Winter in my soul

I've noticed one thing that's been happening over the last two years. My agoraphobia is getting  worse and worse. I can get out of my apartment one day a week, the rest- the other six days I am too afraid? fearful? anxious? to leave. It was never like this.

I haven't seen my psychiatrist in a month. I haven't seen the state worker since Thanksgiving. I'm overwhelmed. No energy. It's like a Zombie- I'm walking dead.

A well meaning family member begs me to go back on meds. I have scripts for Prozac and Abilify, drugs the doctor wants me to take. The doctor and my family want me to consider out patient therapy. Anything.

I know something's not right. Two days ago I made myself get dressed, and go to the supermarket because I needed kitty litter. I bought some food for me and lots of cat food for her, little cans of Fancy Feast. Milk, eggs, half and half, cheese, bread, coffee. Some pasta and sauce, a box of clementines. I treated myself to a hot dog at the Sonic across the street. As I was driving into my apartment complex, a well meaning neighbor stopped me for a chat.

"You never leave your apartment anymore", he said, solemnly to me.

"I'm too depressed to", I say, matter of factly.

"I get depressed too. I go out to the gym two hours a day and I feel better".

"I can't do that right now", I say with tears in my eyes. "It's not an option"

"Because you're overweight? Most of the people at the gym are overweight".

He doesn't understand. He wouldn't. I need help, dammit. I can't get out of bed. I will to do the most basic functions now. Use the toilet. Walk into the kitchen, feed the cat. Change the litter box. Crawl back to bed.

I can't cry anymore. I'm cried out. I've cried enough tears in the last month I could start the second Noah's flood. Now my eyes are so dry they are bothering me, I had to purchase eye drops for the first time in my life.

I've had depressions before. I've been noting the older I get, the more severe they have been getting. How I am not manic like I use to be. One day of hypomania, and a week of depression that's so bad it's like I am a walking corpse. A zombie, only instead of eating brains, I eat at the dreams I had, now broken.

I've had years of therapy. Most of my adult life- well- my entire adult life minus  two years. I know the tools I need. I just can't move. If the building was on fire- I wouldn't move. Only if the cat moved me to action would I try to save myself.

Cat. Silly girl, the only lifeline holding me up. Just a little 9 pound ball of fur and purr. And even then, I can't move. I will adjust my arm, so I can pet her blindly. I'll rub her and put my finger up to her purr box and listen. She deserves a better human than I.

A well meaning friend is telling me to start a blog about the cat. I don't have the energy. Another one is telling me to start writing a book- but my mind is blank. I've written 3 novels in my lifetime. I burnt two after spending years on them, simply because I thought they were no good. Kafka told his friend to burn his manuscripts. I made sure mine were burnt. I once told a therapist, it was like I had committed an abortion, burning those manuscripts.

It was more than just burning. It was the act of destroying something I loved. My dreams were all destroyed, I might as well finish them. As I write this, my body is taking care that my last dream is dying, as it happens to women in their 40s and 50s.

When I use to read tarot cards, I would see the reaction in people's eyes when the death card came out. No- I would say- it's not your death- it's a death of something, that will be reborn. It's a good thing. From Winter comes spring- flowers bloom and life starts up again.

I normally like Winter. This year it feels like it's in my viscera, my bones, my soul. I just don't think Spring will come. I'm hoping it will I don't like the alternative.

Guest Post: Understanding Through Reading 3 Must-Read Memoirs on Biopolar

As anyone who has suffered bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or other related disorders knows, it's more difficult to live with than other illnesses because it affects you and everyone you know. While chronic physical disorders don't necessarily change your behavior, chemical imbalances in the brain make it a daily struggle to maintain healthy relationships because behavior is unpredictable.   Your friends and family, try though they might, just don't understand. And this lack of understanding is precisely what causes these strains in interpersonal relationships in the first place.

