Bipolar 2 From Inside and Out

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Who’s a Spoonie?

With all the talk about cultural appropriation lately, I’m hesitant to wear Kokopelli earrings or eat at the Chinese buffet. I understand that some people object to Canadians playing Englishmen who are pretending to be Japanese for a production of The Mikado is offensive or racist. I don’t always agree, but I understand the principle involved. Even I, a WASP, find Mickey Rooney’s character in Breakfast at Tiffany’s to be egregious, appalling, and insulting to everyone involved, including the audience.

Hand XrayBut recently there’s come the claim that those who are not entitled to it are appropriating Spoon Theory language. And in this case, “entitled to it” means someone with an “invisible illness” – chronic pain, chronic fatigue, and other conditions that do not announce themselves to the public with visible cues such as wheelchairs, crutches, missing limbs, or guide dogs.

If you don’t already know Spoon Theory, you should. You can find the explanation here: http://www.butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory/. Basically, “spoonies” have only a limited amount of energy units per day, represented by spoons. Spoonies must use a ridiculous amount of spoons to get through tasks that others accomplish normally in the course of life – showering, driving to work, driving home, fixing dinner, et endless cetera.

In fact, on any given day a Spoonie may not have enough spoons to get out of bed and get showered and dressed. It’s not that Spoonies are lazy; they may have only three metaphoric spoons that day, compared to a non-Spoonie’s typical, oh, I don’t know, 20? 30?

A few weeks ago, I wrote about whether bipolar disorder and other mental disorders are invisible illnesses: https://bipolarjan.wordpress.com/2016/03/06/is-bipolar-disorder-an-invisible-illness/. (I said they mostly are.) As far as I’m concerned, we’re Spoonies and “entitled” to Spoonie language. Most of us have had the experience of not having enough spoons to spend on a morning shower, having to choose between hygiene and, say, eating breakfast.

So now, apparently, the general public is picking up Spoonie language – saying “I’m out of spoons” when they simply mean “I’m tired” or “That was an exhausting day. I’m done.” And some Spoonies resent that. See http://m.dailylife.com.au/news-and-views/dl-culture/stop-appropriating-the-language-that-explains-my-condition-20160113-gm4whc.html

I have two things to say about it. The first is that language is always growing and changing. But it does it on its own, without our control. (Unless we’re France. France at least tries.) We may wish to eradicate the “n-word,” but we can’t. It’s less socially acceptable to use in polite company, but you know people still use it. Read the comments section on any social media post about President Obama if you don’t believe me.

The second thing is that at least Spoon Theory and language are entering the mainstream. People without invisible illnesses are at least getting a clue of what it means. They may not have the details right, but at least now when we explain it to them, they won’t be starting from scratch.

And after all, isn’t that how Spoon language started – as a way to begin a conversation on what invisible illnesses are and how they affect our lives? Not a secret language that only those who know the password and handshake can use.

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mental health

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I’m Not Brave – I’m Stubborn

Don’t forget! March 30 is World Bipolar Day!

Kopf durch die Wand

One of my friends, who is overweight, recently told me that when she was at the gym on the treadmill, a stranger came over to her and told her she was “an inspiration.”

My friend felt insulted. She was working out for herself and for her health, not to inspire anyone else or to be taken as a symbol of I-don’t-know-what – perseverance? attitude? effort? hope?

I feel sort of the same way when people say that because I am open and public with my bipolar disorder that I am “brave.”

I’m not doing this because I’m brave. I’m doing it because I’m stubborn.

I am who and what I am, and I’m willing to reveal a lot of it because, frankly, I can’t hide it and don’t want to. I’m not average or typical. Not normal, mentally or emotionally.

I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with the concept of “normal.” Desperately wanting to appear normal, but knowing viscerally that I am not. Wondering what it’s like, but knowing that I’ll never know. Wondering what it even means, or what it means that I’m not. I haven’t found answers yet, and at this point I don’t think I’m going to. It’s probably a waste of my time to try.

