb. I’m starting to understand that.

Seroquel almost killed me the first time around. Nope. Not exaggerating. The dose was far too high, and it got to the point where James was staying home from work while he tried to wake me up. It was too sedating and was extended release, which built up in my system and left me unable to wake or respond. Another day or two on that dose and I assume I never would have woken up. One my sister’s extended family members died that way, so it was a pretty scary realization when I unknowingly overdosed under a physician’s care. However, the first day after I had started the drug I was in good spirits. Drowsy, but doing a bit better than I had been doing. By day three I was too drugged up to do anything but smile. Clearly, some positive effect was seen amidst the inability to wake up or talk.

This time, I started at 50mg instead of the 150mg that I started on the first time. James said he saw the effects immediately, though after three days it was clear it was still too high of a dose. I could wake up, but I was slurring my words and struggled to get out of bed for a good hour or two. He was staying home in the mornings while I slept, unable to shake the drowsiness. After three days of that dose and positive effects in my mood, my doc phoned in the lowest dose of the drug- 25mg- and said I could even cut those in half if necessary.

It’s been a few days on the 25mg, and guess what?

For the first time in my entire life, including my childhood for as long as I can remember, I have fallen asleep quickly and slept soundly and have woken up feeling rested and- holy shit- thinking “I can do this today.”

It’s like I’m taking a sleeping pill except it also clears the depression fog from my immediate view. No more insomnia. I’ve slept solid every night since partway through last week. HOLY SHIT WORLD, ARE YOU HEARING THIS? I’VE ACTUALLY BEEN SLEEPING!

I’m not sure how evident this has been because I don’t talk about it much, but we’ve found that my sanity is directly related to the amount of sleep I get. I have struggled with insomnia- severe insomnia- my entire life. I have NEVER been able to get a good amount of sleep or fall asleep quickly for more than two nights in a row at any give point in my life. I remember in eighth grade the night I actually got eight hours of sleep for the first time since I started noticing hours back in second grade- I couldn’t believe how good I felt. I have always struggled with falling asleep, frequently taking several hours for that illusive darkness to take over just before needing to get up for the day. The more exhausted I get, the more panicky I feel, and the more I struggle to fall asleep or wake up at odd stressed hours of the early morning. It’s a vicious cycle.

Well, the Seroquel is indeed a sedative, so I take it at night along with my Lithium.

Yup, the horse balls are the Lithium, and Seroquel is the penis, since, you know, dick feels good when used correctly.

I am not out of the woods yet. It’ll be a little while before we know if this is the right mix of drugs and the right dosages, but at least I’ve been sleeping and being alive has not been unbearable the last few days.

Cautiously Optimistic.

I drove alongside them for several miles, and thanks to my new glasses, I didn’t accidentally run into them or any other cars while I was busy casually gawking and trying to peer into the dark windows. Just a bunch of people wearing suits and other dark attire. Yeah, probably a funeral.

Which made me wonder.

When my life is over, will there be a huge funeral celebrating the end of a miserable, unhappy life, or sadness of a pathetic life gone passing? Will people show up wearing modest black clothing, eyes teary, will they pull out their most uncomfortable heels and dress shoes to accompany their suits and dresses? Will people actually have warm or funny things to say about my charming personality, and will most people be clueless of my mental hardships and illness that dictates every second of my every miserable waking moment?

When I was a kid I was terrified of death, but not for the reasons most are. I was petrified that once I died my soul would continue to exist forever just as God promises. I didn’t want that. I wanted to die and cease to exist. Yes, as a child. Dying wasn’t the scary part. It was the knowledge that most likely some kind of continuation exists, and I didn’t want that.

I worry about my kids and I feel sorry for my husband. Sometimes I wonder who the hell he pissed off in another life to get stuck with a wife like me. I am such a horrible human being. And no, this is no pity party, just the truth. I absolutely cannot imagine what it must be like to be in love with someone who’s life is a mental black hole. I’m fine one moment, and a switch flips the next and I’m blankly staring into space and sweeping the mess off the kitchen counter onto the floor. The screams and yelling about calling a crisis center because “I’ve lost it again” are enough to snap me out of the trance enough for me to realize, shamefully, that my illness is once again in control.

I’m a good faker. In public, I just reach for the outskirts to avoid the conversation and dizzying triggers surrounding me. At dance competitions the amount of stimulation is so overwhelming that I usually end up drinking to dull the pounding in my heart. It’s a race: me against the bipolar beast. Except we are one of the same, always, and running from myself is pointless because I will always be right there, in the moment, beside myself.