Reading about those who have struggled with bipolar disorder is a helpful way of gaining a new understanding and perspective. Everyone has different ways of dealing with the disease, and it can be inspirational to find others who understand, and who can articulate their personal stories. Here are a few memoirs that are particularly noteworthy:

1. An Unquiet Mind: Memoirs of Moods and Madness by Kay Jameson

Kay Jameson is probably the leading researcher on bipolar disorder. As both a psychiatrist and a sufferer of bipolar disorder herself, Jameson offers insight into the illness that both personal and professional. Jameson, although critical of big pharma, does demonstrate how a combination of lowered medication and personal support saved her life. Best of all, Jameson clues us in on the latest advances in neuroscience that can offer new hope for an illness that has been misunderstood and misdiagnosed for centuries.

2. Just Like Someone Without Mental Illness Only More So: A Memoir by Mark Vonnegut

We all know Kurt Vonnegut, the eminent writer who gave us such classics as Cat's Cradle and Slaughter House Five. But what many don't know is that his son, Mark, struggled under his father's shadow with a debilitating bout of decades-long psychosis that was first diagnosed as schizophrenia but what he now considers bipolar disorder. In his latest volume, released this year, Vonnegut offers fascinating insight into his own struggles, as well as giving readers a more expansive perspective on mental illness in general.  With panache and humility, Vonnegut is adept at both writing humorously and inspirationally. In one of my favorite segments, Vonnegut states:

"None of us are entirely well, and none of us are irrevocably sick. At my best I have islands of being sick entirely. At my worst I had islands of being well. Except for a reluctance to give up on myself there isn't anything I can claim credit for that helped me recover from my breaks. Even that doesn't count. You either have or don't have a reluctance to give up on yourself. It helps a lot if others don't give up on you."

3. Manic: A Memoir by Terri Cheney

While Jameson's book is told from the perspective of a clinician, and Vonnegut's is told from both the perspective of a doctor and the son of a famous writer, Manic is written by a former entertainment lawyer. The most interesting part about Manic is that Cheney writes her book in short episodic segments that very accurately describe what it's like to cycle from the rapid highs to the soul-wrenching lows that characterize bipolar disorder. Cheney's account is not necessarily an uplifting one, but it's certainly describes the bipolar life with a candor that is hard to match.

These are just a few memoirs out there about individuals who have learned with varying degrees of success to live in the rollercoaster existence of bipolar. Even if they don't offer hope per se, they at least offer solace. Knowing you are not alone in your suffering can sometimes be more uplifting than anything. 

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Kitty Holman, who writes on the topics of nursing schools.  She welcomes your comments at her email Id: kitty.holman20@gmail.com.

***This is a guest post. The views and ideas expressed in this post are not necessarily the same as the author of this site. Please direct any comments or questions to the author of the post at kitty.holman20.gmail.com.

Write

I Gotta write or I really will die. Dust off the book and write til my hands bleed.  Make pitcher after pitcher of ice tea and write. Write until the Phoenix rises again. The fog is lifting. Americans lover second chances. I gotta write. If I don't now I won't get a second chance again. I did it when I got sober. I gotta do it now I cannot be this depressed for the last four years and continue without being worm bait too much longer. Only Time Will tell. Write. Write.


ETA: Don't you love the 80s and the old 80s videos?

Fragile

Gratitude. Dad came home from the hospital yesterday. We came so close to loosing him,  had things gone slightly worse by a few hours and they had to operate, we would have lost him for sure. Grateful he is still here, and that he watched baseball on TV today, and was almost able to yell at the umpire. Thank you all for the well wishes. It meant so much to me I don't know what to say. 

I feel fragile, like I am in mourning somehow, and my dear friend Mary is in mourning over a friend who died the same way... the world just seems to be going topsy turvy and is making no sense. Maybe it was always this way. There is so much I want to write and I cannot. I'm sterile. I have ideas, but they dry up after a paragraph or two. This has never happened before. It's like the egg gets fertilized but doesn't implant. Yet you feel like you were pregnant. Maybe in time I can pick up what I have been writing and finish it, but right now, it's unusable, unworkable. Dry. 

I'll remind you all I am on Twitter, trying to learn it, and would love to have people follow me. I just posted the following quote on writing on my Twitter feed which is "Going Through Hell". 