So, if I’m outside the “norm,” which I am, I may as well admit it. And since writing is what I do, I write about it. I’m not doing this because I’m “brave,” I’m doing this because on some level I have to. I’m stubborn.

I’m stubborn enough these days to have made a sort of peace with the concept of “normal,” even though I still don’t understand it.

I’m stubborn enough to acknowledge my difference and give it its proper name – bipolar disorder.

I’m stubborn enough not to care when I say that and some people flinch or back away.

I’m stubborn enough to reveal things that embarrass me because they are part of me and part of what I’ve lived and lived through.

I’m stubborn enough to get tattoos proclaiming my status as “mentally ill” and using them to open conversations and educate others.

I have not come to embrace my stubbornness easily. I’ve tried to fake “normal” and hide my differences. I’ve gone to my shrink and just referred to “doctor appointments.” I’ve made Prozac jokes even though I was taking it at the time. (For this I am truly sorry, as I later learned that one of those jokes made another person afraid to admit that she took Prozac too.)

I’m not trying to be an “inspiration.” I’m not trying to prove anything to anyone else. I’m doing what I have to do for me. If someone else finds some good in it, that’s fine. But that’s not why I do it.

I am bipolar.

I am a writer.

I am stubborn.

Taken together, you get this blog.

Bipolar Me.

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mental health

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What Is Sanity?

And who is sane?

Negatives Positives Computer Keys Showing Plus And Minus Alternatives Analysis And Decisions
These are questions you don’t hear much anymore, at least outside of judicial proceedings. Even there, the phrase “guilty but mentally ill” is gaining currency. “Not guilty by reason of insanity” made people think a criminal was getting away with something. And indeed, the “insanity defense” has been misused.

We’re much more comfortable talking about health and illness, concepts we all understand, than about seemingly fixed states like sanity and insanity. They sound so final. At least illness can be treated; health can improve.

Before the deluge of psychiatric labels and the DSM, how to tell if a person was sane or insane was a vital question. The insane were put away – in an asylum if they were poor or kept discreetly out of sight at home if they were wealthy.

But were all the people in asylums insane? And what kind of treatment did they receive? Investigative journalist Nellie Bly determined to find out. Her 1887 exposé Ten Days in a Madhouse was a muckraking revelation.

Bly feigned amnesia and delusional fears, was reported to the police by her landlady, and declared incurably insane.

While she was at the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island, she experienced cold, hunger, brutality, and no diagnosis or treatment. Several of the other inmates were, like Bly, sane by any modern standard, but poor, friendless and alone. The newspaper she worked for arranged to have Bly released, but the other women remained to be beaten, choked, starved, humiliated, not treated and driven insane if they weren’t already.

Bly’s ordeal and testimony did prompt a grand jury to recommend an increase in funding of $850,000 – quite a large sum in those days – for the Department of Charities and Corrections, which oversaw asylums. (It is ironic to note that the word “asylum” originally meant a place of protection, safety, or shelter.) But it mainly went for better physical conditions – warmer clothes, edible food, more and better-trained nurses – rather than actual diagnosis and treatment of the women’s “insanity.”

The question of who is sane and how you can tell was revisited in 1973 by psychologist David Rosenhan. A professor at Stanford University, he devised a simple experiment. He sent eight volunteers, including both women and men, to psychiatric hospitals. Each person complained of hearing a voice saying three words – and no other symptoms.

All – all – were admitted and diagnosed, most of them as schizophrenic. Afterward, the “pseudopatients”  reported to their doctors and nurses that they no longer heard the voices and were sane. They remained in the psychiatric wards for an average of 19 days, beating Nellie Bly’s experience by nine days. They were required to take antipsychotic drugs as a condition of their release.

Rosenhan’s report, “On being sane in insane places,” created quite a stir. Indignant hospital administrators claimed that their staff were actually quite adept at identifying fakes and challenged Rosenhan to repeat the experiment.

This time hospital personnel were on their guard. They identified over 40 people as being “pseudopatients” who were faking mental illness. Rosenhan, however, had sent no volunteer pseudopatients this time. It was a dismal showing for the psychiatric community.

