Meh.

I haven't been writing in a while. Haven't been taking my meds lately either. I just can't be buggered. Which sounds blithe, but really, I mean that there's something inside me that simply doesn't care. I don't know what motivates it, what brings it into being, but there's a level of apathy that's so profound that I, very honestly, do not care. Last week, I didn't care enough to eat. This week and last, I don't care enough to take my meds. Tell me how that works?

Then there are days I'm fine, except for a mild Eeyore down. Something constant and stable in its own way. But that's a day or two, and it's deceiving. I feel like I don't need all this kid glove handling. Still, Jb says I've been up and down. And I haven't been doing things I normally do. I'm trying to lose myself in books and sleep. And it pisses me off. Because I thought I was better. I wanted to be better. I want to be better. I just want this all to end.

In Passing

So, it's passing. I think. I hope. That was probably the worst I've been since the hospital. Jb and I have a rule: no killing myself. Wednesday, it was a hard rule to keep. Thursday and Friday, I just wanted for him to come home. Smoked a lot. Rocked myself on the porch stairs trying not to think about it while I've got Leonard Cohen's "Everybody Knows" playing through my head like that last strip of film that keeps slapping against the reel--over, and over, and over.

I should have gone to the hospital Wednesday. I should have gone Thursday. I was that bad. But I couldn't stand the idea of another stay, starting back at square one. It had taken me 5-6 months to pull myself out of the last one, and since the first hospital stay, I swear it's as if I get worse and worse, and never better. Or there's the hope of better, and then the crash hits. I'm always waiting for the other shoe to drop. But mostly, I couldn't put Jb through the strain of another hospital stay.

This weekend I have Jb as a babysitter. I've an appointment Monday with my therapist. Another Wednesday with my psych. It'll give me things to do, keep me in line.

Out of the blue, a woman I'd struck up a friendship in the ward called me. Last time I'd talked to her, she'd been convinced she was going off her meds and talking about suicide. I couldn't call her after that; I didn't want to know. I couldn't deal if she had. It was so good to hear her voicemail, to know she wasn't a fallen comrade, that I cried. When I called her back, I was suicidal, and she was completely manic. I couldn't keep up with her, as slow and dumb as my brain had gotten. But then again, how do you keep up with someone on a manic kick?

Hard Day's Night

This is a hard day. I wake so depressed that I immediately go make brownies to make myself feel better, which it doesn't. (I always tell myself that eating the almost burnt edges doesn't count.) It makes me feel as if I just gave Jb more ammunition to criticize me for. Then I'm chatting online to another person who is probably as fucked up in the head as I am sometimes, though he's far more passive-aggressive about it than I am. It's one of the few social things I get to do all day, and there's something in knowing he's as fucked up in his own way as I am. We're both in foul moods this morning, though, so the conversation is short, and that's fine with me, except that it isn't. I spend the morning listening to Pandora.

I am doing nothing. I am achieving nothing. I have anxiety about what Jb'll say when he comes home, about the mood he'll be in, about how much he'll hate me for the nothing that I do or feel. I cannot focus on any one thing, and the only emotional hit is music. "Ten Year Night" by Lucy Kaplansky comes on, and I'm triggered back to Michigan, flying down the highway along the railroad tracks far up toward the peninsula from a little town called Cheyenne where I braved a bar to get a cheeseburger that tasted better than anything I'd had. And the shifting of gears was so necessary to my running, the control of the down shift, the letting go as you up shift, the jump of the gas as your foot grows heavier, and all around you country you couldn't know. There's a certain face, too, that comes to mind with those times and that song, and it's as hard to out run that history and burnt bridge as it is to shift through the old melody line.

The tears are in my eyes before I ever realize I'm crying.

I remember what it's like to fly.

I Don't Know Anymore

I don't know what I'm doing or how I'm feeling anymore. I'm down. A minor depression maybe. Maybe something more. Brought on by days of heavy bleeding and IBS. That's enough to put anyone down for the count for a few days. I'm broken out like I'm 16 again. The bathtub's been stopped up, so I haven't showered. I feel disgusting and out of place and unable to face the world. I don't want to go out. I don't particularly want to do anything. I'm definitely going through the motions when it does come time to do things. I'd be hard-pressed to get myself beyond the front door today.

