BlogHer is doing a fun contest and you all know I love to humiliate myself so . . . go there and read about it, then . . .
Replicate it here!
Tell me about your heinous prom dress. Give the year (or approximate if you don’t want to out your age - for example, my senior prom picture was taken “in the late 1980’s”). Post a picture on the web (use any photosharing site like Photobucket or Flickr) and link to it in the comments so we can all giggle together. The bigger, the puffier, the sluttier - the better.
I’m not giving out any prizes, but I guarantee it will make us all laugh, and laugher is truly the best medicine for all that ails you. Except bad fashion. Even laughter won’t cure that.
Here we go. I’m first. Deep breath.
And yes, that’s a giant black bow on the back of my head, to match the giant white bow you can’t see (thank you fleeting mercy!) hanging off my shoulders down to my butt. At least it wasn’t a butt bow.
It’s 1992, and I’m insanely smart - or at least I think I am. My boyfriend thinks I’m smart too and spends hours discussing literature and theory with me, editing and scribbling all over both my school papers and my fiction. He loves his red pen and it doesn’t surprise me years later when I find out he’s gotten his PhD in English and is teaching in some erudite university in the Pacific Northwest.
This is the year that I will always look back on as my “peak”. The time when you think you are the smartest, prettiest, funniest, most charming, most things to offer. Everything after the peak seems downhill, not as glorious, not as bright and definitely not as shiny.
I don’t sleep much that year. I’m too busy writing and careening back and forth between East Quad, Catherine Street and Packard Street, where my boyfriend lives directly over the room of my ex-boyfriend. Sometimes the three of us end up sipping coffee in the kitchen, awkward silence surrounding us all. Looking back, I can count the episodes now, they make sense to me, they are clear as day. Looking back I know that not sleeping has been a major trigger for many behaviors. Over the years, not sleeping has poked the sleeping monster in my belly and my brain, usually manifesting itself in an ugly episode of anorexia or bulimia. Later in life, it manifested differently - insidiously - in a form that to me seemed perfectly normal.
That year, I am a full-blown anorexic girl. I don’t need sleep and I certainly don’t need food - well, not much. A few crackers here and there, the random noodles my boyfriend picks up from an Asian market down the street, a nibble of a lemon poppyseed muffin as I sprint across campus, not wanting to be late. I work in a lingerie shop (but not a skanky one - we cater to women who’ve had mastectomies or reconstructive surgery). I make a bowl of takeout soup last two days. I am a senior in college. I am writing a story for the Hopwood Awards. I am in a high-level fiction workshop with 5 other people. I work, write, run around, drink at Del Rio, consume far too much caffeine, eschew sleep. No need for it. Wonderwoman, superwoman, sprinting around in my workout clothes in January, freezing to death, slipping on icy patches on uneven pavement, listening to massive amounts of Tori Amos and burning the few calories I allow myself to take in. The less I weigh, the more powerful I feel. The less I eat, the more crazy energy I have.
I wake the boyfriend sometimes, chattering in his ear, writing story ideas on the pad of paper next to my bed. For the first time in my life, I have a large group of friends - so many because, at the time, I’m funny and “vivacious” and “interesting” and, well, a little boisterous, a little impulsive. Want to to go Canada on a Wednesday night at 10 PM? I’m in! Let’s GO! Clubbing in Detroit til 5 AM? Sure, as long as I can make it back in time for my 8 AM class. Like most college students, I’m a study in excess, but my excesses surpass everyone else. I don’t talk about these things with my family. Sometimes I lie about where I’m going to the boyfriend, or I drag him along, kicking and screaming about deadlines, studying. I am very persuasive. No one can usually say no to me.
Drinking makes me tired and boring, so I do it rarely. Instead, I abuse food, buy clothes on a credit card, and spend time wandering around the streets of Detroit trying to run into my “other” boyfriend. Somehow I manage to get my coursework done and somehow, even though I feel like my brain is crackling with energy/exhaustion, I manage to keep going.
In the spring of 1993, I graduate. The end of the energy comes with the graduation. The bagpipers lead us into an auditorium for our commencement; I cry as I walk across the street. I cry a lot that spring. I go see a doctor about my “depression”. They prescribe more Zoloft. I don’t remember much of that summer, other than a cross country road trip. My short-term memory is fine, but my long-term memory is shot.
As I float through the next year of my life, I can clearly remember only a few things. One of them is how I feel like I’m swimming in oatmeal every day. I am so placid and complacent, my boyfriend stops loving me long before he tells me. He needs me to pay my half of the rent. He can’t kick me out. He needs my money; I’m the only one working full-time. We move 20 miles outside of Ann Arbor, and it’s a summer house, drafty, ugly, but on a tiny lake. I don’t feel depressed. I don’t feel anything. I quit one job, start another. The company goes bankrupt. One day I wake up and I have gained 45 pounds. I have no job. My boyfriend tells me he no longer loves me. My parents show up a few days later, dump the bulk of my belongings into U-Haul, and I leave Michigan forever. I cry and sleep most of the way to North Carolina.