Times have changed, of course. Few people are confined in locked wards for life. Diagnosis is, if not yet a science, less of a guessing game, backed up by the DSM and assorted checklists of symptoms. And insurance companies hold the keys to psychiatric units as much as medical personnel do.

Still, the fundamental questions remain. Are neurotics sane and psychotics insane? I have bipolar 2. Am I mentally ill? I would have to say I am, since my condition will require treatment, barring any dramatic scientific advances, for the rest of my life. And my illness does affect my ability to function “normally.” Yet I think that few would consider me insane (unless I were suddenly to start shooting people in a public place, of course).

Speaking freely about mental illness and mental health is, presumably, supposed to make such disorders more understandable, less fearsome, less stigmatized. I suspect, however, that there are those who would rather we remained out of sight – if not locked away in asylums, then restrained in the virtual straitjackets of strong psychotropic medication.

And while group homes and other sorts of assisted living situations are now more available (though not nearly as accessible as the need for them would require), the general public prefers that such facilities, along with halfway houses for addicts and parolees, be constructed “NIMBY” – Not In My Back Yard.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Maybe the conversations surrounding such issues are reducing the stigma of mental illness, or insanity, or whatever you choose to call it, but I’m dubious about the level of success. There’s still a long way to go.

 

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mental health

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The Pluses and Minuses of Highs and Lows

Low polygonal shape mountain background with clouds.

Bipolar disorder comes with highs and lows – mania and depression, for those who still call it manic-depressive illness. Bipolar 2 comes with plenty of depression (trust me on this), but mania that doesn’t reach the heights of regular mania. Hence the term “hypomania” – low mania. Like “hypoglycemia” – low blood sugar. (Actually, low blood sugar can affect the bipolar person’s – or anyone’s – moods, but that’s a story for another time.)

So. Mania. Mania comes with pluses – exuberance, euphoria, ambition, confidence, and other good feelings. It also comes with minuses – risk-taking behaviors that can ruin relationships, careers, finances, lives.

Hypomania, however, is usually not so extreme. Sometimes you don’t even realize that you have hypomania at all, because it comes out sideways, as anxiety. This is what happened to me, and is the reason it took me so long to get the proper diagnosis of bipolar type 2.

Recently I have been exploring the realm of hypomania, and I’m here to report that, similar to regular mania, hypomania has its attractions and its drawbacks. And they are intertwined.

On the plus side, I have more energy – more spoons to spend. I can go longer between naps. I have now gotten out of bed, dressed, and out of the house for three days in a row. I can concentrate longer on the books I’m reading and spend more time with my husband and do some actual paying work.

On the minus side, I pay for that energy. It’s like borrowing spoons – you can’t keep doing it. Sooner or later the spoons have to be replaced. Right before my most recent spurt of energy, I had a need for a nap that turned into a mega-nap – almost six hours. I woke up just in time to get ready for bed. Then I slept at least ten hours more – maybe 12. It’s impossible to schedule these things, but I have left tomorrow open just in case my body and brain decide that’s payback day for the three days of activity.

Another plus is that my creative juices are flowing. I’m working ahead on blog posts because I know at the end of the month I have a huge commitment that will keep me from writing something for that Sunday. I’ve also taken steps to spiff up my posts with visuals. And I’ve been thinking that I ought to write some fiction.

However, there’s a however. The last time I had a creative spurt I almost talked myself into starting two new blogs, for a total of four. I have plenty on my plate already, what with these blogs and paying work and trying to find an agent for my book and getting ready for a writer’s conference. This is no time to start a big new project that could easily devour my time and my ability to do the things I already need and want to do. But I do now have a computer file set aside for notes and ideas that flit through my busy brain. Call that file “Later.”

And let’s not forget anxiety. It’s hard to find the pluses there, except that anxiety, if properly harnessed, helps me prepare. I suppose it sounds better if I call it anticipation instead of anxiety. Anticipating my upcoming dental work spurred me into putting together the financing for it. Anticipating the writers’ workshop allows me to prep for all the details – wardrobe, business cards, directions, strategies to cope with exhaustion – that would make my nerves fray even more at the last minute.

