A strange state of mind

I had to take the past few days out which makes me feel SO angry with myself; I loathe being at the mercy of emotions. And once again I'm fearful that my brain & body are beginning to over-ride me. Imagine having a dictatorial stranger in your house & that you are completely at their mercy. This is bipolar. I am not my bipolar, but my bipolar is me.

From Sunday morning to midnight yesterday, I managed a total of five hours sleep so I've been feeling very disorientated & restless during the past few days. Last night, my brain finally submitted and allowed me to sleep so I feel better today.

Now that a quieter place has opened up, I'm going to see if I can't paint it out. I think the trick is not to analyse it but to gently acknowlege it & see if it will work through. And I shall also count my blessings, for I am fortunate & have many.

Namaste!

On friendship...

My sweet friend, Jean Yates, the Rock CHICk™ shared a lovely quote with me about friendship.

"Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What! You, too? Thought I was the only one."

At this point in my life, as I emerge out of a bipolar exile and meet up with old friends and exchange smiles with new ones, it seems entirely pertinent to share C.S. Lewis' fine words with you.

I also liked his quote about the soul; it's delightfully loud & proud! We are each of us so much more that can readily be perceived, but do we always remember that about each other?

Shine your light, dear Reader! And shine bright!

A fill in!

,

Something for you to colour in :-) You can find some more here!

I've just scrawled an entry all over Facebook which properly belongs over here. Here's a copy:

" Time for ‘the art of curiosity’. I’ve taken a deep breath and looked at my blog & website for the first time in an eon. Oh boy, do I have a lot of work to do! But have I the energy & determination to do it?

Thanks to bipolar blips, I’ve never been able to truly run with the concept of ‘the art of curiosity,’ but after this last big bad wolf of a bout, I feel an odd sensation of renewal & recovery this time. What could possibly have caused this change? I put it down to the humble pencil. By using my creativity to help do battle with the dragon, I feel as if I put more of myself into the fight this time & I think this self-knowledge may be the source of my more positive viewpoint today. Even on the worst days, when waking was a scream of anguish at my still having to live in my brain & immobile body, this time I managed to drive marks onto a pad of paper which I kept by my bed. Marks which looked like a scrawl to everyone else, but which were actually helping to anchor me.

I couldn’t have functioned without medication and the people who cared for me, but my pads & subsequent journals of marks allowed me to remain in contact with myself. Rather then being adrift in mire, these marks, which became more lucid & fluid when I had moments of feeling human, which ultimately calmed into meditative drawings and notations of what was around me, charted my days & I was able to see that not every hour was a heartrending scream. They helped me to start comforting myself and this simple act of being kind to myself kick-started something in my brain.

But enough! This is no place to bore you. This should be in a blog: henceforth meanderings about this, that, life, art & all manner of curiosities will – with luck – be contained once more in ‘the art of curiosity blog’.

I thank you! "

This blog needs..

more than a tidy up. I've got to dust it off, buff it up and then starting adding my favourite things to it. And if this last bipolar blight really has decided to let me be, perhaps I can truly start working & taking photos of the results again.

To be free.....that's my desire. And to sail again and let optimism fill the spinnaker. And if it works out, may be I can shake my boring, mummified website up too!!

My first task was to change the poem in 'Life's Candle' to Carol Ann Duffy's marvelous poem, 'Prayer'. Now I'm rummaging through the places that I visit when I'm feeling curious. This is down on the right hand side. I've got friends & marvelous places to add so if you're watching, I'm working on it.

New post...new life?

My computer went bang taking my life with it and as this coincided with a foul bipolar blip ( so much for medicated control!), I appear to have absented myself from life for a long, long time. Things have changed. I haven't made jewellery in an eon. Instead I draw, paint, make marks; trying to make art out of just looking. It's an absorbing way to live and a much better aid to recovery than just pills & therapy.

So here I am, taking baby steps along the road to recovery. Time to move on. Time to live again.

Moth Balled!

Could it be possible that I'm putting my obsession with assembling jewellery up in the loft alongside the Christmas decorations? I fear the answer is yes for I'm taking a sabbatical. I haven't gone totally mad & thrown in the pliers completely. After all I still need things to wear even though my jewellery caskets are overflowing - I hold this frivolous belief that you can never have too much jewellery!

So what am I going to do? Most importantly, we are home tutoring our son who has been shamefully neglected by his school. Alongside their disastrous handling of the bullying incidents, we have now discovered that the SEN department has lost his file, PDD diagnosis and all. For the past two years, no account has been taken of his condition & he has received none of the support which should have been available to him. His school should hang its head in shame - quite literally in my opinion!