There's nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein." ~Walter Wellesley "Red" Smith

Why I Write- Re-Write

I don’t know why I write. Some people want to be doctors, some chefs, some astronauts. The only thing I have ever been good at is writing. It calms me, it embraces my soul, it makes me whole. Some think that racing cars, playing sports, is the be all to end all. But I cannot explain how I feel when I put a sentence on paper and it works. It’s better than food. It’s better than sex. It’s better than anything. The closest thing I can come to explaining is a great chef, who cooks a gourmet meal to see people smiling and enjoying and savouring every bite. Or an architect who sees the wonder in visitors eyes as they marvel at his buildings.

Emily Dickenson wrote “I write for myself and others”. I’ve always written for myself first, never been conscious of my audience. If I am happy with what I write that is paramount. If I touch someone else, that’s gravy. Gravy.

It hasn’t always been easy. I cannot spell for beans, so when I used an old typewriter, I had to write and re write. But something so romantic about hitting the little round buttons and putting a sheet of virginal white paper in between the roller, and then taking it out covered in type. Now I use a Macintosh, it’s the closest thing to the feel of an old typewriter. And I have use spell check, which is one of the greatest inventions to a writer since the fountain pen replaced a quill.

My life hasn’t been easy. Maybe eons ago my soul was asked for another round at life, to learn more lessons. This time it’s been hard, I have experienced the good and the bad. I’ve lived through things that would bring an ordinary person to their knees, but I am not ordinary. I’ve been blessed with an artist’s temperment and an unusual way to see the world, but I’ve also been cursed with Bipolar and all that implies. My relationships with people suffered, as I would rather be alone with my words and my books. Maybe that is why so many writers are drawn to felines. I am like a feline, independent, aloof, and a lover of all fine things and fish and foul. I can spend hours watching people go by me on the street, just as my cat can spend hours from her perch watching birds and squirrels go by.

In summary I would like to close with a poem by the late Raymond Carver. He was the subject of an aborted Masters Thesis, but this poem has stuck with me since I first read it, like a tattoo on my heart.


Gravy
Raymond Carver

No other word will do. For that's what it was.
Gravy.
Gravy, these past ten years.
Alive, sober, working, loving, and
being loved by a good woman. Eleven years
ago he was told he had six months to live
at the rate he was going. And he was going
nowhere but down. So he changed his ways
somehow. He quit drinking! And the rest?
After that it was all gravy, every minute
of it, up to and including when he was told about,
well, some things that were breaking down and
building up inside his head. "Don't weep for me,"
he said to his friends. "I'm a lucky man.
I've had ten years longer than I or anyone
expected. Pure Gravy. And don't forget it.

Angel In Blue- Repost

Ideally, you should feel safe in cyberspace. I know from watching too many episodes of Law and Order that this is not true.

You take precautions.

I admit the Myers Briggs had me down as an introvert. From a family of mostly extroverts. I admit my idea of a perfect Saturday afternoon would be to sit in front of a roaring fire, listing to music and reading, the cat at my feet asleep.

That would be hell to most of my family who like to move and stay active.

I know I isolate too much.

I know my writing habits are strange. I've been hearing that since my first creative writing course as a Freshman in College.

My ex, and almost every other writer I know, professional and amateur, set a time of day to write and that is when they write.

I cannot do that. I have to wait for the bolt of lightning to strike, and then I write. And write and write and write, for days on end straight, til my fingers bleed. And I write. Then I rest, go back to what I write and edit.

Consider me both Eliot and Pound.

My ex, would always tell people I was the better writer. But at home, in private he would yell at me I wasn't writing enough. Because I was sinking down into depression and with depression the darker it gets, the more vast the waste land it is, and I cannot write.

When I cannot write for more than a day or two, look out. Send the men with the white jackets.

When I first set up this blog, I was urged to do so by two of my dearest friends in the cybersphere. The email address that goes out to people is in my cat's name. No one knows my surname. Less than 5 people in cyberspace know who I am in real life.