I assume I needn’t discuss the minuses of anxiety. Let’s just say that for me, they include regrettable and appalling physical symptoms that no one wants to hear about.

Any way you look at it, the dental procedures are going to be a low and the workshop a high. I can already predict some of the difficulties that will accompany the workshop boost. It’s harder to think of pluses related to the dental work. Except that I really need it done, and with luck it will (eventually) improve my looks, my breath, my health, my pain level, and my self-esteem. At least that’s what I’m telling myself now.

Bipolar disorder is often compared to a seesaw (or teeter-totter, if you prefer) or a swing set or a roller coaster – for some reason, usually as a form of amusement that involves ups and downs. The amusement is debatable and fleeting. But the ups and downs are with us always. Better to learn to ride this beast rather than let it ride us.

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Is Bipolar Disorder an “Invisible Illness”?

Empty Chairs Laid Out For Meeting

Yes and no.

First, a little on the concept of invisible illnesses. These are the sorts of afflictions that are not apparent on first looking at a person – conditions such as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, celiac and Crohn’s diseases, diabetes, epilepsy, lupus, Lyme disease, and many others.

Disabled-world.com says, “Many people living with a hidden physical disability or mental challenge are still able to be active in their hobbies, work and be active in sports. On the other hand, some struggle just to get through their day at work and some cannot work at all.”

Most mental disorders are invisible illnesses by that definition. There isn’t a sign around our necks that proclaims “Bipolar,” “Social Anxiety Disorder,” “PTSD,” “Depression,” or even “Schizophrenia.”  The word “Crazy” isn’t tattooed on our foreheads. Our mere appearance doesn’t give away our “secret.”

We have a lot of the same problems that people with other invisible illnesses have. Spoon theory, for example. For bipolar people, simply taking a shower requires so many spoons that we seldom go out. (I count myself among that number.) People who don’t know or understand Spoon Theory often don’t understand why we don’t accept their invitations or cancel at the last minute, or simply don’t show up. You lose a fair number of friends that way.

On the other hand, a mental disorder is not always invisible. People can see us burst into tears for no apparent reason, or go into the bathroom at a party and never come out. They can see our shaking hands, confused looks, and depressed expressions. They can hear our awkward attempts to socialize “appropriately.” They may not know what is wrong, but they can often tell something is.

When we realize this is happening, there are various strategies we try. We can leave the situation – entirely or partially (my go-to is to leave the room on the pretext of needing to make a cup of tea). We can try to brush it off or laugh it off (“Sorry. My nerves are bad today” or “I don’t know why I said that. Must be a brain-fart”). We can try the half-truth/half-joke (“Oops. Guess my meds just haven’t kicked in yet”). We can ignore whatever is happening and hope everyone else does too.

Or we can own it. “I have social anxiety disorder and need to be in a less crowded space than the mall.” “I won’t be able to go to the carnival with you because my PTSD is triggered by loud noises.” “I may come to your party if my bipolar disorder will let me.”

We can also address the subject when there isn’t a situation looming. During a phone conversation or an IM chat, we can let the other person know that we have a mental disorder – an invisible illness. It doesn’t have to be dramatic and dire. Casually may be the best way to handle it. “I know you’re wondering why I didn’t go to the movies with you last week.” “When I saw my doctor yesterday we talked about my physical health and my mental health too.” “You know that character on that show that has PTSD? I have that too, but it’s not exactly like on the show.”

If that sounds risky, you’re right. It can be. There will be people who still don’t get it. People who “don’t believe in” mental illness. People who try to brush it off. People who offer the latest vitamins or super foods or Eastern philosophy as the cure-all.

But you’ll also find people who say, “Oh, my brother-in-law has that too” or “Okay. But I’m still your friend” or “What can I do to help?”

So those are the choices, basically.

Take a chance. Or stay invisible.

Neither choice is right or wrong for everyone. Mental illness is very personal.

You decide.