On a brighter note, I've been turning over the idea of a book in my head for, oh, a year or three now, but I hadn't considered doing anything with it because I had no characterization, and thus, no plot. There was no motivating force behind one of the main characters. Except that suddenly, today, while starring testily into the bathroom mirror, the character's motivation burst full bloom in my mind. Suddenly, I knew exactly what had happened to him, who he was, and what he wanted, or didn't want, and why he had become what he'd become. Moreover, it gave me a better handle on the other main character. I've a tertiary character that's still vague to me, but a little research might help me flush that out. Do I have any energy to do anything with all this, though? I doubt it. Which upsets me more, and it becomes a whole cycle of "I want to be a writer, but I don't write," along with accompanying feelings of guilt and failure. Guilt for wasting what talent I might have and fear of failing. Then there's the commitment and time it would take, and the game you play if you want to publish, and maybe all the work would be for naught. Then what? Then I wasn't good enough--just like I thought. (And if that's not self-fulfilling prophecy thinking, then I've never had cognitive-behavioral therapy.)

Otherwise, there's nothing much to say. I see the psych Thursday, I think. I don't even know what I want to discuss with him. I'm so very meh about the whole treatment process. I don't care about the drugs, I don't want to take them, and I'm fed up with being "sick." I should be better than this, I should be bigger than this, I should be able to handle this on my own. Treatment and meds have never, ever helped me. And I've tried a few. Effexor, Paxil, Zoloft, Prozac, Topomax, Wellbutrin, and now Remeron, Lamictal, Klonopin. I don't even know if I can put any faith into a diagnosis. I feel like I'm in that revolving door of doctors and meds, where you wait 30m for your scheduled appointment to sit 15m with your psych who tells you next to nothing while handing you a few more prescriptions across his desk. All the while you're barely keeping your head above water with all the doctor bills and prescription costs.

Still Here

I am . . . here. Which is to say that I have nothing to say, despite feeling somewhat better than I have, mentally speaking, since the hospital. My body, however, not so fine. First period in fourth months, non-stop IBS during the day . . . it's really more than I can be buggered to say that I actually swept up some and have a load of laundry going down in the basement. The dishes and dinner are waiting, but I can't quite bring myself to that yet.

Overall, I'd say I'm very . . . meh. With a bit of restlessness and random anxiety thrown in. Maintenance was supposed to be by to fix the tub and oven. No show, of course. And I've been sitting here waiting for them all day. Thus, no doubt, the anxiety. I still don't like the idea of having to deal with strangers or having people in my "space." I actually was resistant enough to the idea of leaving the new apartment that I rescheduled last week's psych appointment for this week. And I still don't want to go.

I don't care to write anymore either. That's be supplanted by reading. I'm reading again. And with that, the writing's dried up. There is nothing intelligent in my brain to say, no spark of personality to put forth. These are clunky words put together by a clunky mind and typed by clunky fingers. We're broke. I have no job. I have no idea what I'm doing with myself. Epic fail.

By the by, when I went down to do the laundry, I really took a good look at the basement, and promptly wished I hadn't. There are, I'm certain, the largest cockroaches I've ever seen down there. They're all dead, which is a good sign, I guess, but dear god. As long as they stay down there. The spiders are welcome to them.

Back to moving around the apartment and random futzing with this or that to pretend I'm being productive. If I were working, this would be one of those days when I couldn't be buggered to do my work because I'm too distracted and unable to focus. My body feels leaden, and I'm utterly unmotivated, except that I owe it to Jb to do something. Feh.

