After days of depression comes the flip side of bipolar - the manic phases filled with irritability and a lack of patience for people's shortcomings. Not the best combination when you are working in retail. Especially in the "big city" with snobbish jerks and self righteous retards. Just to make the perfect horror show, I forgot to take my medication this morning. All the seeds were planted for a combustible combonation.
I tried to start my day off well, listening to my music on the way into work to try and set my mood in the right way. The traffic was the same stupid people in bruises as always, but I navigated it the same as always - leaving early to allow plenty of time and less stress to arriving on time. I talked with my wife and my best friend about the (very positive) decision I had made in the past 24 hours, and they certainly helped make me feel like the darkness of depression had passed and I felt much better about myself and my choices. There were two polar opposites (see what I did there?) that were coming together to produce a day that could go any number of ways. That is what awaited me....
When I got to work, I felt really good and the day started off well. In what would become a running theme, I had the first of a number of customers who came into the Apple store with a dark aura and a chippy attitude. The strain of my mental condition combined with these people who feel justified in being jerks to customer service agents made it very necessary to keep my emotions in constant view and take breathers when needed. All the way up until close, people came in with surly demeanors, like there was a bad moon afoot. However, with the support of my coworkers and my internal resilience, I made it through the day with my head held high and my knuckles unmarred.
What people generally misunderstand about bipolar is the mania side of the equation. Depression is relatively easy to understand, as we all have experience with being 'blue' or 'miserable', if not worse. However, mania gets the reputation for those in a manic state buying new cars or feeling invincible; leaving many to think that mania is a 'pleasant' type of disease to have, much like having a nymphomaniac (there's that word again) for a wife. Much like the latter, there is a leering dark side to mania where it leaves the sufferer to feel highly irritable, having racing thoughts that leave you unable to concentrate, gives you a tendency to fixate constantly on something dark in your mind that tortures you incessantly and shifts decision making focus from logic to pleasure (the pleasure principle - therein explaining where the new car that can't be paid for comes from - and worse), It's hard to explain in a way to people who don't have mania how disconcerting and frustrating it is to be in a frame of mind to act out in fun for the moment that you will pay for greatly after you 'come down'. Racing thoughts seems like a good thing - thinking about fie or six things at one time - but it's not a complete thought process, it's just multiple things clouding your mind with an inability to grasp and manipulate any of them, leaving me confused and frustrated by my inability to function mentally at my best. Notice, however, that I didn't use the Hollywood standard of uncontrolled violence. Frustration and violence are different things, HOLLYWOOD.
I made it through one of thousands of days I have spent in my life riding the wild fluctuations involved in the bipolar disease process.I have never asked pity or excuse for what I have, only understanding from those who might give me the benefit of the doubt. I have a day of rest ahead, after which I will take my medication and try and get back to the right frame of mind before work on Sunday. I can rest easy on my ability to (finally) make a mature decision and the God sent support system I have in my wife, my best friend and those who care for me and are willing to listen to my maniacal mumblings until I can finally figure it our or here it for myself. I'm getting better......
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