It’s been a long time since I wrote anything here. I’m mostly working from home, and the days all run together. I feel very safe, and I am mindful of the contact I make with others when I’m out...
It’s been a long time since I wrote anything here. I’m mostly working from home, and the days all run together. I feel very safe, and I am mindful of the contact I make with others when I’m out in town.
I’ve been thinking about something that has been on my mind a lot the past several months. I do not feel like bipolar disorder rules my life in the same way it did when I started writing this blog ten years ago. I take my medicine every day, and it seems to be working very well.
I also meditate every single morning. It’s not long. I’m not a monk. This morning was only fifteen minutes as was yesterday’s. Some mornings are about twenty, and some mornings I will go for a full half hour. I want to get up to a half hour regularly. I would estimate that right now my average is twenty minutes.
I talk to my therapist every other week, and those sessions are important to me. I tell him everything that’s going on in my life. I talk to him about my dreams, which can sometimes be very entertaining. I tell him stuff that I can’t talk about in conversations with friends and acquaintances. I give him intimate details about my life.
I continue to eat a very healthy diet. I don’t eat junk food and limit my intake of refined sugar greatly.
My sleep has been less than ideal for about a week. I stopped taking one of the medications I use for anti-anxiety. I simply don’t feel anxious. I don’t want to take pill that’s unnecessary. Anyway, that pill had a side-effect of helping me sleep. Without it, I’m restless. I wake after about five hours, and then it’s a while before I can fall back to sleep. I’m sure this will pass.
I’m not getting any exercise these days, and I’m not going to beat myself up about it. I’m doing really well all things considered.
Those are the foundations of my recovery from bipolar disorder: medication, meditation, therapy, diet, and sleep. I should also add there is an underlying assumption of sobriety. I’ve been sober for 21 years, and I’m not going to change that.
So, I’m doing all these regular things to stay stable, and they’re working very well. I think it’s time to state what I believe will sound quite stunning in the field of mental health.
My bipolar disorder is in remission. I am stable.
I think my life documents this revelation. I think it’s important to say this out loud. The idea that a mental illness like bipolar disorder can go into remission is viewed as ridiculous by some people.
Why should it be? It is a completely manageable chronic illness. I’m managing it now. Why shouldn’t I assign the correct term to describe it?
It’s important to speak correctly. I am going to speak this way about my illness as long as it’s the truth.
