Am I Still Ill?

Hi peeps. Feeling a little sleepy lately. Basically I had a kind of episode. I was buzzing a fair bit. Difficulty in sleeping. Heavily engaging with the Suicide Project (I wrote about 450 posts and comments in the space of a few weeks).

When I say a kind of episode tho’, it was nothing like as bad as any previous episode of psychosis. And at risk of being sickeningly repetitive, it’s all down to the ‘love of a good man’. He looks after me 24/7. Feeds and waters me (well I do some of that too), keeps the house clean (having higher standards than me in that respect), shops for food etc, mows the lawn, drives me around in the car, motivates me to do the things I need to (like exercise) and so on and so forth.

In other words he is what I always knew I needed. A real-life carer.

And he’s been virtually living at my house lately. We’re basically married in everything but name. His companionship and affection is worth the world to me. It’s a bit of a Cinderella story as I said somewhere else. Not as in material ‘rags to riches’ of course, in fact as previously remarked, I’m a bit less well off since he’s been around. But well, whether people want to ‘get’ this or not, having that special person in my life is something which I would defy anyone to put a price on. Anyone who thinks it’s worth giving it up in order to have more financial security, has never been manically depressed or anywhere near it.

Hey Zoe, why so defensive? Well you wouldn’t believe how difficult it is to get the message across to my mother that a) I have a serious and seriously devastating mental illness and b)M keeps me well and stable. The fact that anyone else has an opinion about the rightness or otherwise of us being together is largely due to my own complaining about him right here on this blog and in real life! So I have no one but myself to blame for that!

Anyway after that episode of ‘mania’ which wasn’t (but would have been if it weren’t for M), I now have an episode of ‘depression’ which is also pitifully mild compared to what’s gone on in the past. And best of all, I have hope folks. God has been good to me.

What does any of the above say about the nature of manic depressive illness? Well to me it says, this is a condition which can be very much affected by environmental factors, including the emotional environment as it were. I feel secure, happy, content and blessed. I am no longer driven to roam the streets, in fact I am content to stay home most of the time (as is he). Even my groups, meetings, counselling and therapy, I almost feel as if I could take or leave. They often don’t seem worth the stress of travel and going outside my comfort zone for.

OK of course one must venture out now and again, in fact it’s good to get out at least once a day for exercise and fresh air. But by God the world and all its supposed glories has little appeal, when I’ve got my very own homegrown miracle unfolding right here and now.

Things always change and evolve in my life. My relationship with M has definitely moved on from the stormy times. We’re solid now. He’s far less stressed and doesn’t ‘act out’ with shouting and other anti social behaviour nearly as much. If I’m happy he’s happy and vice versa. And we are.

I’m a bit like a teenager. Defiant and rebellious in love. Kirsty MacColl wrote a song (when she was pretty young I think) called ‘They don’t know about us’. It went

‘You’ve been around for such a long time now/Maybe I could leave you but I don’t know how/And why should I feel lonely every night/If I can be with you, you know you make it right/And I don’t listen to the guys who say/You’re bad for me, and I should turn you away/Cause they don’t know about us/They’ve never heard of love.

‘I get a feeling when I look at you/Wherever you go now, I wanna be there too/I tell the others not to bother me/Cause when they look at you they don’t see what I see/And I don’t listen to their wasted lines/Got my eyes wide open and I see the signs/That they don’t know about us/They’ve never heard of love.

I know more than anyone wants to give me credit for. Let them talk cause I’m no longer listening…They’re probably only jealous in any case. Who wouldn’t be?

I’m being such a teenager I’ll probably break out in pimples next…and it would probably serve me right, eh folks?

Lots love, Zoe xxx