 

 

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mental health

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Beware the Mental Health Meme

This post was specially written for BlogHer’s Social Media and Blogging section, but I thought it worth sharing here too. (Credit for the photo goes to my husband, Dan Reily.)

 

Slide1

Most Internet memes are harmless, or even amusing. They proclaim that someone has a wonderful granddaughter or that kittens are cute.

But some memes that travel the world sow unhelpful or even hurtful ideas as they go. The one above appears mild and even inspiring, but to a person with mental illness, it says a lot more than appears on the surface.

The meme that started me on this train of thought was one that invited people to embrace the crazy or enjoy the madness or some such. As a person with mental illness – bipolar disorder – I found the message troubling. The comments were even more so. One said that manic-depressives could at least enjoy the mania.

Admittedly, mania comes with feelings of soaring confidence and a whirlwind of creativity. Mania can also prompt risky behaviors – reckless driving, shoplifting, unsafe or extramarital sex – that can lead to a lifetime of problems, including failed relationships, arrest records, serious debt, and worse. Those are surely the opposite of enjoyable.

But I didn’t know if I was alone in these feelings, so I asked other bipolar bloggers how they react to popular memes. Here’s what they had to say.

Nondescript inspirational memes (of the sort that proclaim daylight follows darkness) seem relatively harmless. Reactions went from “meh” to “a waste of time.” Bipolar blogger Brad Shreve (insightsbipolarbear.com) likens them to affirmations. His research showed that evidence from reputable studies confirms that affirmations mitigate stress. Nevertheless, “I find most of them trite and condescending,” he says. “They just aren’t my thing. I choose meditation.”

Amy Balot, who blogs at madwomanacrossthewater.net, dislikes the sort of memes that tout positivity. “I do have a big problem with the way a lot of ‘motivational’ images seem to imply that all you need to do is think positive thoughts and your life will be hunky-dory,” she says. “It seems to be blaming people for things like depression or anxiety.”

Supposedly positive memes raise the hackles on a number of the bloggers. Dyane Leshin-Harwood, blogger at proudlybipolar.wordpress.com and author of the upcoming memoir Birth of a New Brain, says they range from “cool and empowering” to “[make] me feel guilty that my life isn’t as good as it could

be! It seems like it would bring anyone with bipolar depression down even
further.”

It does that to me as well.

Many such memes also promote a “bootstrap” approach to mental illness – which Jim Buchanan, who blogs at mythoughts62.wordpress.com, finds “irritating”: “I feel that this sort of thinking is harmful and it essentially blames the person reading it for their problems by implying that they ‘don’t want to allow themselves’ what is needed for a good life.”

Shreve adds, “Usually these entail [the idea that] the individual can change by doing one thing – [changing] our attitude. As if we could just snap out of depression, mania and more, if we would just put [our] mind to it. I find these guilty of mental health shaming.”

And as for the “find-your-sanity-in nature” meme that began this article? Amy Balot doesn’t care for that type. “I don’t dispute that spending time with animals or outdoors can be great and even therapeutic; but I do dispute the implication that these things are a replacement for therapy or better than therapy,” she says. “It minimizes the struggles of the mentally ill and says they’d be ok if they just took their dogs for more walks in the woods. Not all problems are solved by a little sunshine and fresh air.”

Memes intended to be humorous are a gray area, since humor is so subjective. Personally, I don’t mind being called “crazy,” but many bipolar people do. Using “crazy,” “insane,” or any of the many synonyms – “weird,” “eccentric,” “not normal” – can make people with mental disorders feel as if the meme speaks directly to them, even if that wasn’t intended.

But some people with mental disorders enjoy a gentle poke of fun at themselves. Shreve agrees: “These can be touchy because they could hurt or offend someone who is going through a difficult time, but they help me.” (Here’s one of his favorites: http://www.someecards.com/usercards/viewcard/326b0799dbae216dbe3bf6069e297ea48d).

I must admit that I can sometimes see humor in our situations. I’ve written pieces called “The Lighter Side of Insomnia” and “Confessions of a Crazy Cat Lady.” It’s not a matter of malice being intended; I don’t think people who pass along memes that we consider hurtful are “out to get” those with mental disorders. But that’s the problem: They don’t think before they click “Share.”