I'm not neglecting my voyage in the good ship 'the art of curiosity...' though. Oh no! I'm casting my net in different directions to see what I can find. There are always more things for me to discover & play with.

Happy New Year!

May it be a time full of peace, good health & happiness!

Dipping a toe in the water!

This isn't a picture of a younger me - I was never cute. I was always too grimy to be cute.

BUT this is quite a sweetly appropriate photo as I'm dipping my toe in Blog Pond for the first time in eons. Look how shallow & safe the water is - it looks cool too! Water wings are handy if you're not sure what you're doing - I guess the bipolar equivalent is diazepam. Well it is for me ;-) I'm going to try paddling for a while until I can swim again.

What have I learnt about life recently? Grab what you can, when you can & whilst you're still able. I'm talking about opportunities. My experience of bipolar is that bad 'episodes' usually teach me something. This episode's homily could have taken the form of 'I wish I'd done such and such when I was younger", but instead it appears to be following the route of, 'whilst there is still breath in your body, try to grab what you can, when you can.' I somehow managed to get close to death a couple of times recently and I'm guessing that this is why Madame Bipolar is trying to proffer a whole life lesson.

As my son is still having problems with troubles, I've been teaching him a poem that I know off by heart. I know that you will know it too - I think everyone should have a copy of 'Still I Rise' by Maya Angelou lodged in their brains.

Ms Dangerfield is absent because...

1. Her brain is full of unwieldy thoughts.

2. Space monkeys sing jingles to her in the middle of the night.

3. She has decided to set herself free.

4. Her metaphysical house has blown down & she needs to reassemble it twig by twig.

No, I haven't lost the plot. I'm simply trying to learn how to live in a new way & part of this involves training myself to avoid being sidetracked by distractions.

Possibly this is something that many of us need to think about from time to time - what to do when our lives become simply too full of 'stuff'.

This stick person has peeled herself back to the bare bones as she is in need of restoration. It's a bit chilly at the moment :-)

The Bad Hair Day Code

I'm trying to climb back from a bipolar slump. I don't like to bore people with tales of what life is like if you're a bipolar babe - thankfully when one has spiralled down to the point of no return, one is usually too incapacitated to do anything other than pull the bedclothes ever tighter over one's head, so one couldn't write anything anyway! Sighs of relief all round :-) One can't keep people out of the loop completely though - my family & friends do need some explanation as to why I occasionally disappear from view.

We all develop different strategies of dealing with bipolar swings & mine are particularly irritating because I push people who are close to me away by being flippant & by denying that there's anything wrong. The crash comes & members of my close circle say gently that they did try to warn me - unfortunately I either didn't hear or I wasn't listening.

I'm also a difficult patient because I argue, joke & make light of things - I do my best to switch the focus away from me. I think I do this because I don't perceive myself as being a person - I am merely a thing with a series of human roles: wife, mother, daughter, listener, advocate, etc. Whatever was me was destroyed a long time ago. Please, please don't feel sorry for me - I only mention this for the purposes of illustration. I've never asked any fellow bipolar babe if they feel divorced from life in this way - it wouldn't surprise me if some of us feel that we can only participate in life from the sidelines. That's just the way it is for some of us.

Usually I refer to my bouts of depression as 'blips' & those that include suicide attempts as 'slumps'. I'm being dragged out of a slump this time & I'm fortunate that I'm being monitored via a daily visit from the wonderful health care team who are looking after me at present. Inspired by the hood-proof hair gel, I've now been allowed to add a new term to the monitoring lexicon - 'a bad hair day'. This covers days when one's concentration goes into hiding; when even the smallest things seem mountainous. The positive aspect is that one is at least trying to do something helpful because:

Razors pain you;

Rivers are damp;

Acids stain you;

And drugs cause cramp.

Guns aren’t lawful;

Nooses give;

Gas smells awful;

You might as well live.

Dorothy Parker

Sometimes it's essential to be frivolous. Being frivolous is not necessarily frivolous :-)

First Post of the Day

We all have blind spots. Whoops - there I go again making assumptions for which I can offer no evidence. Back in the days of educational yore, I would have been 'slapped down' for my posit. Please allow me to re-write my opening sentence.

In my experience, most of us have blind spots. I have one about the writers Thomas Keneally ( Schindler's Ark') & William Styron ( 'Sophie's Choice'). Sometimes I mix their work up but worst of all, I occasionally morph them into one writer!!

I'm telling you this because I've just been listening to Thomas Keneally being interviewed on 'Desert Island Discs'. ( BBC Radio 4 is one of our national treasures & it's quite literally in the background of my life because I listen to it all day, every day.) Aha, I thought, he'll talk about 'Darkness Visible'. It took about 30 seconds before the light dawned & I realised that, once again, I'd mixed them up.

