Category My Stories | Thrive With Bipolar Disorder

An Example of “Normal” Mania. Understand what an episode of mania is for people affected by bipolar disorder

in Ideas About Mania / Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories by Robin Mohilner May 25, 2011 0 comments

One of my goals is to normalize bipolar disorder by using myself as an example of what “normal” mania looks like.

Fifteen years ago, the mania I experienced fit the diagnosis of bipolar disorder perfectly to the extent that I was quoted by my psychiatrist to be used in some textbooks for higher education.

My experiences were normal for mania, not special or extraordinary at all.

Here I will share those experiences with the hope that it gives you the opportunity to feel normal and so you know that you are not alone.

Because this is educational, I will take apart and expose my experience of mania by:

Using the diagnostic criteria of the DSM IV (the guide book used to diagnose mental illness)
Type of Mania

Hypomania: mild mania that does affect functioning but one is still able to function

Full-Blown-Mania: severe mania that fully disrupts the ability to function and take care of yourself

My Hypomania

that grew into full-blown mania

Hypomania came into my life when I was fifteen years old and lasted for a few months until it peaked in full-blown mania shortly after I turned sixteen.

Diagnostic Criteria of Mania:

Mood that is elated, expansive, or irritable.

I was excited by EVERYTHING in life during my hypomania. The slightest idea felt brilliant to me and could lead me to several minutes of pure joy until the next brilliant idea.

Behavior: My energy was like taking the sun into a pitch black cave. It blinded people. People described me as bouncing off the walls. Yet this was pretty normal for me, so no one noticed that anything was wrong. At this time, I was not unusually irritable for a teenager.

Inflated self-esteem or grandiosity.

I felt truly important and special. However, I did not feel more important or more special than other people (human beings as a whole…I definitely felt more special than the people I didn’t like and those who were mean to me). I believed that I existed for a specific purpose chosen by God and that I am a prophet. Yet, I didn’t believe that I am any more chosen by God than anyone else, but during that time my energy and focus was on understanding God’s message.

I experienced Invincibility in the form of fearlessness. I did not believe I could fly and breathe under water or have any super powers, yet I did believe that I was a super human who was capable of using all of my potential and brain power and that those powers were far greater than what most people are aware and capable of.

During hypomania, the rules simply did not apply to me. It was NOT that I wanted to break the rules, I just felt so free from consequences to the point that I did not even consider the possibility of consequences in my actions.

Behavior: I was in high school…so I couldn’t do all that much with my belief that I was a prophet, I was only 15 when I had hypomania. So I did what any normal prophet would do…I led my people. I did not feel that my Chemistry teacher was effectively teaching his class so I led a walk-out and the entire class followed. I personally did not return to the class for two weeks until the principal and teacher met with me to discuss how he could improve as a teacher.

Not needing sleep. Unable to sleep.

I stayed up all night studying and decoding the bible and other religious texts throughout the world, as well as studying quantum physics. I believed I was uncovering messages from God on how to unite all people. When I wasn’t studying, I drew intricate spiritual drawings. When I was tired, I slept in school because it was so slow and boring. Yet at the time falling asleep in class was considered relatively normal for teenagers.

Pressure to talk. Unable to stop talking.

Yep, that was me. But it was not unusual for me at fifteen and sixteen.

Racing thoughts.

I had multiple thoughts traveling through my mind at once from an infinite number of perspectives. At times my thoughts would get jumbled and would be difficult to express. It was very difficult for me to focus in on one thought at a time.

Behavior: As a result, school was too slow. The world around me could not keep up with me and I felt very bored in school. Yet, at the same time I had more thoughts than I could express. I spent my time in school drawing these intricate drawings that integrated ancient spiritual symbols (that I did not even know I was using) because it was the only way to feel quiet in my mind and to focus all of my thoughts. In fact, my school work and exams were covered by this art.

Obsessed with a goal. Unable to stop goal directed activity.

Yes. I was secretly obsessed with being a prophet and put all of my energy into learning from God.

Excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have painful consequences. This is where hypomania and full-blown mania begin to blur.

My sex drive was through the roof and I had difficulty containing it. My values kept me from acting out my sexual impulses. To keep myself from having sex, I took up boxing.

Because I was so sexually excited and had no income, I used my sexuality to try to get things I could not afford, like a car.

I went to a car dealership convinced that that the dealer would want to give me a car because I was “Hot!”. It didn’t work, but I got him to drive home with me and try to convince my parents to buy me the car.

I was a brand new driver driving down surface streets at 80mph without even noticing it or without even feeling that I was going fast.

And I was just old enough to be dating. When I met a guy, I unloaded all of my emotional baggage on him on our first date, then was very hurt when he didn’t want to date me.

If I had had money, I would have spent it ALL. And then I would have gone into incredible debt. If the internet had existed, I would have stolen my parents credit cards and bought EVERYTHING. I was lucky that I was only 15-16 when mania came into my life.

Full-Blown Mania

I was not hospitalized because my mania peaked while my family was on vacation and there was no safe place at the time to contain me, other than jail…which was considered for my safety, but not the chosen option. Therefore, I experienced the full experience of mania.

I characterize full-blown mania by the severity of symptoms and the delusions I experienced. During full-blown mania I went from wanting to serve God to being violently angry. I was completely out of control both emotionally and physically. I went from being fearless to completely paranoid and delusional.

I should have been hospitalized. However, help did not arrive in my life until I had crashed deeply into a depression where I no longer felt alive because I could no longer think or feel anything.

What you are about to read is full of pain. I share this to give hope to others who have experienced mania. I want you to know that you are not bad or crazy.

Actions I took during full-blown mania:

I cursed at and told off the highway patrol man who gave my father a ticket for speeding.
From my vacation, I contacted every boy I had a phone number for in my high school (yet didn’t care about) and aggressively pursued having sex with them as soon as I returned home. I scared them so badly that not one boy took me up on it.
I got in a fist fight with my friend in my vacation home.
I threatened to beat up a child for splashing water on my friend.
Every emotion I ever had came exploding out of me uncontrollably.
I viciously attacked my mom verbally and physically with rage and hate. I was so angry at her. I wanted to hurt her. I wanted her to feel the pain that I felt. And I wanted her to help me.