Being home alone or with the kids is the hardest part. Working is when I come alive, and not just the illness. Without the distraction of being held accountable by a multitude of adults, my illness leaves me feeling worthless and unable to reach out to find a way to pull myself back into reality.

When I die, I think I will feel sadness if I’m with it enough to actually feel. Sadness for the fact that I was a life full of promise at the beginning, but fell prisoner to an illness gone rampant without any real way to control it. Sadly, Bipolar I isn’t curable or even controllable. It can be muted by powerful drugs, but the mania and bipolar depression will always break through. Your body can only handle certain levels of medications like lithium, so while with a higher dose you could function as “almost normal”, your body stops you short of trying to achieve that.

Some days, if not most, I pity the people in my life who have to live with my illness more than I feel bad for myself. I know how much I hurt on the inside and just how much I would prefer to either live without my head screwed on backwards or to just finally rest in peace from the mental turmoil and strife, and I cannot imagine just how bad it is for my husband and kids to watch me struggle constantly. It’s a miracle they haven’t left me yet with all the horrible things I’ve done and said.

Some days, I wish that procession on the freeway was mine. Today is just one of those. But here I am. Alive. Sick. But here.

Current Mood: Sad

Pay no attention to my hideous cake decorating. While I can bake like nobody’s business, I absolutely cannot be bothered with frosting. I don’t eat frosting, therefore, it’s not important. But birthday baby wanted a pink cake, so at least I made sure the top looked okay, right?

It’s been three years since a baby bust out of my vag at top speed in the blow-up kiddie pool in the middle of my living room during the middle of a thunderstorm. My homebirth that I was so proud of. And now, my amazing three-year-old.

She had a wonderful birthday filled with spending time with my parents, who flew in for the occasion, opening presents, eating at the Old Spaghetti Factory downtown and playing at two different parks. My kids are spoiled.

I must admit that each birthday is a little hard on me. Not because she’s growing older because honestly, I love older kids and don’t really like infants. Toddlers are a ton of fun for me because I’m a freak. No, I’m not one of those parents who laments about the the fact that their baby’s all done grown up and all… it’s just a reminder to me that since she was born, I have dealt with mental health issues up the wazoo and each passing year really isn’t much easier.

I am sick to death of being poked with needles that leave me with bruises to check my “levels”, doctors, and therapists. I am tired of opening my pill bottles every night and downing a handful of prescribed drugs just so I can wake up and function the next day. I am tired of hearing that I’m not on the exact right something-or-other every time I go for my medicine checks only to serve as a guinea pig for some God-awful drug that leaves me depressed or psychotic or induces fine motor skill loss.

The last three years, unfortunately, have been the worst of my life in many ways. Honestly, some days I’m unsure just how many more years I am willing to fight all of this.

Thank God I have my little April to look at. She’s one of the reminders of why I’m here. If one good thing has come out of the last three years, she certainly has been it.

Current Mood: Bored

I’ve always struggled with that- success, feeling success, severe fear of failure. That’s a big part of why dance competition- and any competition- has been so difficult for me my entire life. My family didn’t encourage any kind of team sports or team anything, I was taught that non-comformity was superior (not directly, of course, but by example), and that we were better off doing it by ourselves. Completely, utterly, and pathetically alone. Luckily, I managed to pull off the skill of communication completely by the Grace of God because I certainly wasn’t taught the ins and outs of making friends or handling situations in a more diplomatic sense. It took trial and error, and I still have difficulty sometimes, but in general I am pretty confident with my communication skills.

And with communication skills has come the ability to find a way to succeed no matter how difficult the situation. Thank goodness.

Right now, I need that. Not only has my private lesson filled up to the max, but I’m booked to deejay five dances between last and this week, teach group classes, workshops, and run our own dance (wow!) indefinitely on Friday nights. I also have four dance competitions scheduled- three out of state, and I am on staff for the one coming up in town (which means I am teaching and deejaying at a freaking national convention- holy amazeballs Batman!), and that’s just during the end of summer and fall. That’s not even covering my life outside of dance, which is just as busy with family visiting, college interviewing, my daughter starting kindergarten at a private school (Cha-CHING!), another awesome camping getaway in a couple weeks, and like 40 other things that I can’t think to mention off the top of my head.