It was supposed to serve as therapy, a kind of letting my soul go, a safe place for me. It isn't anymore.

The whole goal of this blog was to help other people understand what the hell goes on in a bipolar's mind.

My ex, a published and respected writer in the field himself, once told me, :"No one can get inside the bipolar mind like you do. What you write is difficult to read, impossible to put down and brilliant."

That seems to be the opinion of another friend of mine in real life who said almost the same thing on his blog back in January.

I write, I write. I don't know how to do much else. I am not that good with people. I would rather be alone than in a group. I feel uncomfortable with them, I feel like I have to be "on".

I know this also was a deal breaker in my marriage, the ex would tell me I am too much of a homebody. Like I said, when the lightning strikes......that is the way I am.

I wish I was disciplined. I'm not, much to the wrath of my Creative Writing teachers and other writers I have met and befriended.

"I would suffer like Van Gogh to paint like Van Gogh. I would not suffer like Van Gogh, however, to paint like Gaugin." said Kurt Vonnegut in a New York Times interview.

I believed that. I wrote like Van Gogh painted at the end, painting after painting in the last few days of his life alive, before he put the gun to his chest and pulled the trigger.

Much to the detriment of my family who loves me. Because I don't answer the phone when I am on a roll. I don't get dressed. I stop every hour or so to put fresh ice in my water, or use the toilet.

I don't want to be disturbed. I just want to write, damn it. Leave me alone. The world can go to hell, I will write and write and write. And when I am done, then and only then will I make time for you.

It may be selfish. It probably is, considering I quoted Ayn Rand yesterday and her views on selfishness as a virtue.

It might be selfish to wish I was able to live my life without meds. I know in my heart that 23 years of over 40 different psychiatric meds must have done a number to my brain. How could it not have? It would be ridiculous to assume any thing else.

Besides, As Neil Simon said in the play "The Odd Couple", "When you assume, you make an ass out of you and me".

I went back on an antidepressant around noon yesterday. This morning I woke up with a splitting headache, nausea and diarrhea. I cannot sleep, my brain is going too fast. But I am depressed at the same time. I never had mixed states until this year. I try to write, the ideas are flowing but the hands won't type. I have my notebook out to jot down ideas, and a tape recorder if I cannot hand write fast enough to keep the words flowing.

My brain feels like it's covered with cotton balls. I lay in bed last night , listening to the air conditioner spit out a cold blast every now and then, and tried to sleep. And the thoughts raced, even with a Klonepin. At 2 am I can barely hear the traffic there are no cars on the highway.

I tried to work on my novel but my brain is too tired. Instead, I vegged out on the couch, watching daytime TV, and making trips to the toilet.

I feel this in my heart right now.

"And the song that I was writing
is left undone
I don't know why I spend my time
Writing songs I can't believe
With words that tear and strain to rhyme"
(Paul Simon).

if my brain becomes lethargic, it won't write. I will try to discipline myself in the future, set aside a block of say , six hours a day and leave that to write. And if I only write a couple of sentences that day it's Ok. I have read enough books on the craft to know that is a verity with writers.

What do you do to a dream that is deferred? Let it die like a raisin in the sun???

What do you do if you cannot dream anymore? You don't feel safe anymore?


And she never had dreams
So they never came true
My fade away angel
Angel in blue
(J. Geils Band, 1981)

Lovely song. Dust off your vinyl records and listen to it. Really listen to it. It was supposed to be written about Faye Dunnaway, but it is so much like me it's scary.

Sometimes I feel like I can't even sing

Sometimes I feel like I can't even sing (say, say, the light)
I'm very scared for this world
I'm very scared for me (say, say, the light)
Eviscerate your memory
R.E.M

Why bother? Watching the evening news, i just don't understand. Tensions in the Middle East mounting, most likely a war next year. Every day another story of a mother or father murdering their children. Or a boyfriend murdering their girlfriend. Children in parts of the world, all parts going to bed hungry. Commercials on TV asking you to sponsor a hungry child. Another commercial for Polar Bears. Our Boys and Girls coming back from war and nothing there to help them once they arrive back here. People abusing animals.Tiger isn't a hero anymore. It's all too much.