Delusions (beliefs that could not be disproven by anyone while I was manic, yet they were not real) = Psychosis:

I believed I was to be the mother of the messiah and needed to be impregnated by my best friend.
I believed I was gang-raped by the kids in my junior high who emotionally hurt me.
I believed my mom was trying to hurt me, so I called the police on her. (This is how the police got involved and wanted to put me in jail for my safety.)
I believed I was locked in a room so I found a hammer and destroyed the door. It turns out that the door was not locked.
I believed I was responsible for my grandmother’s death and my mother’s cancer.

This is painful to share, no matter how many times I have shared it. Nonetheless, I share it because I am not alone in this experience. So many people have experienced this and I want them to know that they are not bad, wrong or crazy…they lost control to mania. This experience is normal for mania.

An Example of “Normal” Mania

in Ideas About Mania / Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories by Robin Mohilner May 25, 2011 4 comments

One of my goals is to normalize bipolar disorder by using myself as an example of what “normal” mania looks like.

Fifteen years ago, the mania I experienced fit the diagnosis of bipolar disorder perfectly to the extent that I was quoted by my psychiatrist to be used in some textbooks for higher education.

My experiences were normal for mania, not special or extraordinary at all.

Here I will share those experiences with the hope that it gives you the opportunity to feel normal and so you know that you are not alone.

Because this is educational, I will take apart and expose my experience of mania by:

Using the diagnostic criteria of the DSM IV (the guide book used to diagnose mental illness)
Type of Mania

Hypomania: mild mania that does affect functioning but one is still able to function

Full-Blown-Mania: severe mania that fully disrupts the ability to function and take care of yourself

My Hypomania

that grew into full-blown mania

Hypomania came into my life when I was fifteen years old and lasted for a few months until it peaked in full-blown mania shortly after I turned sixteen.

Diagnostic Criteria of Mania:

Mood that is elated, expansive, or irritable.

I was excited by EVERYTHING in life during my hypomania. The slightest idea felt brilliant to me and could lead me to several minutes of pure joy until the next brilliant idea.

Behavior: My energy was like taking the sun into a pitch black cave. It blinded people. People described me as bouncing off the walls. Yet this was pretty normal for me, so no one noticed that anything was wrong. At this time, I was not unusually irritable for a teenager.

Inflated self-esteem or grandiosity.

I felt truly important and special. However, I did not feel more important or more special than other people (human beings as a whole…I definitely felt more special than the people I didn’t like and those who were mean to me). I believed that I existed for a specific purpose chosen by God and that I am a prophet. Yet, I didn’t believe that I am any more chosen by God than anyone else, but during that time my energy and focus was on understanding God’s message.

I experienced Invincibility in the form of fearlessness. I did not believe I could fly and breathe under water or have any super powers, yet I did believe that I was a super human who was capable of using all of my potential and brain power and that those powers were far greater than what most people are aware and capable of.

During hypomania, the rules simply did not apply to me. It was NOT that I wanted to break the rules, I just felt so free from consequences to the point that I did not even consider the possibility of consequences in my actions.

Behavior: I was in high school…so I couldn’t do all that much with my belief that I was a prophet, I was only 15 when I had hypomania. So I did what any normal prophet would do…I led my people. I did not feel that my Chemistry teacher was effectively teaching his class so I led a walk-out and the entire class followed. I personally did not return to the class for two weeks until the principal and teacher met with me to discuss how he could improve as a teacher.

Not needing sleep. Unable to sleep.

I stayed up all night studying and decoding the bible and other religious texts throughout the world, as well as studying quantum physics. I believed I was uncovering messages from God on how to unite all people. When I wasn’t studying, I drew intricate spiritual drawings. When I was tired, I slept in school because it was so slow and boring. Yet at the time falling asleep in class was considered relatively normal for teenagers.

Pressure to talk. Unable to stop talking.

Yep, that was me. But it was not unusual for me at fifteen and sixteen.

Racing thoughts.

I had multiple thoughts traveling through my mind at once from an infinite number of perspectives. At times my thoughts would get jumbled and would be difficult to express. It was very difficult for me to focus in on one thought at a time.

Behavior: As a result, school was too slow. The world around me could not keep up with me and I felt very bored in school. Yet, at the same time I had more thoughts than I could express. I spent my time in school drawing these intricate drawings that integrated ancient spiritual symbols (that I did not even know I was using) because it was the only way to feel quiet in my mind and to focus all of my thoughts. In fact, my school work and exams were covered by this art.

Obsessed with a goal. Unable to stop goal directed activity.

Yes. I was secretly obsessed with being a prophet and put all of my energy into learning from God.

Excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have painful consequences. This is where hypomania and full-blown mania begin to blur.

My sex drive was through the roof and I had difficulty containing it. My values kept me from acting out my sexual impulses. To keep myself from having sex, I took up boxing.

Because I was so sexually excited and had no income, I used my sexuality to try to get things I could not afford, like a car.

I went to a car dealership convinced that that the dealer would want to give me a car because I was “Hot!”. It didn’t work, but I got him to drive home with me and try to convince my parents to buy me the car.

I was a brand new driver driving down surface streets at 80mph without even noticing it or without even feeling that I was going fast.

And I was just old enough to be dating. When I met a guy, I unloaded all of my emotional baggage on him on our first date, then was very hurt when he didn’t want to date me.

If I had had money, I would have spent it ALL. And then I would have gone into incredible debt. If the internet had existed, I would have stolen my parents credit cards and bought EVERYTHING. I was lucky that I was only 15-16 when mania came into my life.

Full-Blown Mania

I was not hospitalized because my mania peaked while my family was on vacation and there was no safe place at the time to contain me, other than jail…which was considered for my safety, but not the chosen option. Therefore, I experienced the full experience of mania.

I characterize full-blown mania by the severity of symptoms and the delusions I experienced. During full-blown mania I went from wanting to serve God to being violently angry. I was completely out of control both emotionally and physically. I went from being fearless to completely paranoid and delusional.