Now, I wish I could talk to the ex-boyfriend, fill in the gaps, find out what I was doing, what happened to me, apologize for my drugged-out persona mixed with violent mood swings. Genevieve’s wedding. On the way home, screaming and crying because he wasn’t going to marry me. Hating him, not wanting to get married, but begging him anyway. Then quiet apologies later, a fancy dinner, buying him a mountain bike on my measly non-profit salary.
I go back through my journals from that time and it’s all glaringly obvious to me. Because I spent so much time on the depressive or sedate side of the poles, I kept getting anti-depressants. They kept from me the darkest times and I am grateful, but they did nothing for my moodiness, my irritability, my impulsivity, and my many unhealthy and frankly destructive behaviors, not the least of which was the eating disorder. The problem: when I had what I would now consider a hypomanic episode, I felt like I was on top of the world and invincible and just flat out healthy. I didn’t notice how an episode was always followed by dark despair and puking/starving, or my other favorite behaviors I used to distract myself. I just thanked god when I felt “good” that I was, and enjoyed the ride while it lasted. I don’t remember ever feeling balanced. The majority of my life has been spent swinging from one extreme (relationship, friendship, you name it) to the other, barely breathing between the two. Break off a 14 year relationship and 1 month later meet my future husband. Feel safe, fall in love, let’s get married. White dresses, anorexia, anxiety, obsessing and controlling myself and every detail I could, not sleeping again, freaking out the day before we got married, crying in the garage of our first home because, well, I had no idea why.
I hid my depression from as many people as I could. Mike saw it, my parents have seen it, my sister and a few very close friends. On the days I couldn’t hide it, I would reintroduce myself the following day with a smile and my cheerful (and fun! oh so fun!) persona and say that everything was okay, I just had a bad day. Sometimes, those bad “days” lasted a few years. I always thought, “I’m not that bad, I’m not that depressed, because every once in a while I’m totally, ridiculously happy and euphoric. The birds sing, the sun is out, and the wind in my hair is enough to keep me going for at least another week. Depressed people stay in bed, they moan and groan. I’m not depressed.”
I was, but it wasn’t the only demon. Average age of diagnosis of bipolar II: nearly 40. Average age of first episode: 25 years old. No wonder 15% of people with the illness off themselves before they can figure out what’s wrong.
This really hit home with me: (read the entire article here - it’s well worth the time)
Is there a test for bipolar disorder? Can you be sure if you have it or not?
This used to be simple. When “manic” only meant one thing (classic mania) one could ask “have you ever had a manic episode?” and many people knew what was being asked:
* Mood much better than normal
* Rapid speech
* Little need for sleep
* Racing thoughts, trouble concentrating
* Continuous high energy
* Overconfidence
* Loss of contact with reality (delusions)
As you now know (start this section on diagnosis afresh if you came from elsewhere), this list looks for obvious mania. It misses all the complexity we have just discussed. What you might be wanting is a “no way!” bipolar test. Something to provide a clear statement, like: “no, you don’t have it, or anything like it”. Or you might be looking for the opposite: “you definitely have bipolar II”. Sorry, that is not possible, but please read on.
On other websites you’ll find a test called the Mood Disorders Questionnaire (MDQ) which is supposed to give you a “yes or no” answer. But another test came along after the MDQ which is better suited to looking for subtle versions of bipolar II.
Think about it: if by this point on this website you’re saying to yourself “that’s me!”, which some people do, then you really don’t need some test to tell you that you should go ahead and consider treatment. Or that the diagnostic basis for that treatment should include a consideration of bipolar II. On the other hand, if someone else thinks you might have it, but you don’t think you do, is a test result going to make a difference to you? If so, go ahead and take one of these tests.
Family or friends could “take the test”, answering as if they were you, on the basis of what they’ve seen you do or heard you say. And then they could gently wonder out loud if perhaps the test might mean something, who knows, no one can tell for sure, but darn it sure seems like your life is a struggle sometimes, wow, what if there was a tool out there that would make life a bit smoother sometimes, not even necessarily a medication treatment, oh well, just thinking about this, of course you’d want to decide for yourself, not for me to say of course, etc. etc. (there’s a technique like this called Motivational Interviewing, if you’re interested).
Many people don’t like being labeled. It’s hard to handle, that label, the stigma, the embarrassment. But for once in my life, things make sense to me. I just finished a couple of books about Bipolar - and although the cases I read make my symptoms look like a balmy spring day, I could relate to nearly everything. I have had similar, or in some cases, exactly the same experiences. One of these people, before being diagnosed with Bipolar, wrote a book on anorexia and bulimia. She was diagnosed with depression - it didn’t help. Writing about her eating disorder didn’t really help either, because the disorder was covering up the root cause of her problem. She was a blazing drunk too - thankfully drinking has never been my schtick. Knowing what I do know about drugs and alcohol combined with Bipolar, I’m swearing off any amount of alcohol permanently. It’s plainly not worth the risk. Because of this, I don’t mind the label, as long as I can get the therapy and medication to help.