My mother and I were watching the news and what made me even sadder than I was, was how she was talking about how almost everyone writes a book nowadays, what is the fine line between fiction and non fiction?

This brought up the discussion of my novel- I told my mother it is a NOVEL. I will send it out as a novel, even though most of it is true. Mom had just read a book about prison and she was upset about strip searching. I just looked at her and said, they do that at every hospital I have ever been at.

She looked at me and almost cried. No....

"Oh yes, and it 's the most horrible thing, evasive as hell. They do a body cavity search". She didn't believe me. I continued, "yes, they put you in a room with a nurse and another woman, they tell you to strip down to your bra and panties, then they remove the bra, one woman is checking out the bra to make sure there is no contraband sewn in, and the other one is checking your boobs to make sure there is no contraband there. Then they hand the bra back to you, you put it on, and they tell you to remove your panties and it's like having a gynecological exam, they stick a finger inside, and they check your rear end too." She got upset and said why?

Easy, I said. The second time I was at that hospital a girl OD'ed because she snuck sleeping pills up in her privates. They were finding the drug addicts were putting drugs up there or their rear ends.... And yes, it's humiliating, it's really humiliating. I am sure it's worse though for a guy.

Last night I dreamed of J- I had not dreamed pf him since he left over 3 years ago. I woke up in a cold dead sweat. I dreamed of Absinthe, something i have never had, but i feel like the girl in painting.

I want to sing again. i want to pick up my clarinet and wail hitting that high "F" in Tchaikovsky's 5th- and play jazz. Pick up a guitar with my surname on it- and play til my fingers bleed.

I want to be able to write, write write until my fingers bleed and my nails have all broken. I just don't know how to anymore. I have more ideas floating around in my head than I have in years, I just... I just.... I want to be great. It's all I got, it's my only dream. And I feel like I am that guy who gets to the Olympics, breaks his leg and comes in last with his father. I may be down and out, but I will cross the finish line. As he was dying, baseball great Tug McGraw signed a baseball for my father. "You Gotta Believe". I believe this. I will get my groove back. I just need patience, and that is something I have never had.

Headache back, plus book rejected

I woke up this morning about six am. The cat was crying for her nom-nom's. I fed her, watered her, cleaned out her box. I scritched her behind her ears, rubbed her backbone down to the tail, and gave her a kiss on top of her head. Then i took some ice tea out of the fridge and took my morning medicine. 600 mg of lithium, and 60 mg of Cymbalta. I took the glass of ice tea over to the computer, read a few emails, replied, and read a blog which made me cry, and responded to that. By that time, the meds were kicking in. My head was pounding, and I could barely make it to the bathroom in time to vomit all the tea I had just drank.

i went back to bed, put a cold compress over my forehead and eyes, put the radio on softly, and fell asleep. A couple hours later I hear the doorbell ring. it's about 9: 30. Big Fed-EX truck by my door. I open up door a crack, I am still in my lavender nightgown, and sign for a package. My heart sinks. I know what it is.

It's my two manuscripts I sent to the boyfriend/fiance of a relative who works for a major magazine. i wanted to get an honest opinion. Are they sell=able.

The note was kind, considering the circumstances. The first book, about a bipolar woman, was good and almost publishable, but people aren't interested in reading that type of book right now, with the book market in shambles.

The other one on Jack The Ripper was excellent, but very dark, and extremely graphic. You might want to lighten it up. (I m sorry, but the murder of Mary Kelly is GROSS).


Ok. Try again. Or maybe, i can re write the first book, the bipolar one, and make her a Vampire. Hell, all the Twilight fans would buy it!


For a blue Saturday, i leave you with a funny picture my Godmother emailed me yesterday. Enjoy!


How you know you are taking the Swine Flu too seriously....

Five hard questions you must answer to succeede

This came in the mail from Writer's Digest this evening.

For all of us who struggle daily with our writing and our muses.