Yes, I am busy. But more importantly, I am constantly on the brink of having a heart attack due to that fear of failure. The possibility sucks. And then at the same time, I have moments like this where I can stop and breathe and look at the words on my virtual page and realize that regardless of how crazy my life looks from the outside and sometimes feels on the inside, there are moments every day where I can put my feet up or spend time scrubbing the mold off my bathroom walls and remember that I am, in fact, only human and that if success fails in one small arena, it’s hardly an indication of what kind of successful life I live, and there will always be that reality of taking care of my family and home to which I come back.

Perhaps in some ways, my illness is a blessing. Without the breakthrough mania despite the Lithium’s best efforts, I’m not sure I could get from one day to the next when my life gets a little out of hand.

Current Mood: Alarmed & Happy

Luckily, because mania is awesome like this (not), I feel fully rested and ready to take on the world.

Thank God for the Lithium, or I’d be running full force toward a short bridge when this calmed-down euphoria takes a plunge into dysphoria. Though I have to admit that regardless of how powerful of a drug it may be, it’s really no match for my insane mood swings.

Sometimes, I hate myself.

Current Mood: Alarmed

Sadly, it’s a direct result of the sunlight.

See, bipolar disorder has several different parts to it, but the two defining symptoms of the illness can manifest in a number of ways. That means the depression and mania can mean different beasts for different folks. People without depression commonly look at someone with it and think, “Oh, they’re just really sad.” And for mania, “Wow, they never slow down,” or, “They have so much energy,” or, “They’re just so happy!”

Depression can make one irritating to be around because the affected person just can’t feel a positive lift in energy or break out of that somber funk regardless of how hard you or they try to force it. In bipolar disorder, depressions is usually chemical, not situational. There are temporary fixes that are frequently part of an endorphin rush (sex, exercise, getting a promotion, etc), but persons affected by that sort of depression revert back to that downer state once the evanescent high passes.

Mania can run in both directions- it can look like a crazy, energetic frenzy, or it can manifest as a bitter, angry depression from an outsider’s perspective. The first one is more common- euphoric mania. The second, dysphoric mania, is the primary form of mania I struggle with, and probably the main reason I am on such a high dose of Lithium, though I can’t say for certain since I cannot see into my doctor’s head when she looks at me.

I have moments and times of euphoria, and it usually starts with positive energy and quickly fades into its negative counterpart. Without medication, my dysphoric mania looks something like this (though this is from my perspective, so people close to me might give you a more accurate description- I can only imagine the appearance of my illness from an outside view): I get extremely energetic, I run on ridiculous wee hours of sleep, I talk too fast, and I get this frenetic energy bursting from the inside that makes me feel like I’m missing something and desperately have to find it, or I have to suddenly achieve some impossible, unrealistic task RIGHT NOW (law school, anyone?). That lasts for only a short time- maybe weeks at best- because eventually, my body and mind can no longer handle the broken sleep and insomnia. I start feeling irritable over little things, my temper shortens. Then before I know it, I just can take it anymore. I get into circular, irrational arguments with James that make perfect sense to me, but I can see his face fall when he recognizes the Bipolar Conversation coming at him full force, and seeing that makes me even more irate because dammit, I am just fine whythefuckwon’thelistentomeSTOP BLAMINGEVERTHINGONMYILLNESSI’MNOTCRAZY! From there, everything starts to fall apart. My sleep habits worsen. My mood worsens. I feel frustrated, unmotivated, angry. I have too much energy and I wake up from my disturbing dreams of that time I was raped, or finding out I am pregnant again and knowing I’m going to die, and I have to force myself to stop from leaping up and running a marathon. My patience lessens, I stop doing housework and cooking. I don’t want to be touched, my body image suddenly becomes nothing but a horrible focus on that fat bulge at my hips or my prolapse or my stretch marks, and sex leaves me sitting naked on the bathroom floor, knees to my chest, scarcely breathing, and wishing that I had the nerve to kill myself and leave this world and my kids in a better place while I watch James’ heart break from the shear agony of knowing it is impossible to reach into my head and rewire me and make me believe that he loves me and everything will be okay. Because at that time, there is no possible way in my reality that I can be okay.

