thank you so much for this book!

... all these years I keep trying to document and prove that the things I see are real. observable reality. and your list of manic signs, the first one, made me feel so much better.  "phone rings and you already know who it is"  Not, I 'think I have ESP" but rather, I DO have ESP.  wow.   talk about feeling validated.  

does anyone know anything about using zyprexa 'as needed'?  drs seem to want to control things by 'maintainance' medications.   I know lithium can't be stopped and started like that.  for me it pretty much completely stops my feeling and ideas production. and blocks out God, and gives me a thick skin.  so it seems pretty useful -- to make it all stop. 

 my teeth are better, they were getting a weird horizontal line. I'm finally sweating again, a weird thing to be glad about but not ever sweating was pretty weird.  on a very small dose of zyprexa I drew from observation, blind contours of people, every day for a year. The drawings, they were kind of cold.  not terrible, but it's hard for me to look at them now.  nice to have discipline. it makes food taste fantastic.  It makes life so easy.  like a vacation.  

And I couldn't remember all the yrs of my life when I was in a different chemical soup. And there was no God. and I was bored. and I couldn't tell if I liked or didn't like any of the guys I started dating. a whole new me.  no feeling, no passion. 

I suspect it has helped me in a lasting way even though I don't take it all the time anymore. I seem to be more conscious of food. and more awake when I cook.  dont' burn pots anymore.  maybe even though they think you should always take it, it can help in a lasting way. to take it for a while. 

I could never have gotten off lithium if I didn't have zyprexa.  I tried 3 times in 20 yrs., disaster each time. Over the past 6 months I finally got off lithium.  it wasn't easy. and I couldnt' have done it without my team and my system and my maps.  

I was interested to see your maps, I didn't see any though.  you seem to be talking maps in an abstract metaphorical sense.  ?

I made maps.  identity maps.  of all the real people I know. and all the pieces of me inside and outside my head.  I posed questions and solved puzzles. I did a huge amount of work on myself.  and to figure out how to optimize myself. to figure out what I was supposed to be and what I was naturally good at, and do that. and what I was always going to be something of an amature  at, but what set me free, and do that too.  I made a map of my life. and then I figured out how the machine of me works. and what was broken. and then I worked on fixing those things. to whatever extent possible.  and some things I decided to leave alone.  

there are chronic, oozing festering sore type people who come into the retail store where I work. they are the old ladies with canes, who practically smack other ladies in line to be rung up.  then there are the handicapped, usually amazing, fantastic, warm and loving personalities, who are limited.  sometimes they even have a cool looking automatic chair.  

I decided I'd rather be limited.  and I need to stop being contagious, festering, and chronically miserable.  Yes, the illness is real. BUT I believe that people can grow and learn and master skills they once were terrible at. They can get it together.  They can stop trying to be someone or somethign they aren't supposed to be and be themselves.  and they can do a partial job of that. and of the healing. and of the resolving.  

I am the product of imperfect parenting. That is normal. My parents are serial divorcees.  That is very common these days.  Our whole generation is gender-roles confused.  I am not going to say it's all good. but I can use the bad, if only to learn from.  I can use the extreme, if only to see clearly what is going on.  the dynamics are so clear.   and then go back and do everything half assed. just get basic skills in all MY areas. and give back all the powers that are NOT mine.  just my powers and no one elses.  and do one thing at a time.  yeah, that's hard.

I may have been abused by a pedafile bio father as an infant.  My older brother tried to drown me for whining as a child.  my mother was depressive and cold and distant and then started karate and got really mean and angry and scarily pushy.  My father was so bright he was the star and the center and made himself so essential that I couldnt' do it without him.  and and, well, my parents are human too.  their imbalances more subtle than mine perhaps. but so much more dangerous to me. so hard to see. I didn't get out of the way.  I didn't fight back.  I held it in, and was good and nice. and eventually blew up.  and then I was in trouble and the trouble.  It couldnt' be this simple. heal the whiner, and limit the whining. and then the anger will be less and that power, that real strength, that energy, does not have to be shut off completely either.  oh, and I had to stop dating larger than life men. and circling around them. and I had to stop trying to be the type of person my mother could love, say, my brother.  I had to just be me. and of course, I have to figure out what that was first.  and that wasn't easy.

I am not my illness. and the illness is real. But it is not the way they describe it.  and I believe people can heal.  I know it. and God and love are essential parts of that process. and helping others.  and packaging. the surfaces are important too.  and cleaning, and other things we don't value or pay much for. essential.  to me anyway.  

and I believe people can heal. 

I once told someone 'it's not against the law to be manic". and then I read a discription of the 5010 hold they kept Britney on, and it says that all you have to do is be exhibiting DMV symptoms, and they can hold you, and medicate you, etc.  Maybe I misread.  But this rewriting of the diagnostic manual -- that's HUGE.  it's not just medical. it's LEGAL.  

maybe some small thing can be done.  large things, well they just seem manic.  I tried to save the world when Bush was bombing Iraq. and all I got was a month in a horrible hospital and worse emotional tramas and abuse than I have ever received in my childhood. My violent alcoholic boyfriends never physically injured me.  oh man.  Reading about your stories, it got me going a bit. I have to calm down.  

but hey, what about a very very small shift. and just inside me. I can start there.  this, for me, is huge. I don't join 'mad' groups.  I dont' compare notes with other bipolars. not much anyhow.  I don't try to help.  But if I can and I don't, then what?  

when I am depressed I am not helping. and when I'm helping I'm not depressed. it's that simple.  

I got this message.  It's 2009. It's time.  

I can't stay in the closet (arranging my shoe collection or 20 yrs of identity outfits), any more.  it's a fine large closet, used to house a murphy bed for someone.  Maybe I'm not ready. Maybe. but maybe I want to help. maybe I can help. maybe I can and maybe if I don't we will all be in lots more trouble. 

just a little thing. a small shift. a new direction.

I don't want to stick my neck out too far. be too friendly. get too personal. but this is just an anonymous forum.   

can the posts be deleted later???

 and by the way, I was on lithium for 20 years. half of my life. and I'm scared.  But I have tools. and I'm confident I have the basic skills now. the main broken areas aren't anymore.  did I say I'm scared?  reading some of the posts on line of people who say they're just rebelliously cold-turkeying on their meds, well that is really scary to me too.    This illness is real.  when I am trapped in my head, noone can hear me scream.  

not to leave it on such a dramatic note, but there it is. I'm not going to happy ending-ify this one today. I'm still in the middle.  I haven't proven they are wrong.  They say 'no one gets better, and I know that is wrong. I have. and I do. I work really hard and I use lots of resources and I AM so much better.  but it's not over.  I feel. and my life is just begun.

I have a great network of support, my team. and yet, they aren't that interested. in this puzzle. in this struggle.  maybe it would be nice to find some people I have this in common with.  i can just keep reading online too.  ...

thanks again for the book.  so lucky I found it.