I should have been hospitalized. However, help did not arrive in my life until I had crashed deeply into a depression where I no longer felt alive because I could no longer think or feel anything.

What you are about to read is full of pain. I share this to give hope to others who have experienced mania. I want you to know that you are not bad or crazy.

Actions I took during full-blown mania:

I cursed at and told off the highway patrol man who gave my father a ticket for speeding.
From my vacation, I contacted every boy I had a phone number for in my high school (yet didn’t care about) and aggressively pursued having sex with them as soon as I returned home. I scared them so badly that not one boy took me up on it.
I got in a fist fight with my friend in my vacation home.
I threatened to beat up a child for splashing water on my friend.
Every emotion I ever had came exploding out of me uncontrollably.
I viciously attacked my mom verbally and physically with rage and hate. I was so angry at her. I wanted to hurt her. I wanted her to feel the pain that I felt. And I wanted her to help me.

Delusions (beliefs that could not be disproven by anyone while I was manic, yet they were not real) = Psychosis:

I believed I was to be the mother of the messiah and needed to be impregnated by my best friend.
I believed I was gang-raped by the kids in my junior high who emotionally hurt me.
I believed my mom was trying to hurt me, so I called the police on her. (This is how the police got involved and wanted to put me in jail for my safety.)
I believed I was locked in a room so I found a hammer and destroyed the door. It turns out that the door was not locked.
I believed I was responsible for my grandmother’s death and my mother’s cancer.

This is painful to share, no matter how many times I have shared it. Nonetheless, I share it because I am not alone in this experience. So many people have experienced this and I want them to know that they are not bad, wrong or crazy…they lost control to mania. This experience is normal for mania.

How to experience mania without it becoming a full on manic episode

in Actions / Daily Living / Ideas About Mania / My Stories by Robin Mohilner April 13, 2011 5 comments

This is a dangerous topic if misused that should be explored with caution and should not be attempted without the support and accessibility of psychiatric professionals.

By no means do I encourage any person living with bipolar disorder discontinue taking their medication or change their dosage in order to experience self-management (especially if you have not been medically treated and stable for several years). To suddenly discontinue medication has the potential to be life threatening.

However, it is important that people living with bipolar disorder (and those treating it) know that contained mania can be a gift in a person’s life and permit them to continue to feel like they have not lost themselves.

There are some psychiatrists who prescribe so much medication that the experience of genuine emotion is not possible for a person. I take a stand against over-medication.

I have been stable with bipolar disorder for fifteen years and am in the process of becoming a licensed psychotherapist, what follows is how I experience mania without it becoming a manic episode.

Step 1: The Trigger

You must know your triggers. You learn what they are by paying close attention to your episodes. Not all triggers will be able to be controlled and contained.

I have three types of triggers:

Stress: that I’ve broken down to be defined as anything that I don’t have the interpersonal resources or ability to handle at the moment. The lack of a plan of action.
Excitement: Stress with a specific goal, yet I still don’t know what I’m doing, but it is so much fun figuring out how I will reach the goal and having the burst of excited energy.
Urgency: When I feel the pressure to have or be something right now.

When either trigger combines with URGENCY that is a dangerous mania that I must contain as soon as possible. This form of mania could exacerbate rapidly into an out of control mania that could lead to full-blown mania if I am not paying attention.

The safest trigger for me hands down is EXCITEMENT. However, it’s a catch-22 because if I do not pay attention and respond carefully to the excitement, URGENCY will get involved and then I am in the danger zone.

My least favorite trigger is STRESS because I have no clear goal and no plan of action. I simply don’t know what I’m doing so I’m completely overwhelmed.

URGENCY is so dangerous because it causes us to ACT and those actions can change our lives permanently. URGENCY also causes us to lose control on every level and mania takes over.

I cannot stress this enough. The key is to pay attention. Keep an eye out for URGENCY.

Step 2: The Mania

I only allow myself to experience mania that comes from excitement. Any form of mania that comes with URGENCY is dangerous to me and must be contained right away (see below).

My Actions of Mania:

I think about, research or work on a project or goal for several hours straight (significantly beyond 9 hours a day). I become so obsessed on my goal that I can think about nothing else. Key: I am unable to stop thinking about my project or goal and I cannot stop working towards my goal. I am obsessed.

How do I know when I am in trouble:

I am not able to sleep. I stay up all night with both ruminating thoughts and new ideas. I sneak out of bed to do research or keep working. I do not disclose to people about what I’ve been doing all day because I don’t want them to know how obsessed I am.

How I keep URGENCY away:

Urgency is really hard to keep away. It has taken me years of practice. What it comes down to is throwing away the time-line for when my goal has to be achieved or the project I’m working on must be completed. It requires the will and ability to put down and put away what ever it is that I am working on.

It was very easy to write those sentences, but very difficult to do in real life. It takes me tremendous will power to prevent urgency.

Step 3: Containing Mania

I cannot say it enough how important learning how to pay attention is!

I allow myself usually only one day to experience mania because that is safest for me. In the past I allowed myself a week and I really paid for it. It took me months to recover and feel like myself again.

By giving myself only one day of mania, I notice that the recovery time only a few days and there are minimal consequences in my life.

Here is how I contain my mania:

I get support. I let everyone close to me in my life know that I am experiencing mania and ask for their support.
I give myself permission to experience mania from when I wake up in the morning (which is really early since I was probably up all night being obsessed) until 5pm.
I force myself to stop working on my goal in order to eat and shower. This is not always easy to do.
At 5pm, I have to completely remove myself from the situation. I disconnect myself from whatever it is that was fueling my mania…the excitement. I do not give myself access to what excites me. If I am not able to do it, I ask for help from my support system.
I eat dinner and usually with some form of prescribed sleeping aid, I take my lithium and go to sleep for about 10 hours. Otherwise, my mind will not stop thinking.

When I wake up in the morning, often it is as though a reset button has been pushed; however, the manic energy is still somewhat present, but in a weakened form.

With the remaining mania, I do not allow myself to even get close to working on the goal that triggered the mania. Instead, I put it to work in some other productive way (like cleaning etc).