'Darkness Visible' by William Styron & not Thomas Keneally is a window which looks into the experience of depression. I'm certain that I'm responsible for a fair sized slice of royalites because I buy a copy of this book, lend it to a friend & never see it back again. This is one of those books that I'm delighted to lend on a permanent basis. It's a bell that rings true - it's a bell that sings out loud.

My copy is packed away ( the bulk of my library is packed away whilst our house is being torn into shreds & as I live with a man who boasts that the only non-fiction book he's read is 'Lord of the Rings', I do get rather acerbic when I try to explain that, frankly yes, I do need to refer to such & such book) so I'm going to buy another copy because I want to read it again.

It's a joy to find a book that one can read over & over - one that will be a legend for the amount of copies which are borrowed on a permanent basis. Such a book is 'Just this Side of Normal - Glimpses into Life with Autism' by Elizabeth King Gerlach. It's wonderful - so pure & beautiful. I'm going to order at least 10 copies!

Elizabeth - thank you :-)

Alan Fletcher & 'The Art of Looking Sideways'

Today Ditsy Daisy would like to recommend two books by the graphic designer Alan Fletcher. 'The Art of Looking Sideways' has been my thousand page friend since I discovered it earlier this year & yesterday the substantial 'Picturing and Poeting' was delivered. How can I describe them? This article is helpful.

They're not to be looked at or read progressively - the idea is that you open them at any page you wish. They're rich with succulent ideas, images & inspiration. When I'm on an even keel I 'eat' books, but I lose this ability when I experience a blip. I'm particularly drawn to these volumes because it doesn't matter if your mind is in grasshopper mode - they keep up with you!

For the aforementioned reasons, I hereby declare that 'The Art of Looking Sideaways' & 'Picturing & Poeting' are Official Battle Books!

High Society!

Here in little England, the High Society season is well under way. Wimbledon's on the horizon & thus far, we've had the Chelsea Flower Show, Ladies' Day at Ascot, the opening of the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition & now Glastonbury, the newcomer to the list, is well underway.

At this point I need to sing - I'm no Amy Winehouse so cover your ears & read the lyrics instead:

'Mud! Mud! Glorious mud!
Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood.
So, follow me, follow, down to the hollow,
And there let us wallow in glorious mud.'

Google Glastonbury to see how well the new drainage system is coping ;-)

Glastonbury is the only one on the list that my Step-Grandmama would not have attended. Were she still alive, we'd be more likely to find her in Burlington House, the home of the Royal Academy. Join her ghost, be curious & pay a visit to the Summer Exhibition.

Can I beat agrophobia before 19th August when the exhibition closes? Not at a chance, so I'll try to work towards next year instead. I've been saying this for blah, blah years now, but one mustn't give up hope. When you have bipolar, anything can happen!

A short postscript to yesterday's entry. I'm working on a another 'Melanie' bracelet which features a set in beautiful shades of chocolate, chestnut & cream. What a treat!

Some Battle Books & why I use them.

An Elegant Wrist

Recently I've been asked about manic depression, endogenous depression and, for want of a better expression, crisis recognition. I'm an expert in only one area - me - so I will relate a little of my own story as well as a tale of the moment in which I saw a glimmer of light above me, even though I was at the bottom of a deep, cold & blasted hole. How can one be buffeted by ice cold, stormy winds whilst curled up against the brick & unyielding wall of your own personal pit? I don't know, but that's how it feels sometimes.

Some of you may feel that I shouldn't broadcast what I'm about to say, but I prefer to discuss it in the hope that my one voice will join the many who are now requesting that depression loses its stigma. So many people have themselves experienced depression, debilitating anxiety and other illnesses which bring on the dark night of the soul, but these conditions are viewed by many as guilty secrets. It is my belief that employers must reassess their response to mental illness - such a step would ease the lives of a vast number of people. In my opinion, such a move might also help to bring about an earlier recovery and possibly one that might endow the sufferer with greater resilience too.

So here we go. What is me? Why is me? What is wrong with me?

If you had asked me a year ago to describe myself, I would have said, 'mother, wife, daughter' and that would have been it. I did not know myself or recognise anything within myself. In my mind I was simply a series of roles and not a unified person. For a reason that I won't bore you with, I felt that I - my spirit - the essential me - had mentally died when I was 25. What remained was just a shell - a body - a thing. The professionals who have cared for me over the years haven't just marked me down as lacking self-esteem - they're fighting self-alienation.

