While mania may feel wonderful after enduring depression, it’s important to remember that it is still a crucial part of bipolar to manage. “Well, even in that deep misery I felt my energy revive, and I said to myself:...
While mania may feel wonderful after enduring depression, it’s important to remember that it is still a crucial part of bipolar to manage.
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“Well, even in that deep misery I felt my energy revive, and I said to myself: in spite of everything I shall rise again, I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing, and from that moment everything has seemed transformed in me.” — Vincent van Gogh
Van Gogh, who many scholars believe had bipolar, seems to know how to describe the wonderful feelings that mania creates when the mood swing first starts. Unfortunately, as he found out, these wonderful feelings never last. Euphoric mania often spirals out of control and what started as something pleasurable, productive, and all around wonderful eventually becomes a serious and destructive series of poor choices. Even for people with hypomania, the wonderful feelings that start the mood swing rarely last.
This is one of the cruel tricks of bipolar disorder.
We’re given a taste of paradise and we want more. But then it turns out that the paradise wasn’t real, and we’re faced with the depression once again.
The Importance of Preventing Mania
One thing is clear — mania must be prevented if a person with bipolar disorder wants to lead a stable and productive life. I know this is hard to read if you live with a lot of depression. When you feel down, anything’s better than that awful sense that life is hopeless.
Managing bipolar isn’t a short-term process. It takes preparation and a vision of the future. When we manage depression and mania, the future can change. If we manage depression and allow mania, our future will have more depression and mania. This is the path of bipolar disorder.
I lived for mania before I was diagnosed with bipolar at age 31 in 1995. I didn’t know what to call it then of course, but I knew that my suicidal depression was not something I wanted in life and the exuberant and exciting moments where anything was possible were what I lived for. I didn’t have the words or the knowledge that both were illness. Now I do.
Mania Increases the Severity of Bipolar Depression
If we covet, encourage, and give in to mania, we increase our depression. It’s that simple. People with bipolar are intelligent, but we often make decisions based off of our current mood instead of decisions that truly give us a better chance of a stable future.
Here’s my advice for creating a better future for yourself and the people who care about you:
Recognize the signs of euphoric mania as illness. Write them down and teach the people around you to say that you’re manic when they see these signs. Avoid all substances and behaviors used to treat depression that can create mania. Bipolar isn’t a fair illness. The facts are that the majority of treatments that work for depression can create mania in those of us who have bipolar depression. Focus a year in advance and give yourself time to get better. Removing mania will help you manage depression.The Reality of Euphoric Mania
Euphoric mania only feels good. It doesn’t represent good health. Van Gogh created beautiful works when potentially manic, but he likely paid the price when the depression became stronger than the mania. He didn’t have the knowledge we have today. We are lucky!
Be kind to yourself. If you read this whole blog without cursing at my stupidity for telling you that euphoric mania is not a good thing, you’re on your way to stability. Please join me here. I am sick all of the time, but I am aware of it and I have a life I can manage.
UPDATED: Originally posted on November 29, 2018
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