I spend the day doing self-care practices that include both exercise and repetition because it has a calming effect on me.

I continue my self-care practices until I notice that I am no longer triggered and that the fuel that fed the mania has been consumed.

I continue working on my project or goal once the excitement of it has worn off and it becomes “work” again.

This is my story for how to experience mania without it becoming a full on manic episode. I hope this is useful to you.

Getting back on the horse

in Actions / Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories by Robin Mohilner October 15, 2010 1 comments

Wonderful people have expressed concern for me because when I stopped writing, I shared that I was going though difficult circumstances.

Those circumstances are not in my life anymore and I’m doing fine…so why am I not back in my routine?

I didn’t really have an answer for that. Until now….

Writing this blog is very important and incredibly special to me. But nothing I was doing was helping move in the direction to resume doing what’s so important to me. I had managed to get in my own way and couldn’t see it until now…I had a lot of excuses instead.

What I realize that what really kept me off my horse was this belief completely based on fear. The belief stole all inspiration and motivation from me. It set me up to fail and disappoint myself. The belief said, “After taking a long break from your routine, what you write needs to be profound…it needs to be brilliant…well, at least it has to better than anything else I’ve written thus far.”

The belief made me feel a sense of shame for not picking up my routine as soon as I was able to. It shamed me for not doing everything I can to be my best.

My response to the shame and pressure of this belief was to think, “Blog. What blog? oh, look at all that I’ve written. It’s like a book. Hmm…I’ll go watch TV now.”

In all my other writing, I simply did my best and hoped it was useful for my readers.

But this pressure put me between a rock and a hard place.

So I kept putting off these feelings until tomorrow. A month passed and I still had nothing to say that was better than anything else I’ve written and I got good at ignoring shame.

I woke up thinking differently today.

Today I said to myself, “Write something. It doesn’t even have to be good.”

Here are some ideas of how to get back on the horse:

Big Challenges:

We have to do something that we’re not doing right now in our lives.
We have to change.
Pressure to do it well or even better than before.
Hard work
Waking up earlier
Compromise or sacrifice
Lack of inspiration or motivation
Fear of failure or fear of success
Disappointing ourselves and/or others

Response to these challenges:

Do something.

Do anything.

It doesn’t even matter what you do.

It doesn’t even have to be good.

You just have to get back on the horse.

My invitation to everyone who reads this who is struggling with either starting or getting back into a routine is….DO SOMETHING…IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE GOOD, but it will get you on your horse.

People’s responses to how identity can be rebuilt after it crumbles away

in Actions / Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories by Robin Mohilner August 11, 2010 2 comments

So many people living with bipolar disorder have shared with me the pain of experiencing everything they know about themselves crumble away.

For some the crumbling happens in the experience of mania and depression. For others the loss of identity occurs when medication begins to work.

Here are some questions that revealed lessons learned from identity crumbling away. This is based on responses from people thriving with bipolar disorder:

What part(s) of yourself do you feel you lost?

“I no longer feel like myself. I see myself as a stranger.”

“I lost things that I knew that were true about myself. I am not who I believed myself to be.”

“My personality. My personality is different because of the medication. My personality is different because of mania. It is different because of depression. I don’t know what my personality is anymore.”

“My profession. I can’t do what I love to do.”

“I don’t think and feel the way I used to be able to think and feel.”

“My dignity and integrity.”

“I am afraid of myself.”

“Trust for myself.”

“I’m not the person people expect me to be anymore.”

“I hurt people. I now know how deeply I can hurt.”

How did you initially respond to losing these parts of your identity?

“I gave up. I didn’t have a reason to try.”

“I rejected the good things people said about me.”

“I was scared of myself and what I could be.”

“I was confused. I didn’t believe anything about myself was real.”

“I didn’t trust anyone, including myself.”

“I got angry. I felt powerless.”

“I didn’t want to be around anyone. I isolated myself.”

“I wanted off of medications. I didn’t want to be “better”, I wanted to be comfortable.”

What insight or experience did you have that changed your response to this loss?

“My psychiatrist shared with me everything that I wouldn’t be able to be in life. He listed all of the professions and roles I would never be able to have because he said that I can’t handle stress. He said I wouldn’t be able to go to college, shouldn’t have children, and will find romantic relationships to be very difficult for me…..My response to all of this in my mind was “F*** YOU! I’ll prove you wrong.” That experience completely changed me.” (This particular story is Robin Mohilner’s)

“I realized that I cared far more about what other people thought about me than caring about who I want to be. When I put effort into who I want to be, it changed my life.”

“My family believed in me. They trusted me when I couldn’t trust myself. They forgave me for the hurt I caused them. It gave me hope.”

“Just because my personality changed it doesn’t mean that my character changed. It doesn’t mean how I treat people changed. And just because I did some horrible things that I never thought were possible for me to do, it doesn’t erase all the years of good things about me.”

What helped you build your identity?

“I stopped trying to fit in and be like everyone else. It was very clear to me that I was not what people traditionally call “normal”. I couldn’t be normal no matter how hard I tried. So I gave myself permission to not have to be that way. I allowed myself to like myself anyways.”

“I tried to always do my best, to think my highest thoughts and separate drama from my feelings. Doing this gave me a place to stand.”

“Therapy. My relationship with my therapist helped me and challenged me to trust myself. I became aware of my own strengths, abilities, resources and limitations. I set reasonable goals and achieved them. That helped me begin to trust myself.”

“I educated myself. I did not rely on my doctors or professionals to know everything there is to know about bipolar disorder. I learned any and everything I could about bipolar disorder from as many places as possible.”

“I defined what bipolar disorder would be in my life. I chose for it to be a gift. I realized that it doesn’t have to define who I am, but it does affect me. I learned about what makes me vulnerable to an episode and it gave me a sense of power because this knowledge gave me control.”

“My belief system. I focused on exploring values and beliefs and choosing which ones fit me. It opened space for spirituality in my life.”

Bipolar Dating Bloopers: Stories About Disclosing Bipolar Disorder on Dates

in Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories / Relationships Effected By Bipolar Disorder by Robin Mohilner August 4, 2010 8 comments

I feel sorry for the boys I dated when I started dating.