1. Who are your favorite authors and why?

2. What do they do that grabs your attention and keeps you turning pages?

3. What keeps you coming back to your favorite genres?

4. What compels you to write fiction/ memoir/ poetry?

5. How will you make sure that your own work grabs and keeps your readers' attention every bit as well as your own favorites capture you?

My miracle-A memoir in madness-REPOST

I normally do like this time of year. Autumn sounds so much nicer than fall. Watching the leaves fall in my part of the country is the most beautiful gift that Mother Nature provides. All the magnificent hues of reds, yellows, and oranges. But the leaves soon fall off the trees, withering, dying, reminding us of our own mortality as we watch children playing in the leaf piles. I watch the squirrels scampering around in a last minute of food collecting before the winter arrives. It always makes me smile at their antics. And I must confess, I feel lucky to live in a town that has both black and gray squirrels.

But with the change of scenery brings sadness. This is not a depression, this is a sadness that is overwhelming. It permeates my entire body, through each pore, worming it's way into my soul. I take extra care to make sure I am doing well, watching it carefully so it does not transmogrify into something more overwhelming and sinister. It is hard. There are changes at work, and many of us feel our jobs are not as secure as they were prior to September 2001. Yet I manage to stay optimistic, I am fortunate enough that I have saved up enough money that I could live for a year frugally and write if I lost my job. Not that many people have that luxury. Or perhaps it is me; I have once been homeless, so I watch my money carefully with a sense of dread that it can happen again.


Despite the best measures, I found myself slipping towards depression around Thanksgiving. I do not know why, after all, my heart's desire has always been two things, one of them looks like it will happen next year. I have always wanted two things in life, one is to be a published writer. I have an agent. It may happen. I just need the discipline to make it happen. The other heart's desire will not happen. That is to be a "normal" person, with a family. And real manic depressives should not be with other people, since we drive them crazy, as our moods washing over us and changing as easily as turning on and off like a water faucet , as mutable as the tides. And perhaps that is where the depression came, from sadness. A writer, like all artists, tends to be a solitary introvert. I find when I write, and I get on a roll, I do not want to be bothered. I take the phone off the hook. I walk around in a t-shirt that covers down to my knees, and just write. As a person with bipolar disorder, I find the bests writing I do is when I am slightly depressed, just somewhat sad, as you would feel after seeing a movie like "Titanic". Or slightly manic, just ever so slightly just as a normal person would feel after 3 cups of coffee. In these moods I have the discipline to sit and write for hours with a glass of water or a Snapple by my side. But no, this is down and out depression. I see the warning signs. Two days without showering. Three days without washing my hair. Two days without brushing my teeth. I tend to hypersleep when I am depressed. I am now sleeping 12 or more hours a day. I cannot concentrate. I cry at the drop of a hat. I take such things like St. John's Wort. This does not work. I call my shrink. He suggests I come back in to go back on meds after being off them for about a year. With trepidation, I do. I don't like meds, I really don't. But I have decided if it is between meds or suicide, I will take the meds every time. Suicide is not an option. I had Lyme disease so my body chemistry now does not allow some of the more standard drugs anymore. He and I discuss what options there are. He feels I am not in danger to myself, or others, so hospitalization isn't an option. So it comes down to lithium or Depakote. I've been on and off lithium for years, I personally don't like Depakote because it makes me fat. So I leave his office with a script for that and start taking it.


My body does not adjust to it well. I go several days unable to sleep, unable to keep food down. I have nightmares. I am fortunate enough to have a good friend on the same coast who is a hypnotist, and he helps me through the drug induced nightmares. I find as the lithium enters my bloodstream to normal levels, I get suicidal. Very suicidal. I decide to do the unforgivable. I want to die. And being a Virgo, I have to organize it. I paid off all my bills, checked my 401K and my will, and made sure the cat was taken care of. This makes me feel good. It's a fail-safe in knowing that I can do this if I choose to.


