Healthy Highs

Bipolar has been likened to a roller coaster ride with thrilling highs and teeth grinding lows. Although it's exciting, a roller coaster starts in one place and, since it's on rails, ends up in the exact same place. What it does between start and finish is the fun of the roller coaster. Bipolar works the same way: what goes up must come down and what goes down must come up.

Every high has an equal and opposite low. And the good news is each low has an equal and opposite high. The higher the high, the lower the low will be. I used to run marathons as I found it was a great way to burn of all of the excess mental and physical energy. A marathon last for 26.2 miles and somewhere around the 20 mile mark, most runners hit the wall. The wall is when you run out of both mental and physical energy and you push forward on sheer will. I found the best way to deal with the wall is just to know it's there and keep on running. And that's how I approach bipolar. The only way to deal with the highs and lows is just to know that they're there.

You can have triggers to help you get high or stay high but the high can only last for so long. The same goes for the lows. Whether high or low, I just know that this too shall pass. When my highs are unfocused, I tend to be destructive. I've broken the sound barrier in my car while evading the police in pursuit, and I've thrown punches with a guy 60 lbs my senior who needed a good beat down. I've had three sex partners in less than twenty four hours, and sucked down more alcohol than a human can handle and somehow no passed out. I've stayed up for three nights just to get it all done, and overloaded my back with my mouth to ensure I'd have more sleepless nights. I spent six years leaving the house on Monday morning with four suits over my shoulder and not arriving home until Friday night; then I'd sleep for five hours and head back to the office.

While on a low, I've spent the weekend watching Seinfeld reruns on the couch without moving. And I've been bedridden for two years and not been able to lift my head. I also remained celibate for 11 years and 9 months from age 24 to age 36; when I got back on that 'horse,' I rode it until its legs fell off.  I've also stayed awake all night because I was too tired to actually go to bed. As I write this, it's 3:57am on Friday morning and I've been up all night. I can usually derail myself and get some sleep but not tonight. And the alarm goes off at 7:30.

 I'll probably wind up getting around 3 hours of sleep. To shock my body into being awake, I'll drink two Red Bulls before noon which will get me on a high. I'll ride that high to the end of the work day, and crash before I get home. And since it's Friday and I may work late or go out for drinks after work, I could spend the entire weekend in bed. Since it's winter, I keep a blanket in the car just in case I crash and have to take a nap.

Although the lows can be destructive as nothing gets done, I've learned that highs can be even more destructive if I don't have something to use up all of my energy. I've spent a good deal of time planning strategies for riding out the highs. This had to be done during a high because planning during a low wouldn't get me anywhere.

The key is to make sure the highs are productive and the lows are stable. When I'm high, I focus my energy like a laser beam; while low, I recharge.

While on a high, some of the productive activities I've planned are:

-lifting weights

-listening to music

-rapping to music - a white guy rapping; how original

-running

-driving (not too fast)

-spending time with friends

-mountain biking

-writing

-dancing – this is sometimes in public while walking through a mall when a cool song comes over the speaker system

-sex - with one partner

 The lows are also something I needed to plan for:

-watching movies

-sleeping (at appropriate times - derail my brain and force myself to sleep)

-avoid making large decisions, or any decisions for that matter.

What I did to help make my moods more regular and predictable

-work regular hours - a varied and inconsistent schedule means varied and inconsistent moods

-have a regular sleep schedule

-have a regular eating schedule

-avoid drugs and alcohol

-avoid caffeine - although I violate this almost daily

-avoid manipulative people - although this is difficult to do in a work situation, I have cut off family members and friends who were not healthy for me to be around

-help the people who are closest to me understand my moods and cycles - they know that some of this is in my control and some of it is not - sometimes this means talking on the phone with me at 3am and letting me crash on their couch at 7pm - as time has gone by and I've learned more about my moods and triggers, these scenarios have gone from quite frequent to very rare. 


It took a while to understand myself, once I knew what I was actually dealing with. It's wasn't long before I was able to live a 'normal' life with very little downtime.