Slippery Slope

I'm heading for a depression. I can feel it coming on. I've lost interest in most everything again: reading, computer games, movies, sex, going places, doing things. I am angry at myself about this, so I'm cranky all the time and restless. Sometimes, instead, I'm listless and passive. The IBS and GERDs is acting up as well. I'm beginning to stress about things like Jb coming home at night. While other things, I don't care about at all: like whether the bills get paid, whether we have money or not, whether we have food or not. When Jb tries to ask me about these things, I get annoyed, short with him. He is constantly yelling at me for snapping at him. My temper and patience are nonexistent. I resent Jb's intrusion into my "world." More and more, he says things to me like, "You know, maybe you should try living here in reality, like everybody else."

This morning, on waking, I remember having a very vivid dream about living in a city with Hitler and being somehow close to him. Because he's a despot and mercurial of mood, everyone is always on eggshells around him, not wanting to curry his disfavor. I am someone he favors, and even I am very careful about what I do and say. It is stressful, this living on the edge, never knowing whether he'll be kind or cruel. And he can be very kind, as well as very cruel. There is a small resistance in the town. They know each other by the books they read. But those loyal to Hitler know them by the books they read as well. I try to sneak past a Hitler supporter with one of these books tucked among many. I make it, barely, out to a terraced park full of students and wildflowers, and there are two women who oversee the whole body of supporters. L-----, from the psych ward, is there in my dream. She screams out at a line of nuns who walk past the park; she was always screaming out about freedom and being closed in.

The dream is telling. I am having a hard time dealing with being home all day, then having Jb come home and disrupt my little world. It's like Jayne says in Firefly, "[He] damages my calm." It also sends me back to my childhood--when I lived in fear of my mother's moods, never knowing what they might be from minute to minute. I have to admit to myself that I've felt this way for the last year or so. Even when Jb was picking me up from work, the last hour of work, before I knew he was coming, I'd start to get sick to my stomach, I'd taste cigarettes in my mouth, and my IBS would suddenly flare up, so that I missed almost a half hour of work at the end of the day, every day. I think, perhaps, this is an inability to deal with change on a small, localized scale. And like in my dream, I used to escape into books. But since the hospitalization, I've had trouble concentrating enough to read them, except in small snippets.

Jb also gets on my ass--understandably so--about not having started to unpack. I took a week off because I needed it after the move, but I've no energy for it. It's been up near the 100s this week, so I tell myself it's because it's been so hot and I've been trying to keep the A/C off during the day. But the truth is that I simply don't have the motivation to do it. And Jb's losing patience with me. We had another fight last night. He told me that I've ruined every night so far in the new apartment, that I no longer participate in our relationship. And I'm left hurt and shamed and guilty and small--and angry at him for making me face the truth. I wish, sometimes, I could not listen. That I could wrap the bubble of my quiet day alone around me.

I cannot blame Jb, though. He is working hard, for both of us. He has every right to resent what he must see as my laziness. And it's like work all over again. How many times can you say, "I don't feel well," before they begin to look at you askance, like you're lying, or making it up. Depression isn't an excuse, but it comes across as one. Unless you've been there, deep and alone, you cannot ever truly understand what it feels like. Mild depression is not the same as major depression. Trying to follow each mood swing is exhausting. Depression is depleting. You are told, expected, to be this or that, but you can't be. Part of you no longer even cares that you can't be. Another part of you is angry and bitter, guilt-ridden and ashamed. And still, even though you want to meet someone's expectations, you can't. The will to try sputters and flags like a flame about to go out, and you're left feeling helpless, and you know it's all you're fault. You are the one who is broken. You are the one who is wrong.

9:59 a.m. How Do I Feel Today?