Then one night it gets bad. Very bad. I wake up in a cold sweat. I try to get back to bed, and I cannot. I feel alone. I do not mind being alone, but this time I do. Maybe it's my hormones. I feel lonely. That is overwhelming. The sense of despair which has been my constant companion for the last few weeks is sitting besides me, it's arms wrapped tightly around me. I cannot breathe. I sense a panic attack coming on. And then it hits. The suicidal feeling washes all over me. I am not thinking clearly. All I know s I want to die now , right now and ease this pain. I feel like it's not going to get better And I want, no NEED to end it now, and fast.


For my own safety, I have no sharp knives in my apartment, or razors.( I do shave but it is with a safety razor). I have no toxic things in the house like Drano, for two reasons, my safety and the cat's. There is no place in the apartment to hang a noose, unless I feel like hanging a stuffed anial. And I am on the 2nd floor, so if I jump, all will happen is broken bones. I took care of myself when I found a dwelling place. But then an idea occurs to me. Perhaps it was because I was reminiscing on a quote from Tolstoy "Happy families are all alike". I live near the train station. Every hour a train goes from NYC to Washington DC. I can throw myself under the train. I get in my old green Ford, and drive to the train station. And just missed the last train, as luck would have it. I sit on the outside, on the cement ledge looking down on the train tracks, my feet swinging softly on the track, my feet making imaginary circles. I look at the train tracks and I know when I see the train coming, I just have to jump down, walk to the thrid rail and lie down. It shouldn't hurt too much, what ever pain there will be will be fleeting. I feel somewhat at peace, very calm, an emotion I haven't felt in a long long time. I am at peace, knowing in less than an hour, I will be one with universe and the stars. I will be anywhere but New Jersey.


It is an absolutely beautiful night, lots of stars in the sky, and a sliver of moon. the air is clear. I
find tears streaming down my cheeks. I do not know why. I do not feel alone anymore. I feel some presence near me. It's 3 am and there are no other people around - cept for a cop. There is indeed a a person next to me, a police officer. He sits down next to me, his badge and belt buckle shining in the moonlight.

"Are you Ok?", he asks.

"Yes"

'What are you doing by yourself at 2 am here? Are you drunk?"

I assure him I am not drunk. he moves my blonde hair off my face, to get a better look at me. I am surprised that such a big man can do this so quickly I don't feel him do it.


We both look at each other with a hint of recognition in our eyes.
We knew each other in college. He was in one of my Lit classes when I was a Teachers Assistant. He makes small talk with me, and realizes I am sitting on the curbside because I want to jump. And a miracle happens. He does not talk to me anymore, we both just hear each other breathing and stare at the beauty of the stars. I feel totally at peace. What seems to be an eternity later, I hear the train coming. I can see the light. I know the police officer's breathing is now coming harder, his adrenaline kicking in. He thinks, no he KNOWS I am going to jump. I look at him, his brown eyes staring deeply into my blue ones. I get up, he is breathing real hard, staring at me. And then I offer my hand to him.

"Can you walk me to my car, please?" I ask him as the train rolls by.

The smile he smiles would light the entire Vegas strip. "Sure", he says and it is over. I am safe, aI am alive, and in the end, that is all that matters.


The suicidal feeling still stays with me, it's still here, it's overwhelming. But I am not going to act on it. I won't jump. And that, strangely enough gives me comfort.




Copyright- 2002, 2007, 2008

Angel in Blue

Ideally, you should feel safe in cyberspace. I know from watching too many episodes of Law and Order that this is not true.

You take precautions.


I admit the Myers Briggs had me down as an introvert. From a family of mostly extroverts. I admit my idea of a perfect Saturday afternoon would be to sit in front of a roaring fire, listing to music and reading, the cat at my feet asleep.

That would be hell to most of my family who like to move and stay active.

I know I isolate too much.

I know my writing habits are strange. I've been hearing that since my first creative writing course as a Freshman in College.

My ex, and almost every other writer I know, professional and amateur, set a time of day to write and that is when they write.

I cannot do that. I have to wait for the bolt of lightning to strike, and then I write. And write and write and write, for days on end straight, til my fingers bleed. And I write. Then I rest, go back to what I write and edit.



