Jen: A Bi-Polar Sufferer
The following is a narrative based on extensive interviewing and research on a real-life Bipolar disorder sufferer, whose identity* will remain withheld.
Jen* is a twenty-something writer who has long struggled with her diagnosis since her mid teens.
Morning
I wake up with a mid-week hangover. No, I haven’t been out raising hell on a school night, it’s my Seroquel. If I take it too late at night I wake up feeling like I’ve been hit by a tequila truck.
For the opening hour of the day I walk around in a daze, but I remind myself that it is there to keep me calm; to make me better.
Can’t start the day without my cup of Earl Grey. The act of drinking tea is more important than the amber liquid itself. Routine is so important to me, and important to my mental health. It’s a platform for purpose; for achievement. Without those two, sometimes it seems like there is nothing to live for.
Yes, something as meagre as a cup of tea feels like it’s pointing me in the right direction.
Right, enough tranquillity, time to get to work. Bipolar has an incredible effect on writing—sometimes good, sometimes bad. I might be a million miles an hour trying to cram 1000 words into one sentence, other occasions I’m so flat it’s hard to pick up a pen, let alone write.
Today is a good day. I’ve managed to shake off the drug induced fuzz and words are flowing. 700 words practically writes itself. Buzzing, I set aside the pen and swing like a rebellious child in my office chair, ready to transfer this energy to exercise.
Exercise releases endorphins, mood-boosting serotonin… blah blah blah.
It makes me happy.
It makes me feel like I’m not a waste of oxygen.
Two dogs accompany me for the 10km run, and seeing the joy on their cute-as-a-button faces makes me doubly happy.
Afternoon
I gulp down my chicken stir-fry, the high of running still coursing through my veins. Keen to keep the buzz alive, I chug a can of Red Bull. Given I hate coffee, and am a very infrequent guarana-infused bubbles drinker, the effect is immediate.
With the dogs safely ensconced in their beds, weary after a long trot, I sit at my desk ready to tackle a 1000 word draft. My heart is racing, my forearms are continuously clenching and the flip of the laptop lid fills me with positivity.
As the time passes, painstaking research and note-taking fulfils my need for purpose and achievement, and the draft begins to take shape seamlessly. Times like this I almost feel normal.
Hang on, wait.
What is normal?
Yeah, strike that. No one is normal. That includes me, bipolar and all.
Evening
I started the day in a drug-induced haze, but I’m absolutely pumped now. Two projects practically wrote themselves and during my 10km run it felt like I was running on air. After a couple of quick calls to friends to waffle on about nothing for half an hour, you can’t wipe the smile off my face.
You know what this calls for?
My favourite bottle of red.
I bounce into the Bottle-o and the old favourite isn’t doing it for me. I’ve had a good day, why not spoil myself? Forget the $15 bottle on my meagre wage, I’m heading straight towards the $30 velvety red from the Barossa.
Full of adrenaline, a stop off at the local TAB garners a large handful of bets. The drive for achievement stretches towards the gambling world, underlining a thirst for high-risk, high-reward behaviours.
Drinking and gambling. Quintessentially Australian, isn’t it?
It can be a wonderful element of camaraderie in a working-class pub.
Or, it can be a devastating display of desperateness in the wrong personality. You lose, and the next bet has to both win, and make up for the previous loss. Then you lose again….and it’s a vicious cycle.
I know I fall into the latter category, but I’m full of confidence after a good end to the day and I feel some big wins coming up.
One glass turns into two, soon enough the bottle is gone and I’m moving onto the last dredges of a vodka bottle in the freezer. Heavy on the vodka, light on the soda water.
Once the first $50 is gone, the liquid confidence makes it easy to go for a double-or-nothing bet on the aptly named horse “Here goes nothing.”
The realisation will hit me tomorrow morning when I’m curled around the toilet bowl.
And then it’s back to square one.