It's one of those "activities" they make you do in therapy and at the hospital. In the hospital, you rated yourself on a scale of 1 to 10. In therapy, I had a sheet of faces with the names of different emotions beneath them. Often, there wasn't an emotion that ever fit how I felt, or I couldn't quite name how I felt. On a 1 to 10 scale? About a 3 today. I'm feeling numb. I don't care about much. There will be no shower today. I will put my hair up in a makeshift bun with a hairband. I will not unpack--something I haven't really done since we moved in. I will not play on the computer. I will not read a book. If I do either, it will be for 10 minutes, maybe less. I may turn on the tv, but I will not watch it. If Jb comes home and asks anything of me, I will be upset and put out. I'm supposed to make a grocery list today. I will wait until the last minute to do it. When we go to the store, I will shuffle around from aisle to aisle without really seeing anything. I will not want to be there. I do not care about eating, though I will when I'm hungry later. I ate half of one of Jb's Nutty Bars because I couldn't be bothered to make anything more complicated. Jb will probably be upset that I did. I don't much care. He will take that as me not caring about him, or his feelings, but it's simply apathy. He can be mad at me if he wants to--he often is these days--and I don't care. I do not want to write. That is how I feel today.

7:43 a.m. Med Check

"Me and my medicine we are
So hard to take
Me and my medicine we are
So hard to take"

Kate MacLeod, "Me and My Medicine"

Meds: Took 'em. Didn't want to, but did.

Jb spent half the morning, I think, slamming every drawer in the file cabinet to find every single freakin' pen because I said I needed one to make a grocery list. I swear it's the stupid, petty things like this that make me want to give it all up. Why bother taking my meds? It's not as if it helps anything. I'm still down. Jb and I still fight. And almost always it ends up being my fault: I've snapped at him, I can't control my moods. It makes a person tired.

Breakfast: I don't feel like eating.

Now back to bed so I can sleep out the day rather than deal with it. I'm too damn tired. And again, that's just another way of saying I'm depressed, down, not up to dealing with the day.

Dreams: Vivid, but I don't remember them.

Change

As Jb puts it, "It happens." But then, so does shit if you believe the bumper sticker, and this week has just been a shit kicker for me. Major life changes have always been a trigger for me. This move was no exception. The last few days before the move I was already in a passive-aggressive state. The two days of the move, I was snappy, angry, bitchy, and hard to deal with. Jb and I went 'round several times during those two days, and even more since the move.

I actually had a small breakdown over not being able to put my own computer together. This from the girl who's always been capable with her own computer setup, who used to troubleshoot computers for her co-workers, etc., etc. This time, though, the wires were too much, and I sat there throwing things around and having a tantrum, all the time looking at the wires like they were some foreign entity I couldn't wrap my mind around. And that pissed me off. I can't explain the frustration. Somehow the fight escalated to me swearing I'd leave Jb -- and all sorts of irrational nonsense.

That night, in bed, when I was far calmer, Jb told me that I couldn't control my moods anymore, that it was worse now than before I went into the hospital. And I feel so helpless in the face of these moods. They overtake me on a whim. I hadn't realized how mercurial my moods had been until Jb pointed it out to me. And at least, at the time, I was in a rational state where I could really look back on the last few days and see that Jb was right. That hasn't stopped the moods, though. We had another fight yesterday, and I ended up sitting in the bathtub for a while. We've already snapped at each other this morning.

The following are among the things that are setting me off:

• My computer setup: I hate it. It's uncomfortable, too compact, and I have no where to put my feet up, which is crucial to me because of the lymphadema in my legs. But I have no space, and I can't stand that. I can't stand not having personal space.

• The bed: It is on the floor sans frame. I hate this. It's difficult to get up, and frankly, I slept on the floor on a futon the entire time I was in college and at my ex's place, but I was 21. I'm freakin' 32-years-old. I want a proper bed frame. I'm too old for this shit, and I wake up every day feeling like someone pummeled me during the night.

• My knee: The osteo-arthritis is acting up. Maybe due to all the rain we've had, maybe because it tends to be seasonal. Either way, it hurts like hell when I'm trying to get to sleep at night, and the computer setup isn't helping any, neither is the bed.

• Cutting: Jb wants to cut this Ikea bed table we have to give me some sort of setup that gives me more room, but (1) I don't want him cutting up a $200 piece of furniture and (2) it won't solve anything because I need a solid base, like the end of the bed frame, to put my feet up. I've been trying a storage container, but the sucker moves all over the place, my keyboard feels like it's sliding off my lap, and it's uncomfortable as hell.

