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                                 My Lifeline During Manic Episodes (con’t).              

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.                   Where does a seventeen-year-old go, when she jumps out of her boyfriends moving car while on microdot because he is berating her and will not take her home? She goes to a locked psychiatric ward, adolescent wing. Does she get an accurate diagnosis there, in 1983? Not likely…even though the psychologists interview the Child and tape her, for teaching purposes…

.   Now that I think back to those 30 days, I can see where I did gain some insight into my mental state as far as depression goes, and addiction. I don’t think Bipolar Disorder was clearly understood then, or maybe my mania wasn’t recognized, but it seems hard to believe due to my behavior. They said I was attention seeking and wanted my Dad’s love so bad that I would do crazy things to get noticed. They said my suicide attempts were based on this idea.

All this was true, I guess, but leaving there with a diagnosis of depression seems somehow like a cop-out on their part. I was excellent at telling them what they wanted to hear, and have been able to be a chameleon all my life, changing my “colors” at will.  However, a profound lesson was learned there: Painting my emotions, as art therapy.

.       I had many works that I made in my Advanced Art Class before my interment; a sculpture of a woman in a fighting pose, another of a man being choked to death by huge green hands(!) to name a few. So I thought I was already “painting out” my emotions. The Art Therapy session was a distraction from the bleak reality of the ward, so I went to see what it was about. The teacher was a beautiful artist, whose mannerisms alone were calming, and she helped guide me thru exercises using color as emotion in very freeing ways. The effect was profound, I experienced such a sense of slowing my disturbing thoughts, a feeling of peace that lasted a while afterwards. I never forgot her, or the sessions, eventually using this technique as a basis for much of my art.

.   Today I find my art to be necessary for my well being, as my Bipolar Mania increases I turn to a canvas for relief, for release of the crazed energy. This process also offers me insight into the deeper issues that set my mind off on these wild rides, I can let the pain flow out and take shape in line, in color, in form. Indispensable for my being able to function at a higher level, where in the past acting out these terrible episodes would have devestating consequences…

(to be continued)

.      These days, research into the disease of Bipolar Disorder has definitively found that those with this devastating illness have different synapses of the brain firing during certain situations, as opposed to those without a BP diagnosis. Tangible, physical proof that the Disorder is a chemical malfunction of the brain, not some kind of moral quagmire. While I am fairly certain that it is much less common today to judge those with this illness as deviants, I still feel the sting of being misjudged and misunderstood on a daily basis.

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.  This most likely is the result of over 30 years of misdiagnosis of my mental illness, and at least that long of my untreated Bipolar Disoder wreaking havoc in my family. Years upon years of huge errors in judgement, promiscuity, active addiction and alcoholism, self-harm, suicide attempts, incarceration and institutionalization, criminal activity and bald faced lies and thievery led to a ton of disappointment in my Family. My relationships with immediate family deteriorated to the point of no return, and complete lack of empathy towards me, a withholding of love in some cases. Tears and blame in others .

.    My Bipolar Disorder manifested itself early in my life; I remember, very clearly, the phenomenon of feeling  ” painted green” in a group of other classmates. A conspicuousness, standing out like a sore thumb, set apart, different. I recall being made an example of, early on as a exceptional student, then in middle school an example of an underachiever, a weed smoking burnout.

.   I did everything to excess, my self worth being tied to my weight led to use of speed and bulemia, even with a thirty inch waist at 5′ 9″. My burning desire to fit in, to be accepted by the “cool” kids, led to extreme risk taking, rape and a strange sense of my own “fame”. It drove my father insane to see his 13 year old daughter staying out till dawn, coming home stoned and drunk. I was an artist as long as I can remember, and practiced writing in miniscule script for years. I had my head buried in my sketch book, hidden in my textbook, telling whoever would listen that I was Michaelangelo’s reincarnation, born on the same month and day as the great master.

.  I was sure to be famous, and tried out in a local hard Rock band at 15, taped squeaking along to Rush 2012’s  Temple of Syrinx; an impossible song for a multitude of singers. My performance was so comical that the band members could not contain their mirth, even in my presence.

.  Yes, the Bipolar Tiger was bucking me around like a prized bronc, and I was surely going to be violently thrown into the dirt.

(to be continued…)

Plugged In, Digital Painting ©STMartin2020

Plant Lady is Ticked!Painted Tart Pan©STMartin2018

The Manic Side of Me:Bipolar Art Lamp ©STMartin2018

There have been many thoughts of escape running through my mind of late. A natural reaction to the primal fear this disease is causing, I think. I have always been an escapist, a dreamer, prone to flights of fancy. This image is one of my dreams, soaring across turbulent seas, racing the wind!

Home, a place I used to run away from. (Doe, a deer, a female deer…) It felt like Prison to my adolescent heart that yearned for escape. From all the anger and bitterness, all the dislike we harbored for each other. And run I did, but still tethered to the safety net of a Mother I could manipulate at will, whether begging for money or just an ear to listen to my endless apologies.

.  I think back now, to the men I chose to give myself to. The one I nearly married, who hit me in the face with a board, ripped my clothes off in front of his friends, and shouted loud enough for the world to hear, that I was a dirty whore. This man I idolized. I told anyone who would listen what a he-man he was, an ex-Marine, so well built and strong.

Threatening me with a beating, he would make me approach other women in bars, to recruit them for sex with him while I watched. My gut turns now at the shame I felt. It mars me still, even though he died 25 years ago by his own hand. I cried for him, the pain he must have been in to do such a thing. But I had so little sympathy for myself. The abuse had been “my fault”. If I had only done a better job at loving him, perhaps he wouldn’t have done it.

.  I have gone down into this Rabbit Hole of flashbacks again. Images of the painful abuse of my ex-husband haunt me as if they happened yesterday. It has been 4 days now, writhing in the Muck of my past, no energy to drag myself out, hoist myself up. I just lie abed washed over by the pain, remembering the burning need to have a man to own. Even if that meant I would burn with jealousy when he flaunted his exploits with other women. No , I even told my best friend that I had really scored a live one, “a real criminal”!! I was so foolish, and so proud.

.  I hope this immobility passes soon, so that I can put away these thoughts, put them back into the Pandora’s box and slam shut the lid. I will then be able to face the world, at least for a while.