So I’m asking: Please think first. One of four Americans will have a mental or mood disorder at some time during their lives. You wouldn’t make fun of someone with a physical illness. Ask yourself: Would this meme still be amusing or inspiring or helpful if you substituted fibromyalgia or diabetes or paraplegia for “mental illness”?

If not, think again.

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Guest Post!

Today I have a humorous guest post on Insights from a Bipolar Bear. You can see it here: http://www.insightsbipolarbear.com/brain-vs-brain/

Come for the guest post; stay for the insights!

Category:

mental health

Check Out This Article on BlogHer!

http://www.blogher.com/beware-mental-health-meme

Category:

mental health

Support and Non-Support Groups

My family has never been big on support groups. When my father had multiple myeloma (which killed him after 15 years), he turned down any opportunities he was given to join cancer support groups with names like Make Today Count. He preferred to go it alone. He was stubborn.

So am I.

I have actually been to support groups for mental illness once or twice, but they were never a success or, I guess, just never right for me.

The first one was when I was in college. That one was a bust because I wasn’t really ready to address my problems and because I had the ability to appear “normal” for an hour at a time while sitting cross-legged on the floor. I couldn’t do that now. (The floor-sitting part.)

The second time was after I saw a brochure for a group called High Flyers and Low Landers, which met in the church I was going to at the time. (I don’t think the organization still exists. The church is still there.)

It was a very odd experience. Everyone had a book, many with needlepoint covers. It was their bible, though not the Bible, which I know many people needlepoint covers for, or at least did back then.

The meetings consisted of a little ritual. One person read a passage from the book. Then each person in the circle had to tell an event that happened to them in the past week. The recital had to be in a specific format: what happened, what symptoms the person experienced (dry mouth, racing thoughts – there was a list), how the person would have handled it before reading the book, and how the person did handle it. There was much quoting of the book and certain specific phrases that everyone had to use.

Some of the quotations were helpful, or at least true. (People do things that annoy us, not to annoy us.) But as I recall, those were the only sorts of comments the people in the circle were allowed to make. Not “How did that work out?” or “What did your mother do next?” or “I hate when people get passive-aggressive.”

It was just too weird and formulaic for me, so I never went back. (As I was leaving, I offered someone a mint. Everyone laughed and said, “Dry mouth!”)

Since I don’t seem to do so well in actual support groups, I recently thought I would check out some virtual ones. I’m not going to name the groups I joined or where I found them, because all of them stressed privacy and confidentiality.

What I found was both support and non-support.

Some of the groups were associated with national organizations or publications, and they pretty much stuck to sharing articles about scientific research or political news about mental illness, along with lists of resources, hotlines, and the like.

So far, so good.

Other groups were more like traditional support groups, with members asking questions or relating accounts of what had happened or how they felt. There were administrators who tried to keep the members to more or less stick to the topic and rules of the group (give trigger warnings, no suicide threats, or whatever).

Some of the groups were peaceful. People asked standard questions (Who’s on this med? Should I take something else too?) and received fairly standard answers (Worked for me. Didn’t work for me. Ask your doctor.) People related similar events and how they handled them, or asked for more specifics so they could understand the situation better. People posted assorted uplifting memes and affirmations.

Then there was the other sort. People did not know how to use trigger warnings or simply didn’t bother. Others shared people’s posts without removing identifying information. Some posted truly vulgar jokes that had nothing whatsoever to do with bipolar disorder. Negativity overflowed. Arguments raged. (Some of the topics were “Bipolar is not an excuse for bad behavior” and “Don’t buy into the drug companies’ propaganda by taking meds.”) There was the online equivalent of name-calling and shouting. People reported other people to the admins. People accused people of reporting people to the admins.

The administrators did try to keep a handle on these groups, but couldn’t always, most likely because they were busy with their own lives and issues and difficulties.