Also, when Jb brought home the saw and measuring tape to modify the Ikea table, I broke down in a crying fit, trying to explain that it was too much change all at once. That I needed time to test out the new setup, to even see if I liked it. I was so brittle from all the newness. I needed time to get my bearings. I swear to God modifying that table would have been the last straw for me.

So, in summation, the apartment is quite nice with its hardwood floors, its quaint window frames that sometimes need to be propped open, and the wild jungle that is our backyard and which I can see through the kitchen window. It's grown on me, though I spent the first few days walking through the place, touching things, opening and closing things, like some befuddled ghost who's trying to understand her surroundings. The neighborhood is quiet, you can hear birds, but little else. And it smells green and loamy when it rains. The apartment feels homey, mostly because it's one of five apartments in an old house from the 1940s. (This is why it's quaint. I'd swear the cabinets and a few other things hail from the '40s, as does the washer/dryer and the stove.) We've met the upstairs and downstairs neighbors.

All this change makes me feel very Benny and Joon-ish, though, as if I'm Joon: fine as long as I'm in an environment I'm comfortable in, but change anything, take me out of my comfort zone, and I start to flip out emotionally, lashing out at Jb and exhibiting a sort of dysphoric mania: the depression and the anger and irritability of hypomania mixed. It's a little like being in a life raft in a raging sea with a small bucket, trying to keep the water from overwhelming the boat. Unfortunately, Jb's no Sam, and he's not dealing well with my outbursts of late. Not that I blame him, but it does remind me that bipolar people are "three and a half times more likely to [`divorce'] than the rest of the population."

Furthermore, the entire time I was unable to log onto the internet because of Comcast's ineptitude, I didn't write. Even Jb asked if I'd been writing, suggesting I probably should be keeping up with that, that he thought it was a good outlet for me. But I simply didn't want to. I felt like I had nothing to say. When in reality, I had plenty to say, especially to Jb. It just all came out in this destructive, irrational way. And part of me feels guilty about it, and part of me feels like I had the right to vent my spleen. That's the grandiosity: the thinking that I'm entitled to more than other people, that I'm different, better somehow. More and more I hear Jb telling me: "You don't care about my feelings, that I'm hurt. You just don't care." And to a point, he's right. There are certain moments when nothing matters to me but me. As if I'm due more than everyone else. And that's solipistic to say the least.

I do care, though. I just don't know how to show it anymore. I feel like an emotional retard, unable to access certain emotions, while others are making hay while the sun shines.

8:10 a.m. Meds Check

Saw the psych doctor on Monday, the day after the move. Told the psych nurse practitioner that I had been feeling depressed, wishing I were back in the hospital, thinking bad thoughts, but not to the point of having a plan. Just the beginnings of them. I was crying more, acting out and difficult to handle, and not interested in much, despite the obvious need to pack and move. I told her that I know change is a trigger for me, and that I usually go depressed afterward. I'm still sleeping a ton. So she tweaked my meds and actually put me on an antidepressant along with the sleep aid and mood stabilizer. Why I wasn't on one before this, I've no idea. There was also talk of raising my Lamictal because of the anger and irritability, but we never settled on a dosage.

Here's my new list of psych meds:
Wellbutrin XL 150 MG 1x a day (antidepressant)
Lamictal 100 MG 2x a day (mood stabilizer)
Remeron 30 MG 1x a day (sleep aid/sort of an antidepressant; up from 15 MG)
Klonopin 1 MG 2x a day (anti-anxiety)

Other meds:
Benicar HCT 40/25 MG 1x a day (blood pressure)
Protonix 40 MG 1x a day, as needed (gastro-intestinal pain)
Levsinex .375 TIMECP 2x a day (abdominal pain/IBS symptoms)

Add to that the 2 Tylenol or Ibuprofen I've been taking for my left knee (osteo-arthritis is acting up with all the rain and change of seasons), and I'm starting to feel like I need a day-of-the week pill box with separate day and night chambers. Not to mention that you'd think someone with Bipolar, IBS, GERDS, lymphadema, and osteo-arthritis could get a response on her medical assistance application from the county. It does hurt the morale.