And then, finally, I crash. I burn. I sleep for pretty much days, and I welcome the 9 solid hours of zzzz’s because after months of that abusive dysphoric mania, I just can’t let my brain think while I’m conscious. I hibernate, barely blog, have nothing to say on Facebook, and I welcome the emptiness. I go to work and smile and laugh on autopilot, and I rarely do anything social. And this, of course, is the depression. The depression that looks more like a lack of energy, motivation, and caring. I’m not sad, I am almost unfeeling. A numbness that nearly denies me the ability to feel even love or pain at its worst. James calls it my “shell”, and the visual really does describe the internal turmoil inside.

And then the sun comes out.

And sunshine? There’s a reason I have always HATED sunshine and preferred cloudy days. Sunshine induces mania in bipolar folk. This would be a good thing for me until you remember that I don’t generally get the happy sort of mania, my mind focuses on dysphoric mania. BUT, it usually starts out as a euphoric mania and switches on me.

Which leads me back to the beginning of this ever-so-slightly manic post of mine: It’s been sunny in Seattle, and yesterday I noticed this burst of energy that left me just a little too happy and enlightened. So I asked James, “Am I acting wired, or am I starting to act manic?” Please, please, no. He kind of grimaced and said, “Honestly, it looks mania to me.”

I had a moment of panic about it lying in bed at 3:30 in the morning after not sleeping at all. I realized that I haven’t had a full-blown manic episode since last year when I almost ran some ugly, passive-aggresive manipulative asshole’s car off a bridge (said person deserved it, I swear) and almost divorced my amazing husband a few months later. After that, there was Lithium, and the mania was under control almost instantly. Every time since then, the “mania” that I have felt creeping up on me has passed on as nothing more than a short stint of its lesser and more gentle cousin, hypomania.

And if this extra energy I feel welling up inside my gut turns out to be just sunshine-induced hypomania, I know it will pass without stupid decisions, without suicide attempts, and without making choices that drastically affect my life only to be lost in translation when the inevitable dark cloud of depressions washes the sunlight away.

One can hope.

Current Mood: Alarmed

And you wanna know what I found this kid doing this morning as I made a lazy exit from my soft bed in my upstairs bedroom? I walked downstairs into the kitchen to find her and her little sister celebrating her new educational freedom by scooping ICE CREAM into bowls. And popsicle wrappers winked at me from the table. They both stared at me with HUGE eyes when they got caught red-handed.

I am the amazing, negligent mother. What makes the whole scenario even better is that after I almost died laughing, I finished scooping a small amount of ice cream into the-half-finished bowl and let them eat it for breakfast while asking Julie not to do it again.

To think that my postpartum depression with these girls was crippling, varying from unbearable all the way to flat-out paranoia and suicidal psychosis, is inconceivable now that I am past it. I have never been the girl who suffers from PMS or hormonal-related mood swings. I’ve always just quite level-headed. I get to play with my dear co-pilot, Bipolar Disorder instead. But at the time, it wasn’t diagnosed, and I had never experienced what role postpartum hormones can possibly play in an unstable mind. I found out, and I suddenly understood why mental hospitals are packed with people wandering the halls with vacant eyes or sitting in the corner batting at imaginary bugs.

I breastfed both my girls because I knew that it was, beyond a doubt, far healthier than shoving a bottle of formula in their mouths. Hindsight is 20/20. I should probably have risked the slight possibility that their IQs might drop, you know, a whole point on the scale if I let a cow or soybean feed them instead. Because what I later learned made so much sense that I probably could have avoided the whole trip to the psycho hospital had I just listened to my body in the first place.

I HATED breastfeeding. HATED. In fact, there was one solitary moment where I kind of enjoyed it- and that was when I nursed my friend’s foster son, a newborn drug baby who had just been weaned from meth. I babysat for him one day, and it broke my heart seeing a baby so listless and pathetic. I scooped him up, shoved his mouth on my boob, and that baby didn’t want to let go. After that, his eyes were open, he looked at me, and my friend was thrilled to see a new baby when she came to pick him up. That moment was so special, so amazing, because I knew that for whatever reason, my boob was a comfort for a baby who needed it most.

That was the one time that the horrible hormonal manic rush didn’t shoot through my body when I nursed. Most women like, even love, the way it feels. I couldn’t stand it. It tickled my nipple to the point where I wanted to scream or cry or throw my shoe through the wall. Once the let-down happens and milk starts to gush, I’ve seen dozens of moms get this sleepy, smily, dreamy, relaxed look in their eyes due to the release of prolactin, a supposedly awesome hormone that makes moms fall madly in love with their baby and forget the fact that they haven’t slept more than 2 hours at a time in the last 6 days.