It got so bad that I took to lurking instead of participating. Every week or so I would go back to take a peek and check on the drama llamas. Mostly they were still running around spitting. I think I had helpful things to add to the discussions and times when I needed help with feelings, but I just couldn’t trust enough to jump back in. I know other people left these groups for similar reasons, and some were blocked or banned or given warnings about their behavior.

In general, I have this to say about online support groups. You’d do well to sit back and watch their interactions before you try participating on anything but a “Congratulations! You got a job!” level. If the group seems truly helpful – supportive – then dive in. You may be able to give and receive help.

But non-support is exhausting. And I’m too stubborn to put up with it.

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mental health

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The Teen in my Head

There is someone else living inside my brain.

I don’t have Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID, formerly called Multiple Personalities). I just have another me who pipes up from time to time. And, man, can she be annoying!

She’s 14 years old, and she doesn’t have a name. I don’t know when I acquired her, but I do know when she acts up.

She’s the one who frets when a friend doesn’t answer my IM. When he does, she squees, “He noticed me! He noticed me!” She’s the one who wants to buy ridiculous, useless – but amusing – things. She makes me eat that extra chocolate cookie, then frets about getting fat and pimply. She’s the one who is hooked on all the stupid clicky Internet games.

I’ve heard the theory that everyone has a mental age that they get stuck at. No matter how old they get, they always picture themselves at that age. Mine is somewhere between 28 and 34. So how did I end up with a 14-year-old?

My theory about her existence is that she is there to try to do what I never did when I was 14 – all the regular teen-age angst and frivolous stuff: mad crushes and pouting, self-obsession and discovering her sexuality, in-jokes with BFFs and trying out fingernail polish.

When I was actually 14, I did none of that. I was in a prolonged downward mood swing, made worse by puberty and the horrors of junior high school. I wrote depressing poetry and read French existentialists. If they had had hipsters back then, I suppose I would have been one.

When I feel her popping up in the back of my skull, most of the time I have to put her in a box and sit on the lid. It’s scary to let her take over. She’s rapid-cycling, impulsive, and worst of all, unmedicated. (I don’t know why my meds don’t affect her, but there you are, they don’t.)

Once in a while I let her out of the box. I let her enjoy some mad crushes (as long as she doesn’t do anything about them). I let her buy things that cost $20 or less. I let her talk me into fake fingernails (once!). I let her have some of the fun that I never had at that age.

The thing is, I don’t know if this is just a me thing, a female thing, or a bipolar thing.

I know I’m not completely alone in having a teen ride-along. I do know a man with DID who has an alter that is a teen girl. I could tell when she was out because she giggles a lot and buys junk food. A friend of mine who has suffered from depression also has a 14-year-old in her head. She has given her teen a name – Innie Me. Hers behaves a lot like mine.

I also don’t know whether having a teen living in my head is a good thing or a bad thing. It could be good, because it does give me access to the feelings and experiences I never had as an actual teen. My teen is better than I am at having fun.

On the other hand, I know it would be a bad thing if I let her have her way all the time. She needs that box and I need to sit on the lid. The trick is knowing when and how and for how long to let her out.

On an episode of Scrubs, one character remarks that no matter how old a woman gets, she always has an insecure 14-year-old inside her. I suppose that men have similar phenomena. Most people are said to have an inner child (although I think they are usually younger than 14). I think my husband’s inner child is usually about seven.

Certainly my teen is insecure. There’s no question about that. But she’s also enthusiastic, engaged, and energetic, as well as moody, dramatic, and confused. I think she may be related to the hypomanic part of myself, although I’m also sure some of my fits of apparently reasonless weeping have been her acting up.

My therapist knows about my 14-year-old. We have discussed her and her behavior and her moods several times. Dr. B. has never expressed surprise or shock or puzzlement at the idea. She does think it’s good that I’m learning to sit on the box lid when I need to. We’ve talked less about when it’s a good time to let her out. That’s something I still need to work on.

I guess I’ll have to learn to live with my 14-year-old, because I don’t think she’s going away anytime soon. And I don’t think I really want her to.

 

 

 

 

 

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mental health

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