Show Me All Your Scars by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781937163266
Publisher: Fourth Chapter Books
Published: 2016-07-17T06:00:00+00:00

Joyce O’Connor was a professional actress on Broadway, off-Broadway, and television in New York City when her son was diagnosed with autism. She holds an MFA in theater and has been involved in the Signature Theater since its inception. She lives in New York City with her husband and daughter and is currently completing a memoir of essays. Her son, Henry, works at the American Museum of Natural History, performs in community musical theater, has a girlfriend, and lives independently.

A Day in the Life with Bipolar Illness—and Nine Years Later

Madeline Strong Diehl

2006

Tuesday, 7:15 A.M.

“Mom, you promised you’d make me oatmeal today.”

I wake up to find Amelia, my eleven-year-old daughter, standing over my bed. Three alarm clocks strategically placed around my bedroom have been buzzing for fifteen minutes, and I have slept right through them. Amelia is staring at me with a look of guarded hope. But I can barely keep my eyes open because I am so heavily medicated and still only got two hours of sleep. Because I dread its side effects, I waited too long before finally taking trazodone, my sleep medication of last resort.

Trazodone takes no prisoners. I affectionately call it “the sledgehammer.” It will be hours before the trazodone and two other sleeping medications work their way out of my bloodstream enough for me to be fully conscious and functional. I’ll be lucky if I can wake up when Amelia comes home from school. But I am now on the third day of almost no sleep—a day that is pivotal to my battle to stay out of the hospital while my husband is away for two weeks on one of his frequent international business trips.

Amelia’s face falls before I even tell her; this has happened too many times. “I’m sorry, honey,” I say, and a lump forms in my throat. “I’ve got to sleep more, or I’ll get that mean, old crabby sickness again. Come up and give me a hug before you leave. And I’ll be wide awake and ready for fun things when you come home.”

“You’ll be here when I come home from school? You promise?” Amelia asks.

“I promise,” I say and add silently: God willing. Because I am currently suffering from mixed states and rapid cycling—some of the most difficult forms of bipolar to treat—I can go from giddy elation to deepest despair within a few hours and end up in the hospital with little or no warning. I can experience, within a day, a range and intensity of moods and emotions that most people do not experience over the course of their entire lives. Imagine scaling the slopes of Mt. Everest and achieving the sublime view from the summit, then, hours later, finding yourself plummeting headlong into the deepest, darkest part of the sea—without an oxygen tank. It is uncomfortable, to say the least. Not surprisingly, it can be fatal.

The fact that this illness can be deadly—in fact, very deadly—is little understood among the general public, but those of us who have it know the stakes are often high.

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