6:02 p.m. More & Less

More packing, less words. Jb's late again. He's always late these days. He works hard, works for the two of us, so I can't resent it, but I get lonely. It leaves me too much time by myself. It's... hard... to be constantly alone with all these interim hours to while away. I'm tired of packing, of doing the work here at home. I'm tired of being here. I've started thinking about the hospital, wishing, almost, that I was back there. I'm feeling depressed, and... brittle. I can't shoulder much more. I feel like it'd only take some small thing to break me, and I don't know what I might say, how I might act, how the anger might come out. It is anger. I'm so angry at myself for being this way, for feeling so broken at times. I can't tolerate the thought of being touched. I want my space, I want. And I don't know what I want. It's just this gaping hole somewhere, and my brain can't wrap itself around the feelings, this ephemeral thing. It's like this dark shadow behind you, breathing down your neck, and you just want to scrub yourself clean, scrub everything raw until it's bare and white and shining and there's nothing dirty left, everything that's wrong is gone. The pressure grows inside until you feel half mad with it. It's times like that I can understand cutters. I curl my fingers in and dig my nails into my palms until the pain makes the pressure ease. But I'll manage. I'll make myself manage. I have for years. I know how to put one foot in front of the other, and there are other people depending on me. I feel indebted, and so, force myself on.

11:45 a.m. Sleep Study

I'm right back in bed after Jb leaves this morning and not up again until 11:46 a.m. I was having vivid dreams, though they were gone on waking. But this is the first time in nearly a week that I've been aware of even having them anymore. I feel like I should note this before moving on to a more thoughtful post. So, not hypomania. I can't do without the sleep. But my sleep schedule has definitely shifted. Could have been a couple days of up-up and this could be the downswing, bringing with it the over-compensating sleep. We'll see what my energy is like around 2 p.m. This is when I begin to wonder if it's bipolar, and then I think about what I'm about to write in my next post, and I think it's likely; it's just been so long since I've had an extended manic episode.

2:04 p.m. I Quit!

You would, too, if you saw our toilet bowel. Got halfway through the bathroom, realized the sink drain is clogged, and I ain't about to remedy it. Hell, after doing some dishes and the bathroom, I can't even get myself up and over to the store to get toilet paper. It is a sad day when I can't walk 2 blocks. And if Jb says anything, "Bang, zoom, straight to the moon!" (Gotta love the old sitcoms that encourage domestic abuse punchlines.)

Okay, dammit, I will go to the store, but it's because of the toilet paper. Not for any other reason! Because, you know, toilet paper is a female necessity of dire importance. Guess I'll get some stupid drain unclogger stuff, too. And finish the dishes, and cook dinner, and, and, and... Makes me exhausted just thinking about it. But, here's the kicker, Jb went out to a flat tire this morning, so the car's in the shop, and ain't no one else gonna go do these little "domestic" lovelies. The fact that we've, maybe, three days until we can start moving stuff to the new apartment and aren't at all completely packed up, well, that's no stress or motivator at all. Nope.

This is how it happens. Every time. I'll take on far more than I really should, work myself up to a frenzy, not sleep at night, wake up far too early, and utterly fizzle once we get into the new place. Once I work myself up with worry and anxiety and cranky resentment, I'll stay uber productive and hypo until I overstep myself, and... crash. With all the fanfare and pomp of my overproductive climb. I honestly don't know how I'm going to pack up some of this other stuff. It's either stuff I need Jb to haul out or down, or it's stuff we'll be using until we actually move. Thankfully, he's been a great help.

6:52 And She'll Be Swingin'

Impulse replaced by crankiness, mood swings, everything that's wonderful about the up and down. It reminds me of a training exercise in Space Camp. We were on a moonwalk simulator, which was a glorified chair on a four-story scaffold with a pivot bar in the middle. The counselors would strap you in, and you'd push off with your feet, and you'd float up into the air, up two-stories, over the zenith of the simulator and back down, to bounce back up and over. It all happened in a sort of slow motion, with that awkward, bouncing gait of an astronaut, except that you had the leisure of being strapped in, of being able to look outside yourself and watch the slow upswing and then the slow downswing of each pendulum-like swing. That's how this feels sometimes, the way a mood will creep up on me, send me up into an agitated, pissy state, then slowly recede into something more depressed, more sluggish. Back, and forth. Back, and forth. Except this is a ride I can't get off.

