Illness. Swollen glands, sore throat, running a fever. Deep muscle pain in certain areas. Scratchy cough. Chills and hot flashes. Weakness and labored breathing. Rapidly palpitating heart from walking up the stairs, which caused no such effect one week ago. Stubborn heart burn and upset stomach from the smallest, blandest of foods.
Mania. Irritability has set in and lashes out. Inability to concentrate with any background distraction. Difficulty finishing smallest tasks. Impulse shopping. Strong sex drive, set to \’repeat;\’ genitals are now sore. Confusion keeping simple tasks together, keep losing my car keys. Strong desire to scream at people for seemingly no reason; actually doing so on occasion. Impulsive behavior. Unfeeling statements and similarly rude treatment of other people. Racing thoughts, but a body that can\’t get itself to move.
Insomnia. After several weeks of not being able to stop sleeping due to the depression, that mood plateaued and then rolled over directly into mania. Now I\’m rapidly cycling between the two, but the manic symptoms are the strongest. The mind will not be quieted, even with copious sleeping aids. The body will not find a comfortable position and lie still. Night after night, I hypnotize myself into a lucid dream that I quickly break from once I realize it\’s not a dream, it\’s a nightmare, and there\’s nothing I can do to control the nightmarish factors. So I then lie awake, attempting to sleep. One hour, two hour, three hours and more every night, just trying to reach that recuperative slumber. Trying to prevent my drugged mind from driving me mad during those hours. Sleep will come, I tell myself, because it always does. Lately, it\’s been coming six hours later than it ought, which then leaves me about two hours of oft-waking rest, but that\’s better than nothing. A few hours keeps me sane(r), stops the mania from peaking. In the meantime, I use the insomnia to stare into the dark nothing of my bedroom and contemplate all the things I would have written if I had only got around to it.
Hypergraphia. Not writing the things I was dictating in my head when I should have, and continuing to not give in to the compulsion now, further intensifies the hypergraphia. My brain says, let it out — you must write! I compel you. But my mind, with which I can think for myself and debate the biochemistry impulses of my brain, I debate the compulsion. Getting up to write is giving in. It\’s not trying to sleep. I must learn to sleep without a great purge of writing beforehand. I must get rid of the ever-present inner narrative which encourages the compulsion. I must sleep instead. Writing gets me nowhere — gets me a sore back and shoulders and such. Sleep makes me feel better, refreshed. Writing makes me feel like I was a bottle filled through the neck, then the cork was popped and I was held upside down, finally emptying me, exhausting me and leaving me with nothing. But I will refill; I always end up refilling. And every night, I need sleep. It\’s an on-going war, with neither side a true victor, and neither side wholly worthy.
The air outside needs to clear. I feel like I\’m suffocating whenever I try to move around.
Yes, I indulged, I gave in, I wrote about nothing, let it pour out in all its manic, Ambien-crossed glory. And now my head is letting me rest, and sleep will come, however so briefly.
I need to start meeting the dawn in the morning, letting it fry my seasonal affective brain again. That\’s always helped in the past. Takes effort, though — being manic and allowing yourself to stay awake for 2 straight days to reset your body clock. Can be dangerous. Right now, I\’m feeling to lazy to bother. Wake me when it\’s noon and I have to head off to class.