I never outright said, “I’m bipolar, you don’t want to date me…do you?” (Hoping they’d say yes.) Nonetheless, this is what my actions said.

I remember the very first time I went on a first date….

Within the first 10 minutes I told him that I’m bipolar. Then I sat there and waited to see what he would say.

There was no second date.

What I came to realize is it is not that he didn’t like people who are living with bipolar disorder. He simply didn’t know me at all. He didn’t know what to say. He had no clue of what that meant and how it would affect him enjoying our time together.

Him not wanting a second date had nothing to do with who I am. It had everything to do with how I presented myself.

Online Dating…

I learned from normal dating that telling a guy in the first 10 minutes was a bad idea. So I wanted to protect myself from being rejected…I waited until I knew that I liked the guy.

Years ago, I decided to try online dating. I met this guy and told him nothing over the chatting on the internet…nothing over the phone…and let him get to know me on our dates. We had so much fun together. We had a lot in common (for people in their early twenties), we had similar backgrounds, interests, playfulness etc etc.

He really liked me. We were excited about each other. One night while sitting on the beach on our third date he shared with me that even though he talks about sex a lot that he’s really a virgin and shared his values, beliefs, hopes and dreams. I felt comfortable with him so I decided to share that I’m bipolar. I felt so at ease that I shared some of my stories and what I’ve overcome and my successes. We felt so connected and bonded after revealing these really important things. We were in fantasy land talking about our future.

The next date he told me that he does not want to see me anymore.

I was so hurt. I couldn’t understand. He seemed so happy about me sharing with him and he rejected me.

Later he told me that it wasn’t personal. He shared that his sister is living with severe bipolar disorder and that he didn’t want his children to go through that.

Even though it made sense…it hurt.

This changed how I did online dating….

I learned very quickly how painful it is to be vulnerable and have someone reject you. It was something I did not want to feel again and I was willing to do anything I could to prevent it.

Therefore, I got in the habit of telling guys on the phone before I even made a date with them.

The way I thought about it was that if we got to talking and liked each other that if I shared that I am bipolar and they still want to go out with me…then its safe…I won’t be rejected.

It was sort of effective dating.

I ended up dating other guys with bipolar disorder and other psychological disorders that didn’t bother me so much because I truly get it and I know how to respond to it; however, I wanted someone more emotionally grounded and stable than me. My choices and behavior wasn’t attracting that.

Dating While Manic

A number of years ago I experienced a self-controlled hypomanic episode and I thought I was out of the woods…but I was wrong. While still under the influence of mania I was really free, I met a guy online. My guards were completely down. I had no attachment to the outcome. I was completely free to say and do whatever I wanted. We hit it off on the phone. I shared with him that I was living with bipolar disorder before we met. I simply didn’t care how he responded. Without any effort on my part, he clearly saw that I was thriving and successful in how I live with bipolar disorder and wasn’t concerned at all.

On our very first date we had the “love at first sight” experience. We were in each others arms referring to each other as “soul mate” by the end of the first date.

By the second date, we were planning our lives together and talking about future marriage. We just knew that even though we didn’t know each other that we were meant to be together.

The following weekend he went on a camping trip with his friends and I was not invited.

While he was gone, I freaked out. I didn’t even know his last name. I panicked because the “relationship” was happening way too fast for me.

So I texted him sharing that I needed to slow down. I sent him probably 100 text messages while he was gone without him responding to even one. I was on an out of control emotional rollercoaster.

When I didn’t get a response from him I kept trying to correct or explain the previous message. I couldn’t control myself. I got angry and sad then rationalized my feelings all in texts to him. I just kept impulsively texting trying to explain myself. When he didn’t respond, I couldn’t stop rollercoastering and expressed every thought and feeling I had.

It turned out that he didn’t have phone service while he was camping.

He got all of my text messages at once.

When he got home, I received a text that said, “Never contact me again.”

I tried to explain myself, that it was mania. He didn’t care and wanted nothing to do with me.

Dating with bipolar disorder is really hard and can be very painful…but it is doable.

Building a loving, nurturing and healthy relationship is possible.

We will explore building relationships in another blog.

I invite you to share your dating stories and bloopers in the comments section.

Stories & Lessons Learned from “Coming Out” with Bipolar Disorder

in Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories / Relationships Effected By Bipolar Disorder by Robin Mohilner August 2, 2010 4 comments

Sharing with people that you are living with bipolar disorder can be a devastating and painful experience. However it can also be one that opens people’s eyes and is liberating for you. In this blog, I will share my own stories including the humor, the successes, and the times when it really hurt to share that I’m bipolar. The stories I’m sharing are about my first time ever revealing that I’m living with bipolar disorder, making friends, meeting new people, and the hardest….my dating stories. I will emphasize the lessons that I learned from each experience.

My First Time…

The first time I shared that I was living with bipolar disorder was in front of a high school summer school class of thirty students. I was forced to go to summer school weeks after being diagnosed because my family was really concerned with seeing me spend my days in a ball in the corner of the couch. After my first full-blown manic episode, I was in a depression so deep that I only knew I was alive because the spoon fogged up when it was near my nose. A teacher, who knew me as an enthusiastic bright student, saw that my head was down on the table since I started the class and I wasn’t participating at all. In front of the class he asked me, “What’s wrong, Robin?…Are you heart-broken?” My head felt like it weighed 50 pounds and was crazy glued to my desk. So I slowly lifted my face off of the table, leaving my head still on it, and in a tone that must have stated “don’t mess with me”…

I said, “No. I am crazy. I have bipolar disorder.”

I really don’t know how people responded to my lifeless expression. I can only imagine that it would really scare people to see me like that, especially knowing me and after seeing me manic. I’m pretty sure that rumors spread through school like wild-fire because everyone gave me space. My friends who were close to me before I was manic, disappeared…except for one. I felt like a ghost throughout the rest of high school. (Luckily, I was able to find support in a positive environment elsewhere.)

…What I Learned

It hurts. It really hurt to have people fear me.