Consider me both Eliot and Pound.

My ex, would always tell people I was the better writer. But at home, in private he would yell at me I wasn't writing enough. Because I was sinking down into depression and with depression the darker it gets, the more vast the waste land it is, and I cannot write.

When I cannot write for more than a day or two, look out. Send the men with the white jackets.


When I first set up this blog, I was urged to do so by two of my dearest friends in the cybersphere. The email address that goes out to people is in my cat's name. No one knows my surname. Less than 5 people in cyberspace know who I am in real life.

It was supposed to serve as therapy, a kind of letting my soul go, a safe place for me. It isn't anymore.

The whole goal of this blog was to help other people understand what the hell goes on in a bipolar's mind.

My ex, a published and respected writer in the field himself, once told me, :"No one can get inside the bipolar mind like you do. What you write is difficult to read, impossible to put down and brilliant."


That seems to be the opinion of another friend of mine in real life who said almost the same thing on his blog back in January.

I write, I write. I don't know how to do much else. I am not that good with people. I would rather be alone than in a group. I feel uncomfortable with them, I feel like I have to be "on".

I know this also was a deal breaker in my marriage, the ex would tell me I am too much of a homebody. Like I said, when the lightning strikes......that is the way I am.

I wish I was disciplined. I'm not, much to the wrath of my Creative Writing teachers and other writers I have met and befriended.

"I would suffer like Van Gogh to paint like Van Gogh. I would not suffer like Van Gogh, however, to paint like Gaugin." said Kurt Vonnegut in a New York Times interview.

I believed that. I wrote like Van Gogh painted at the end, painting after painting in the last few days of his life alive, before he put the gun to his chest and pulled the trigger.


Much to the detriment of my family who loves me. Because I don't answer the phone when I am on a roll. I don't get dressed. I stop every hour or so to put fresh ice in my water, or use the toilet.

I don't want to be disturbed. I just want to write, damn it. Leave me alone. The world can go to hell, I will write and write and write. And when I am done, then and only then will I make time for you.

It may be selfish. It probably is, considering I quoted Ayn Rand yesterday and her views on selfishness as a virtue.

It might be selfish to wish I was able to live my life without meds. I know in my heart that 23 years of over 30 different psychiatric meds must have done a number to my brain. How could it not have? It would be ridiculous to assume any thing else.

Besides, As Neil Simon said in the play "The Odd Couple", "When you assume, you make an ass out of you and me".

I went back on an antidepressant around noon yesterday. This morning I woke up with a splitting headache, nausea and diarrhea. I cannot sleep, my brain is going too fast. But I am depressed at the same time. I never had mixed states until this year. I try to write, the ideas are flowing but the hands won't type. I have my notebook out to jot down ideas, and a tape recorder if I cannot hand write fast enough to keep the words flowing.

My brain feels like it's covered with cotton balls. I lay in bed last night , listening to the air conditioner spit out a cold blast every now and then, and tried to sleep. And the thoughts raced, even with a Klonepin. At 2 am I can barely hear the traffic there are no cars on the highway.


I tried to work on my novel but my brain is too tired. Instead, I vegged out on the couch, watching daytime TV, and making trips to the toilet.

I feel this in my heart right now.

"And the song that I was writing/is left undone/I don't know why I spend my time/Writing songs I can't believe/With words that tear and strain to rhyme" (Paul Simon).

if my brain becomes lethargic, it won't write. I will try to discipline myself in the future, set aside a block of say , six hours a day and leave that to write. And if I only write a couple of sentences that day it's Ok. I have read enough books on the craft to know that is a verity with writers.

What do you do to a dream that is deferred? Let it die like a raisin in the sun???

What do you do if you cannot dream anymore? You don't feel safe anymore?


And she never had dreams
So they never came true
My fade away angel
Angel in blue
(J. Geils Band, 1981)

Lovely song. Dust off your vinyl records and listen to it. Really listen to it. It was supposed to be written about Faye Dunnaway, but it is so much like me it's scary.