That whole prolactin thing? Yeah, that was a myth for me. Instead of relaxing, I felt like I could hardly breathe while electricity shot its way up my spine. Night time feedings always forced my mind and thoughts to run a marathon, and I became the amazing, unsleeping insomniac. I’d get a burst of negative, manic energy, and I’d stare at the clock, sometimes shaking, wondering how long that freaking baby at my breast was going to feed off of me like a leech. See, that’s not a normal reaction. I didn’t think of my girls like that when they were off the boob, just on it.

Later, during all my treatment, I learned that for women struggling with a postpartum mood disorder who have that kind of reaction to nursing frequently have prolonged and more severe difficulty with depression, anxiety, and psychosis. My uncomfortable mental and physical reaction to breastfeeding? That was most likely my body’s way of trying to tell me, “This isn’t healthy for you… your kids will be just fine sucking off a bottle. Give it up and stop being such a stubborn brat.”

In other words, if I hadn’t breastfed, I probably would have gotten away with a minor version of the extreme postpartum mood disorder that I experienced. Almost three years after my little stinker was born, though, I can hardly remember what I was actually going through during that time. My mind was a black hole.

But see, that was then, and this is today. That picture above is me, truly proud and happy to have just watched my 5-year-old walk across the stage and accept her preschool diploma. Somehow, I survived those miserable postpartum crazy hormones, and now I’m just as happy- if not more so since I know what it’s like to be on the other side- than the “other moms” to be a mother.

Yay me! I’ve really gotten somewhere!

And as a side note, I love that color blue on myself. Normally I tear myself to shreds when I have to look at a picture of myself… but this time, I just see a happy mom with two amazing girls wearing a lovely blue top.

Current Mood: Happy

In fact, I daresay that while babies, newborns especially, just flat-out freak me out and make me shudder, I absolutely, positively adore two-year-olds, young kids, older kids, and teens. Yes, you saw that right. While the rest of the motherly world coos and gushes over newborn toes and spit-up, I prefer everything beyond baby, included those “dreaded” teenage years. I love when bitter moms tell me, “Oh just you wait...”. Well, darling, trust me, I’ve paid my dues. I know it’s hard to believe, but yes, I enjoy teens. I always have. I love listening to their troubles and broken hearts, I enjoy hearing and watching them shape their own believes and argue for what they feel is right. I have no false impressions about the difficulty of being a parent of teens, but fact is, I enjoy that age. They’re smart, amazing, and they can take care of their basic needs with little guidance. And I’m a firm believer that if I do my job well while they’re younger, my girls will sprout into some pretty amazing peeps during their older years at home as well. Yeah, I know, shit happens, but I’m not going to dwell on that because I do have faith that I’m not going to change my mind regarding my thoughts on teens.

But until those years, I’d like to say that today in the here and now, I feel so far beyond my postpartum depression era that I can actually enjoy watching my kids run around like rugrats. Why they’re dubbed the “terrible twos” is beyond me… I love age two! I have with both of my kids. And five? Holy cow- my child is truly becoming an individual and it’s just so stinking cool to watch.

So finally, finally I can feel a bit smug when other parents are complaining about their 2-year-olds and wishing they were babies again. Not me! I am so glad my kids are finally beyond those years. Yes, kids are difficult in general, and yes, I have days where I want to step in front of a speeding bus… but 90% of the time, I’m having a great time with them. They’re just amazing little people, and I wasn’t well enough to enjoy them they way they deserve until they got beyond those infant years.

And yes, I’m smiling. Who wouldn’t with a beautiful daughter like Julie?

And, of course, my little spitfire and entertainer, with dimples for days- my darling April:

It’s nice to be well, to be beyond the bitter days of postpartum depression and days of psychosis. I’m not sure when it all faded away into the past, but I realize that here I am in the now, and it’s no longer haunting me. No more anxiety welling up when the dreaded blackened mood would start to rip up the “I think I might be okay again” moments. No more being a trapped prisoner in the labyrinth of psychosis, where I could see the buildings of sanity crumble and crash, but the voice inside of me was too paralyzed to say, “Help me, I can feel it happening, and I can’t stop it.”

‘Course, I’ve got bipolar to grapple with… but that’s a different story. And today, the sun is shining and having a mental illness is pretty far from my mind.

Thank God.

Current Mood: Happy