That pain caused me to decide that I wanted to educate people about the experience of bipolar disorder.

From then on, I shared openly that I am living with bipolar disorder and worked hard at learning so that I could answer any question asked of me to the best of my ability.

Making Friends…

When I got back on my feet, I took off running in life. I didn’t have many friends. Nonetheless, I was determined to not only succeed in all the ways I was told I couldn’t…but also decided that I wanted good friendships.

My first day moving into the dorms at UC Berkeley was quite memorable for everyone on my floor…well, maybe even the building.

Everyone was nervous and uncomfortable about this huge change and new living situation. I came in, bouncing off the walls…so happily manic that it was contagious.

I welcomed everybody to my floor with a HUGE hug and smile. My enthusiasm, humor and spark brought almost everyone together laughing and playing. We all helped each other move in. People felt so comfortable in this very uncomfortable situation of moving in with strangers.

Then I led most of the people on my floor to each of the other dorm floors in our ten floor building and introduced ourselves to all the people in our building…practically going door to door. We were a tribe.

That same day, a group of us sat down in my room and I pointed out my behavior and shared with them that I’m living with bipolar disorder and was triggered into mania by the change etc.

There response was one of care and curiosity instead of judgment. They asked me questions about what its like to be bipolar and what I’ve overcome. I openly shared with them. Then they asked if there was anything they could do to help me…I told them that they were already doing it.

Everyone was so appreciative of my sharing that we all began sharing stories with each other of overcoming hardship. It resulted in the beginning of the closest friendships that I have had thus far.

…What I Learned

I learned that if I have confidence and inspire people that they won’t be afraid of me.

I was quite hypomanic and honest about it. It brought so much joy and freedom to other people without shame, judgment or fear. It tore down the traditional walls between people when they first meet. I inspired and empowered other people to connect with each other and share their lives openly.

I took the fear out of bipolar disorder for my friends. To this day, when my friends meet someone with bipolar disorder they treat them with so much acceptance, compassion and kindness. They have no fear and judgment because I destroyed the stigma.

Meeting New People…

I never walk up to anyone, shake their hand and say, “Hi I’m Bipolar.”….ANYMORE. When I was young, that was basically the first thing that came out of my mouth and then I “fire-hosed” people with everything I knew about bipolar disorder. Fire-hosing is like when someone asks for a glass of water, putting a fire-hose to their mouth instead. I did this because I was so proud of what I had achieved in my life. I had proven all the stigma wrong. I wanted everyone to know that what people believe about bipolar disorder is not true. I’m not as open and free when I meet brand new people as an adult. First I see if they show interest in me. I do this by genuinely being interested in them. I am naturally curious and want to hear stories and learn about people’s lives. If someone shows interest my profession, I share openly with them about what I do as being a therapist (but without going into my specialization…bipolar disorder). If they continue to be interested and want to know about my passion, then I confidently share with them my love of helping people who are living with bipolar disorder. I share that I have this tremendous passion and sense of duty because I too am living with bipolar disorder…. Then I invite them to ask me questions and I share my experience, listen to their awareness and understanding and answer their questions to the best of my ability.

…What I Learned

People only fear and judge people living with bipolar disorder when they don’t understand it. When people understand and have compassion for what they fear, the fear can no longer exist.

Dating…

Oy Vey! There is so much I could say about this that I’ll have to write about this in my next blog that will be up Wednesday….

In the comments section, I invite you to share your stories and bloopers of “coming out” with bipolar disorder.

Special for Moms: My Mother’s Story of Witnessing Me Experience Bipolar Disorder

in My Stories / Relationships Effected By Bipolar Disorder by Robin Mohilner July 17, 2010 3 comments

I wrote this with my mom to be useful particularly for moms who are struggling with acceptance for their child struggling with bipolar disorder.

My Mother’s Story

Witnessing my child experience Bipolar Disorder

Written By Robin Mohilner in collaboration with my Mother

I never saw Bipolar Disorder coming into my daughter’s life. I believed I was seeing adolescence finally kick in as she began to be more moody, distant, and stay up late. She had the typical problems with boys, friends, and the freedoms that come with turning sixteen.

“Bipolar Disorder? What’s that?”

Robin was such a happy child. She was a very good student. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t even rebellious. She never kept secrets from me. But in early adolescence she was wounded deeply by her peers and her relationship with her sister, watching me struggle with cancer, and her grandma’s death. She shut down and held everything in. There was nothing I could do to help her, except watch. We sent her to a therapist, but she impressed them with her self-awareness and maturity. She trusted no one with her pain.

I didn’t know that she wasn’t sleeping at night. Once in a while I’d hear something or see her light on, but it wasn’t a big deal to me because I had difficulty sleeping at night, too.

I once walked into her room and caught her with chemistry and physics books. I told her to go to sleep, but I was proud of her for studying. So I left her alone.

A while after the diagnosis, she showed me what she was doing at night. She showed me her teaching bible. She had strategically highlighted it in four colors. She said each color represented a different voice in the bible. Each color had several meanings. If I remember right, in one case blue was acceptance, pink was love, green was responsibility, and purple was forgiveness. I thought nothing of it. It turns out she was doing this with Buddhist texts, the Koran, the Tanakh, any religious texts she could get her hands on. It was then that she shared with me that while she was manic she believed she was a prophet and was to be the mother of the messiah. I’m glad I didn’t know that at the time because I would never have known how to respond.

One day, I looked through her school notebooks. She had taken notes and done work, yet the pages were covered with intricate and complex drawings that she had never drawn before. They were beautiful, yet strange. I didn’t want to comment on them since I felt it would hurt her. She said they help her focus in school for school was moving too slow. But I left it alone because she’s very bright and was doing well in school. Now I know that the work I saw was not school work at all. She was devising a plan to save the world. During that time period she wasn’t doing well in school at all. Her teachers thought something was wrong in her life and let her slide.

I did know how badly she wanted to have sex. I even offered to take her to a sex toy store to keep her from acting on her urges, perhaps I should have left it alone a little and let her explore online stores, such as lovegasm or similar. She openly talked about masturbation at the kitchen table. This was alien to our family. She spoke about porn and how she visited https://www.tubev.sex/. But I didn’t know she was calling all the boys she knew to try to have sex. It was interesting that they all turned her down. They were either scared of how straight forward she was, or knew something was wrong because that just wasn’t her.