I feel terribly guilty about the people I’ve hurt. I feel bad for Mike for having married me. The divorce rates in people with Bipolar are DOUBLE the normal divorce rates, which hover around 50% as it is. It’s because we are a pain in the ass. But I’m also going to stop for a moment and commend myself for not having given in during the dark periods, for getting help when I desperately needed it. Reading the suicide rates scared the bejesus out of me. I’m strong, I guess, or my will to live and be healthy is stronger than my desire to erase myself. I made it through 38 years being treated for the wrong stuff, but I still made it, held jobs, got married, had children. If you met me on the street, you wouldn’t think I was crazy. You might even want to hang out with me, depending on the day. I’ve managed, somehow, with or without the eating disorder to numb it. In a strange way, I’m really proud of that.
It was a busy day today. It started when I forgot I had lined up the fabulous Mercedes to babysit for Lily (summer camp is closed today and tomorrow). She sat in my driveway for an hour while I ran errands with Lily. Ooops. This afternoon, I took my neighbor’s son with us to the Little Gym so he wouldn’t have to suffer through a long swim meet with the rest of his family. We returned home around 6, and I walked the sweet boy back to my neighbor’s house while Lily and Arden played in the driveway.
As I turned to walk back to my house, I heard gleeful shouting and two girls running straight for me.
First glance at Lily, I saw feathers. Then I saw bare skin. Then I saw a beak, wide open, and possibly a beady eye.
I saw Arden, clutching what looked to be a similar bunch of feathers, skin and beak.
Insert me, screaming and running toward them. In my head, a steady stream of thoughts: “OH MY GOD THEY HAVE FOUND DEAD ROTTING BIRDS THEIR HANDS ARE WRAPPED AROUND DEAD BIRDS DISEASE AVIAN FLU WAIT I DON’T KNOW WHAT AVIAN FLU IS OH MY GOD CRUSHED BIRD GUTS WILL BE ON MY CHILDREN I AM GOING TO VOMIT THOSE POOR BIRDS BIRD FLU BEAKS aghghahhahahahahhhh….” and so on.
Lily and Arden stopped short. Apparently some of those words came out of my mouth at a very loud decibel. Lily looked frightened. Arden dropped her bird and screamed, “I TOLD YOU NOT TO TOUCH THEM, LALLY!” (she calls her Lally when she’s irked or very happy)
Suddenly the bundle of skin and feathers moved, and Lily’s started to cheep. And the cheeping got louder. Then I realized we were being dive-bombed by the bird parents. Two parent birds that were super pissed their babies were being manhandled by unruly children. I started yelling, “Give me the birds!!! Where is the nest???” Arden’s bird was flapping around uselessly on the ground, and I was hoping the wings weren’t broken. Lily scooped up both into her hands and ran faster than I’ve ever seen her run back toward the Crape Myrtles that line the driveway. I helped her get the birds into the nest. The mom and dad birds were still dive-bombing and screeching at us, so we all ran into the garage.
As soon as we got into the garage, Arden burst into tears. Lily followed. They were both shrieking like someone had run over the dog in front of them. I’m sure the neighborhood thought someone had died. I am not sure I’ve ever seen them as upset as they were. They were both so scared, and I think because I yelled, they thought I was mad at them. I took them inside and tried to calm them down by telling them about the time, in Ann Arbor, I decided to take some robin’s eggs home with me to watch. I ended up killing all of them. Ooops again. I assured them the birds would be fine, that their mommy and daddy would feed them, and that I wasn’t mad. We then discussed never touching anything in nest and promptly washed hands for the next 20 minutes in hot water and Clorox bleach.
Mike came home in the midst of the screaming and helped me settle them down. I needed about 30 minutes before my heart rate dropped into the normal zone, and I will possibly need a large glass of something alcoholic tonight. Or a valium. Or both.
I did some reading on the fabulous ‘net back in 2000 when we had a baby bird fall out of a nest in our front yard. We watched the mom circle and make bird crying sounds until we couldn’t stand it, and picked up the bird so he could go back in the nest. I had always heard that if you touch a baby bird, the parents will abandon it. This is probably on par with some of the crap my family forwards me about men spraying you with cologne which is actually mace in parking lots so they can rob, then rape, then kill you - but I believed it. The ‘net said otherwise.
Still, I was very relieved when I checked on the babies tonight. They were both cuddled together, sleeping. I further traumatized them by sticking a camera into the center of the Crape and taking this picture:
I’ll be even more relieved when I see the parents feeding them.