7:06 Meds, Check

2 Lamictal, 1 Klonopin, and 1 Seagrams Ginger Ale (Note: Caffeine Free). Went to bed at 1:30 a.m. Maybe more like 2 a.m. I resent the way Jb rolls over and is out like a light and snoring within a minute of deciding he's tired while I lie there, thoughts random and a mess. Forecast for staying up? Slim to none. Maybe. If I dreamed, I remember nothing. Haven't in days. May be starting a downward trend. Too early to tell, but spent parts of yesterday and the day before morose and in a general funk. Emotionally sensitive. The regular symptoms. Could it be the lower dose of Remeron -- an antidepressant -- finally leaving my system? Unsure. Maybe going down 15MG was a bad idea.

7:45 p.m. Up and Down the Merry-Go-Round

It can be the best day one minute, then one song -- one song -- and my eyes are burning, my heart's aching, and something in my stomach turns sour. I want a cigarette more than life, and even then, the tears start to well up.

Early in the day, Jb and I drive out to Cracker Barrel. All the way there and back we listen to country, Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer, my music, and sometime in the last few weeks, Jb's bothered to listen to some of it, has learned to appreciate some of the songs. It means so much to me that the car flies down the highway, the wind blows in the windows, and everything is green, lush, flowing. And I'm happy; I'm content. Nothing sparkles, the colors don't glow vibrant, so intense they light up my heart, and the pure feeling, the feeling of the moment doesn't overwhelm, doesn't fill me to the brim, not like it used to. And I miss it. The day has been beautiful. I recognize that, appreciate it, but I miss the ecstasy of it. I miss the unnatural high.

We come home, and suddenly, I can't stand being here in the dark when the day's so beautiful. I get antsy, something beneath my skin starts to itch, for the sunlight, for relief. Waiting on Jb, I'm surfing YouTube and I'm watching some Firefly montage to "Ain't No Reason" by Brett Dennen, a song I've never heard before, and it hits home unexpectedly:

There ain’t no reason things are this way.
Its how they always been and they intend to stay.
I can't explain why we live this way, we do it everyday.
Preachers on the podium speakin’ of saints,
Prophets on the sidewalk beggin’ for change,
Old ladies laughing from the fire escape, cursing my name.
I got a basket full of lemons and they all taste the same,
A window and a pigeon with a broken wing,
You can spend your whole life workin’ for something
Just to have it taken away.
People walk around pushing back their debts,
Wearing pay checks like necklaces and bracelets,
Talking ‘bout nothing, not thinking ‘bout death,
Every little heartbeat, every little breath.
People walk a tight rope on a razor's edge
Carrying their hurt and hatred and weapons.
It could be a bomb or a bullet or a pen
Or a thought or a word or a sentence.

There ain't no reason things are this way.
It's how they always been and they intend to stay
I don’t know why I say the things I say, but I say them anyway.
But love will come set me free
Love will come set me free, I do believe
Love will come set me free, I know it will
Love will come set me free, yes.

Prison walls still standing tall,
Some things never change at all.
Keep on buildin’ prisons, gonna fill them all,
Keep on buildin’ bombs, gonna drop them all.
Working your fingers bare to the bone,
Breaking your back, make you sell your soul.
Like a lung that’s filled with coal, suffocatin’ slow.
The wind blows wild and I may move,
The politicians lie and I am not fooled.
You don't need no reason or a three piece suit to argue the truth.
The air on my skin and the world under my toes,
Slavery stitched into the fabric of my clothes,
Chaos and commotion wherever I go, love I try to follow.

Love will come set me free
Love will come set me free, I do believe
Love will come set me free, I know it will
Love will come set me free, yes.