I really started seeing the changes in my daughter when we went for a vacation. I was stuck in the car with her for nine hours. Right away I could see something was wrong. So I started a journal. She would go from so happy and fun, to attacking me verbally in the car, to crying about her pain. When we were pulled over for speeding, she yelled and cursed at the highway patrolman.

When we got to our destination, I was walking on eggshells. She reacted to everything I said or did with intense emotion – intense joy, intense pain, intense rage, and intense guilt. I knew my daughter was sensitive, but this was beyond any level of emotion I had ever seen her experience. Her mood changed within the blink of an eye.

I thought I knew her, but my child was a stranger to me and I didn’t like her. In fact, while she was manic, I couldn’t stand her. We’ve joked about this now. When she was manic I wanted to, as she puts it, “kick her ass”. I never laid my hands on her because I was afraid of her. She may have thought she was a prophet, but at times she acted like she was possessed by evil. I must admit, she did seem to possess certain super human qualities. But it is hard to see the good in the same behavior that is attacking you.

One of the best things that happened to us is that I accidentally hit her with the phone. In response, she called the police to report child abuse while I was at the market. When authorities arrived, I told them about what had been going on and they wanted to arrest her for her own safety. But they didn’t because the sheriff knew her and decided to keep her safe and isolated at home.

She calmed down, but then became more and more violent. She felt trapped and attacked a door with a hammer even though the door wasn’t locked. I was horrified by her behavior. She threatened to beat up a little boy for splashing water at her friend. She got into a fistfight with her friend who was with us. I must admit that I was rooting for the friend. She called her best guy friend and told him that they needed to have sex because she’d get pregnant and their child would be the messiah. She had visions of being raped earlier in her life. I didn’t know what to believe, but she needed help.

I’d had it. I’d written down everything I knew at the time.

So we drove for another nine hours being tortured by her until she fell asleep.

It felt as though she didn’t wake up from that sleep. When we arrived at home she was a different person. There was an absence of emotion. She could hardly move or communicate. She’d get this look in her eyes of terror. She knew something was wrong with her. Sometimes she’d mumble, “I’m crazy.”

When we had her diagnosed, she was unable to speak for herself. My journal told her story.

When I looked into Robin’s eyes, I did not see her. Her eyes were vacant. There was nothing I could do to help her but pray that the medications work and that they work fast.

The medications worked slowly. It was hard for me to be there for her after all the torture she put me through. But I found a way because I knew that everything I’d witnessed wasn’t really my daughter. I could clearly see the Bipolar Disorder. I was determined to be by her side and help her reclaim her life.

I can’t tell anyone how to be a mother of a person living with Bipolar Disorder. I know I wasn’t perfect. But I can say that your child needs to know that you accept them and that you see them for who they are, and not define them by the disorder.

Love Letter to Lithium

in My Stories by Robin Mohilner May 19, 2010 1 comments

Dear Lithium,

You saved my life.

I don’t know who I would be without you.

When you came into my life, I didn’t trust you. I thought you were trying to control me. I was so afraid that you would change my ability to think and be brilliant. I thought you would rob me of my creativity and ability to feel. I thought that if you were in my life, I couldn’t be me and I had no idea as to who I would be.

Something I’ve never told you is how angry I was with you. You took away the most beautiful experience I had ever had. With you I can never have it again. During my mania, before it got nasty and became the scariest experience of my life, I had unlimited power and was able to do anything. I truly believed I was a prophet. It was so easy for me to see my path and allow God to guide me. I had peace…true peace. And you made it so this will experience will never be possible again in this way. I forgive you. What you gave me is worth more than the godliness of mania.

I love you. I love you so much that the idea of not having you within me scares me.

You changed me and I accept that I need you in my life for as long as I can have you.

As I came to trust you and depend on you…you changed how I think and how I feel. You’ve slowed down my thoughts and untangled them so that I can understand and express them with ease. I’ve even gotten pretty good at thinking before I speak and really good at correcting myself after I make mistakes.

You didn’t change my ability to think like I feared you would. In fact, my creativity and imagination, and critical thinking have improved by the clarity you give me through my untangled thoughts. Unfortunately you didn’t improve all of my skills. My hands kind of shake because of you, but I forgive you for that.

I still have the abilities to pay attention, think critically and my memory is phenomenal. Well, most of my memory is phenomenal. It’s kind of funny when I find myself in the kitchen and I don’t know why. You’ve really turned my memory for simple tasks into a joke. And I forgive you.

You changed how I experience my emotions. I always had difficulty crying. Growing up I always needed to be strong. For 10 years on you I couldn’t cry, I couldn’t release my painful emotions, but then I got more of you in me and I can cry whenever I need to. It feels so incredible to cry. Don’t feel bad or guilty, you never kept me from having emotions, I had plenty of them, but with you I couldn’t release them until the last few years.

I don’t know if its good or bad, but I’m no longer as exuberant as I was when I had less of you in my body. When I had less of you I scared people with my energy. I’d walk into the room and people would be so overwhelmed by me and I never could understand why. I felt perfectly normal. But, normal for me was always being hypomanic. I looked happy, but too happy…so happy that no one ever believed I could be that happy which made me scary and weird. I can’t even say I was happy, I don’t think I was happy, but that energy was simply who I was. I’m me now! My energy is more channeled and contained but still full of passion, exuberance and warmth.

Lithium, this may be the greatest gift you’ve given me. Through out my life you have helped me reach my goals by doing your best to successfully prevent full-blown mania. I always had to do my part and you always had my back. Because of you I tackled life challenges and have the quality of life that I was told I would never be able to achieve. Because you did such a good job having my back, I was able to do my part and graduate from one of the world’s most prestigious universities, UC Berkeley and go on to get my Masters degree. I am now doing what I believe I am meant to be doing and trust I am living my purpose.

I love you lithium.

So what that you’ve given my psoriasis and I hate it.

