Check-In

So far, my blog entries have been about topics that I’ve thought a bit about and have pulled together with a bit of work behind them. I do most of my blog entries with the hope that someone out there can be reached or helped. I just want to make a difference. This blog is my small contribution to society; and they mean a great deal to me as I add to a wider conversation about mental illness. This blog, however, will be slightly different. I’m calling it a “check-in blog”. A check-in blog will have a lot less thought, and a lot more stream of consciousness put to it. I will do these blogs periodically mostly for my own benefit. These are mostly like my journal entries- how am I doing right now on my bipolar spectrum? Is there anything right now that is on my mind? Etc. I hope this doesn’t drive you away from reading my blog, but will perhaps add to your understanding of what the life of a mentally ill person is like.

Lately, I’ve been more on the hypomanic scale. My sleep has been getting worse, and that’s one of the first signs to me that my body is hiking uphill. I usually need 9 hours of sleep, but when I tried going to bed last night at my usual 9:30 bedtime, I couldn’t relax enough to sleep until well after midnight. There are tools I can use- I tried a meditation, then some soft music to help lull me there, but my brain was too awake.

That’s another sign that I’m on the upward swing: my brain. When I get like this, my brain just decides it can conquer the world. I start worrying excessively about things- like my son’s social life or my own impact on the world. I also start thinking obsessively about projects that I can do; creative or otherwise.

 

 Projects are bittersweet for me. For Jake, it means mania without a doubt. For me, projects are just a means for me to feel creative and productive. It is unfortunate that mania, or hypomania, so often accompanies my desire to take on certain projects. Often, they start out just being little innocent things, but by the end, they've turned into a remodeling job. Its no wonder Jake fears when I say the word "project".

The projects that I most want to do lately are organizational projects for both the master bath and the kitchen. My make-up and hair products are taking over the bathroom counter, so I need a way to better organize so they are still accessible, but look nice and clean, too. I have found a few ideas on Pinterest. The one I like the best is a mini shelving unit to change the one large mirror into two smaller ones. Along with this shelf, I could frame out the mirrors so they look a little more custom. How do you like that? The one I like best is the one that would be hardest to do. This is not uncommon for me. Somehow, my hypomanic brain believes that I- who has no experience in woodworking or construction- can accomplish any shelving unit I see on Pinterest. Besides, we don’t have the money to do it… so that’s off the list.

My other project obsession is the kitchen. I want to create a user-friendly family command center. This project has been on my mind for a while, and I’ve already started it. For Christmas, I got a wall file, and a white board calendar to put in this area. I also already have some frames (to use for chore charts and a menu board), and a magnet board that I bought for my son, but then never used it. It’s going to take up an entire wall. I want to put some decorations interspersed through the practical things that I can change out seasonally just to keep things fresh and fun. So, it’s not just a practical project, but a creative one as well.

I think, as much as I hate to admit it, hypomania is the driving force of my creativity. Though I am a creative crafty person in general, I usually don’t get any projects done unless I’m more on the manic side of things. But I’m most of the time manic or depressed. Being in the middle of the road- “normal”- only happens 10% of the time. (I got that statistic from my first psychiatrist.) But I guess that number may increase due to medication and therapy- so there’s really no way of knowing. It’s just a matter of using what energy I have to accomplish what needs to be done, without going overboard.

Always in check. That’s the moral of this story- I always have to keep myself in check. I can never be too comfortable.

So, in the meantime, I’ll keep going with my management techniques. I’ll do slower exercise routines in the evenings. Also, I can’t let myself get too carried away with projects. I’ll work on my family command center, but only a little bit. Hopefully, I can keep the mania to a minimum.