Mania, Roller Coasters, and Plates

Hi, (if you are new here) I'm Amanda and I have bipolar depression.

I'm starting to notice my symptoms of when I'm having a manic episode. This is not something I have been able to do in the past. I would only notice I was manic after the fact.

To me being manic is like a roller coaster that I don't ever want to get off of. Which is saying something since I hate roller coasters. Riding the waves like they are the ups and downs of the roller coaster, feeling the excitement of what's to come and can't wait.

It's feeling like I'm on top of the world and can do anything and everything I want to do. So, I decide to do that thing with the spinning plates on sticks. I have the plates spinning and I'm constantly adding more, the projects and ideas that I start when I'm manic and I feel like I will never drop them. But remember some of those plates are my kids, my boyfriend, my life.

Now, there's being manic while knowing I'm manic. So I'm on the roller coaster and scared to death. Screaming to be let off, but on the inside. On the outside, all everyone sees is me excited about riding the roller coaster. I'm screaming, and I'm terrified, but I can't do anything about it.

So the plates are spinning, I'm adding more, but I know they will drop, and I want to add pillows and safety nets but my mania says no they are fine, nothing will happen to them. But they are holding all these new thoughts and ideas and my kids, my boyfriend, my life. I need them to stay safe. But my mania doesn't care, it won't let me protect them.

And this is happening more and more.

I feel like that's a good step, a terrifying step, but a step in the right direction nonetheless. Because I need to know I'm manic to get closer to fixing the manic behaviors, but right now I'm just terrified by knowing.

With knowing it brings up a whole new fear of things. When I was manic before afterward, I was able to be like, "OMG, I could have done this or done that. I could have royally screwed up everything."

I could have hurt myself.

I could have done something that hurt the kids.

I could have had a hyper-sexual moment and done something that would have made my boyfriend leave me.

But I could breathe a sigh of relief because these things didn't happen and I was okay, the kids were okay, my boyfriend and I were good.

Now I'm knowing what's going on, and I'm screaming in my head but my mania doesn't want to hear it. It doesn't want off the roller coaster. It seems to almost want to do things more, because I'm telling it not too.

I go a little too fast while driving and I scream to slow down, my mania speeds up just a tad.

I say stop, the mania says go.

I say don't, the mania says to do it now.

I scream that we can't do this, and the mania laughs in my face.

My mania says I do what I want, and you can't stop me.

I scream we need a safety net, that these things are important to us, that we don't want them to get hurt, that we don't want to get hurt. It laughs and says it will never happen.

But when all is said and done, I'm the one that's left to clean up everything. I'm the one left behind.