I love you. You are a gift from God.

With All My Gratitude,

Robin Mohilner

The DO’s & DON’Ts for Responding to Trauma

in Actions / Ideas: Ways to Thrive / My Stories by Robin Mohilner May 12, 2010 0 comments

The message I hope you take home after reading this:

WHAT HAPPENS TO US IS NOT NEARLY AS IMPORTANT AS THE STORY WE TELL OURSELVES ABOUT IT.

IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO CREATE A NEW STORY.

It is believed that our response to trauma is an ignition for the inherited genes of Bipolar Disorder.

Earlier I shared with a Bipolar Disorder Awareness group that I had opened an old wound caused by trauma from my childhood these last few days. I’ve discovered that no matter how much I know, even though I’m a psychotherapist, that I’m human and get to live with wounds or holes that never fully heal and can’t be filled. So I’m doing my best to decorate my own wound/hole by giving it nurture and a home…instead of forcing it to not exist (which is so easy to want to do because wounds hurt.)

I share this because one common problem all human beings have is that starting at birth we are all completely vulnerable to trauma, we have no protection and nothing to defend us. So when we experience trauma it can easily leave a hole or a wound that doesn’t heal, but we’ll do anything we can, consciously or unconsciously, to heal. We may not even have the awareness of how vulnerable and how hurt we have been by life until we are adults.

At least this is my story because I did a lot of the DON’Ts I will share with you about trauma.

I was a child, like many others, who didn’t always get what I needed from my parents. My parents were great parents and did the best they could. They loved me with all they had to give, but there was no manual for raising children. Its so funny to me that we need a license for everything in life, but after childbirth, they let us walk out of the hospital if with a helpless child if you have a car seat.

For instance, my parents didn’t know that putting me in day care when I was three months old would be traumatic for me. They had no clue that it would be a loss for me that would leave a hole/wound that would affect me throughout times in my life. They did not know that deep down inside that trauma would make me feel that I am not wanted or that I am not wantable. If they had, they would not have done it, they might have found an alternative. Not every child who goes through this experience has this response, but I did.

In response to this trauma and a few others that came later, I told myself over and over again the “I’m not wantable story”. I made this story become true by choosing people to be in my life who weren’t available or ready to want me in the way I wanted them to. I used this as evidence to reinforce my “I’m not wantable story.”

Don’t do this to yourself! If you’re telling yourself this kind of story, STOP IT, RIGHT NOW! Tell yourself a new story and go find evidence to support it.

I say this because the stories I told myself made the hole bigger and my pain greater. I re-lived my own trauma over and over again. I didn’t tell anyone about it (except for my mom once when I was five). I kept it all bottled up inside until it exploded out in rage during mania. Deep down inside I was trying to find someone to want me so the wound would heal. But I never wanted the person who easily wanted me to want me. I wanted the person who didn’t want me YET or enough to really want me.

Unfortunately, all of my efforts for years were unproductive. Even when I earned someone’s “want” that I had to earn, it was never enough. It did not and would NOT heal the wound from my trauma. Even though I was wanted, they could not take me back in time and give me what I needed from my mom and dad when I was 3 months old.

So if you are stuck on this path of story telling, you can stop right now in your tracks and explore new responses and stories. You may need help to stop the story, but it is doable.

We do this often. We want to heal so badly. But this type of response to trauma, what I did, is not what heals. At least it never has for me. Instead, what I choose to invest my healing energy into is creating new stories to respond to the trauma and finding ways to live with holes and wounds that aren’t going to go away. Most of the time I’m not effected by wounds and holes that don’t go away, except when they hurt. That is why I nurture them and give them a home instead of trying to force them to not exist.

My genetic disposition and the flawed stories and types of response to various traumatic experiences in my life may be why I am living with bipolar disorder.

Before we can explore in more detail the mistakes I made with trauma, that so many other people make too. First we should understand what trauma is and how it works.

There are four parts to trauma:

1. The EXPERIENCE is deeply distressing or disturbing.

2. The EMOTIONAL RESPONSE to the experience.

3. What we do to MAKE MEANING of the emotional response. How we think about it.

4. How we ANTICIPATE our future based on how we responded.

DO’S & DON’Ts FOR RESPONDING TO TRAUMA

DO: Acknowledge you are experiencing or experienced something that was deeply disturbing or distressing for you.

DON’T: Bury trauma under the rug as though it never happened. Don’t put a smile on your face and make everyone around you feel good when you feel trauma or pain.

DO: Ask for help.

DON’T: Feel you need to be strong and hold it all in. You’re not supporting anyone else if you can’t support yourself. In that case, everyone falls down.

DO: Allow yourself to feel all the emotions the experience causes you to feel…and actually share them preferably with someone who you can receive support from or in a journal so it can contain your feelings and your body and mind don’t have to.

DON’T: Seal all the emotions in a jar…that’s asking for mania with exploding emotions, at least it did for me.

DO: Make meaning of the experience with a mindset, attitude and language that empowers you. For example, “I did the best I could with the resources that I had.” “I survived a….” “I overcame the loss of my job and found one that I like.” “I am living with bipolar disorder.” “I can do….” “I found my strength by….experience.” “I learned….lesson from this experience.” “I am a better person for experiencing….”

DON’T: Make meaning of the experience with a mindset and language that goes against yourself or weakens you. For example, “I could have or should have done better, but I’m not….” “I almost died in a car accident.” “I will never find a new job.” “I am (something negative that you don’t want to be).” “I can’t do anything.” “I’m just weak, stupid etc.” “The experience taught me nothing, I refuse to learn anything.” “I have nothing to offer.”

DO: Anticipate that because of this experience and everything you learned and gained from it you will and can do better in the future.

DON’T: Anticipate that because of this one experience you will never be good at anything, no one will love you and want you and you will always be alone etc etc etc (all the mean and nasty things we could say to go against ourselves.)

DO: Get professional help if your trauma is bigger than what you and/or your support system can handle.

DON’T: Waste your time by (excuse my language) bullshitting your therapist the way I did. If you don’t feel your therapist gets you and can help you. Fire them and get a new therapist.