During & after a conversation with one of the members of my CP Team last November, something began to change. I think I'm now beginning to 'read' myself & to recognise and identify some of the things about myself which may be useful tools to help me through the rest of my life. If it becomes a rewarding journey, so much the better. I would be happy if I could just say goodbye to the tortured thinking; if it also enables me to make the rest of my life a worthwhile experience, then I shall be blessed.

The CP guy I spoke to is really cool. He's down to earth, funny & full of common sense. He noticeably thought about what I said before asking further questions & he wasn't offended by my black sense of humour - in fact I think he enjoyed it. Sometimes he said that I flummoxed him. For instance, I asked him what was wrong with suicide - you can ask a vet to end your dog's suffering, but when a person wants to do the same for themselves, our society responds by declaring that they have lost their reason & sanity. He thought for a very long time before he smiled at me & said, 'You know, I don't know how to answer that one.'

He came to see me last November & I don't know why & I don't know how, but our conversation rapidly went 'off script' and we talked about a host of other things before he turned our discussion around to ask what I had wanted to do with my life before I hit an early & evil crisis that was unconnected with my troubled childhood. He listened to my answer. I had wanted to be an investigative journalist. It's my belief that most politicians don't themselves identify injustice - they're informed, but not insightful - whereas a writer can reveal & publicise an issue that needs to be addressed & confronted. This was the voice that I wanted to acquire - I didn't want power, but I did want to be a voice. Cool Guy asked why I wasn't doing this now. It took me a long time to confront the answer. I've lost my courage in myself. I have made it easy to hide from myself because I have appropriated blame & conferred it on to people & events that happened when I was younger. In other words, I am not using my early experiences to inform myself. Instead I am reinforcing the damage. By doing this, I avoid 'owning' my reaction to what has happened - instead I am caught up in the vortex of blame. But, as Cool Guy pointed out, this desire to hide & this lack of courage did not arise as a result of my childhood. I had actually emerged from my childhood with an ambition ( which is itself a measure of self-esteem) to write & report on what I had the courage to feel was wrong in the world. This could well have been a positive conduit. Suddenly I felt gripped - I felt that girl alive inside me. My childhood wasn't holding me back. I was not eternally cursed. Before my crisis, bad things had been stored inside me, but they had not overwhelmed me. They were not the trigger that caused my crisis though they did account for the unbearable flood that followed. Having been overwhelmed, I then became fearful & have remained so ever since. Cool Guy's suggestion was a simple one. 'Start with the girl', he said. 'Try to do what that girl would have done if she'd had the support that you have now when she met her crisis.'

That moment of feeling the vitality of the girl disappeared almost as quickly as it had appeared, but I recognised the taste of her freedom - she has reappeared on my horizon. I want to catch up with her. I can't go back & fulfil my earlier ambition, but once again, I WANT to do something of possible significance. I have to be careful though - I must tread carefully around bipolar. This is where the tool of creativity comes in. It's a mindful experience & it heals. I cannot change my thought processes without a lengthy period of careful work, but creativity is my balm & it also begins to feel like my future. If I don't manage to heal myself, I hope I will at least learn a method via which I can express my ideas & imagination. Either way, I hope to learn to be at peace with myself.

I need to scale the cliff faces of my DBT & CGT workbooks, but in these early stages, I am supplementing these tomes with my own researched list of 'Battle Books'. I should warn you that it's quite a long list and it's orientated to developing the life changing skills of mindfulness. It's been vetted by professionals so there's no quackery here.

The works of Nathaniel Branden

'Talking of Love on the Edge of a Precipice' by Boris Cyrulnik

'Fearless Creating: A Step by Step Guide to Starting & Completing Your Work of Art' by Eric Maisel

'Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils & Rewards of Artmaking' by David Bayles & Ted Orland

'The Van Gogh Blues: The Creative Person's Path Through Depression' by Eric Maisel

'Visual Journaling: Going Deeper Than Words' by Barbara Ganim & Susan Fox

The fun ones are:

'How to Make a Journal of Your Life' by Danny Price

'Visual Chronicles' by Linda Woods & Karen Dinino *

'Twyla Tharp's 'The Creative Habit; Learn It & Use it for Life'

Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain' by Betty Edwards - this book ostensibly teaches you about drawing but in my opinion, it's also a powerful course in mindfulness which is a key skill for people who suffer from stress, anxiety & depression.

'The Creative Licence: Giving Yourself the Licence to be The Artist You Really Are' by Danny Gregory. The latter's 'Everyday Matters' is a wonderful book too.

* To read more about Linda & Karen, head towards the 'Sisters on Sojourn' blog.

So there we are. A list of Battle Books that I thoroughly recommend.