There ain't no reason things are this way
It’s how they always been and they intend to stay
I can't explain why we live this way, we do it everyday.

It brings me down to a level I haven't been at for almost two weeks now. I'm ready to cry. I can't understand the meaning of it all, and everything seems momentary: this too shall pass, this too shall pass. But no one ever acknowledges that also means that this happiness, that passes, too. And we're left on the up and down of a merry-go-round, holding tight to a pole, sometimes brave enough to reach for the brass ring, but mostly so frightened that all we can do is hold on tight and close our eyes and wait for the world to stop.

The worst is that I remember the hospital again. I remember how faithful Jb was, coming every night for that single hour they allowed visitors, and twice on the weekend. Every time he came, and when he left, the girls in the ward made such fun of me: "You know he loves you; you can see it in how he looks at you," "Oo, J-----, hug me, too!" Even the nurses, one of them noting how'd come in the middle of the night to bring me something when I couldn't, and hadn't, slept for three nights in row. She told me if he didn't so obviously love me, she might have a go at him.

Half the women in ward sat in group and talked about love, failed relationships, divorce, and every single one of them got a sort of hungry look when Jb was with me, as if they'd give their selves for something, for someone, to look at them like that, to make life more bearable. And all I could think, swallowed by the deep water of depression and lost to the currents of my own thoughts, was that love couldn't fix me. I had the perfect boyfriend; he loved me, was there for me, supported me in ways I'd never expected anyone to support me. But love couldn't fix me.

3:25 p.m. No Downtime

Note to self: 2 p.m. came and went and no down time today as in the past 3 days. Exhibiting some possible signs of hypomania since Friday. Feels full blown today. Because I have to go to the psych? Unsure of trigger if there is one.

Have also gone from thinking the meds might be kicking in, to thinking I don't need no steenkin' meds, to thinking maybe I need more meds, because I can't quite get myself under control.

Will take a Klonopin and catch my bus on time. Will also not drink any more caffeine. Will not continue to blog or look up studies on Lamictal on McMan's website.

11:24 p.m. Wake Up Call

In and out of sleep until 10ish. Try to find it again, but my brain is wracked with scenes from the novel I woke up to yesterday morning. I lie in bed and let them play out in my mind. Question them. Turn them over. Is it too much like any other book I've read? Of course, aren't all plots derivative? It's the characters that drive the story, make it unique. I'm unconvinced. Still, the characters seem to live and breath in my head, having their own voices and desires.

I've been reading Madness: A Bipolar Life by Marya Hornbacher. Not the way I usually read, devouring books in a day's time, but in the way I read now, quick, but slow, scanning pages, but only able to ever absorb a few pages at a time. This makes Marya's book perfect, as her chapters are often only a few pages at a time. Sometimes, it's not until I've read some of her book that I understand what is going on in my own head. For example, I am, and have been, screening my calls. Not because I don't want to talk to people, but because I can't. It's exhausting. Similarly, I don't think I'll be going out today. At best, I hope to take a shower. I haven't in days. And I'm not sure if I've missed my appointment with my psych.

2:17 p.m. Tired & Cranky, Period.

Annoyed. Bitchy. Cranky. Tired. Crabby. Beginning to dislike Jb just for sitting there and watching t.v. Unreasonable dislike, even hatred. Want to crawl out of my skin. Annoyed with all things slow, dumb, insignificant. Or, at least, what I consider insignificant, which is anything beyond myself or my desires, which is completely ridiculous. And yet, the anger and annoyance are still there. Don't want to make decisions. Want Jb to intuit my wants and needs (good luck with that). Totally unreasonable expectations. Jonesing for sugar like a junky. Again, the Remeron?

Note to self: Noticing trend in mood swings. Mood seems to take a dive around 2ish each afternoon.

2:54 p.m. And Down Again

...

What more is there to say. -poof- From up, to down.

The energy feels like it's hiding somewhere, but it's not accessible right now. My lids are heavy, and so is my body. My mind, however, continues with this subtle static.