Trigger Warning: suicide, self-harm
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I hate what mental illness does to my brain so much. Since I've been thirteen I've dealt with suicidal thoughts and self-harm. My bipolar began with a three-year depressive episode that started when I was ten, and I had my first manic episode very shortly after turning fourteen. I don't even remember anymore how old I was both times I attempted suicide. I'm sure if you're curious I mention the age I was somewhere in another blog entry. Right now my brain is fuzzy and I can't remember.
In the past three years, I've spent many a night crying and fighting the urge to act on swallowing a bottle of mouthwash, bleach, all my meds, or ending it with a beautiful scarf. I'm not suicidal right now. I haven't been for quite a while. But my mind, since I was thirteen, constantly makes note of the nearest sharp objects, and the nearest items I could kill myself on. I don't have to be suicidal, I don't have to be in an episode. I don't have to want to cut. My brain just automatically constantly notices these things. It's so second nature, it's not something I try to do. It just happens. It's constant and I hate it.
I've gone forty-one days without self-harm. I'm very proud of this. My mind is still on it all the time, though it gets easier to say no to the urges the longer I go without cutting. There are triggers everywhere. I feel like an addict, I think about it all the time. Sometimes the thoughts are unwanted, other times I crave it so much, but I know it's just not a good thing to do. It's a bad coping mechanism. So I fight it, I have to. I fight it constantly.
It's when I'm by alone that I cry, shake, and express how I really feel on the outside when I don't have to be strong for anyone, I can turn into the quivering and crying mess I am inside. I'm able to get in touch with my actual feelings and face them when I'm alone. When people are around I have to appear strong, I have to laugh, I have to try and look like I'm paying attention to what they're saying while in my head I'm drawing a box cutter slowly down my legs and beautiful red blood is spilling everywhere, sticky, warm, and gorgeous. It only makes the draw toward cutting worse knowing how low the chance is from bleeding out if you cut in the right areas, but it is hard to control sometimes once you start, so there lies the danger, as well as the danger of infection. That's not even mentioning unsightly scars.
This is the sixth day in a row I've been depressed, but these six days have felt more like six months. I can feel myself sliding downward, but I'm completely down yet. For it to qualify as a depressive episode in someone with bipolar, you need to have depression for two weeks. Hopefully, I can kick this before it turns into an episode. In general, I usually get hit with a depressive episode that starts sometime between September and November that usually goes away in March or April. By Thanksgiving, I'm usually fighting suicidal feelings. However, I still love Thanksgiving, though there have been two of the last ten years I stayed in bed nearly all day because I was so severely depressed I physically couldn't get out of bed. I've been feeling very anti-social, angry, and very irritable lately. My pain levels have been very high, and my fatigue horrible. That doesn't help my depression any.
I recently watched a B horror flick called Don't Kill It. (Spoilers following.) In it, a demon takes possession of people's bodies. When the demon takes possession, their eyes turn all black and they let out a guttural scream, before killing everyone in sight. In the end, instead of killing other people, one person gets possessed and while floating in the air, she throws back her head and lets loose the sounds of Hell, before the grenade she's holding explodes, and her body parts fly everywhere. I feel like I'm that last person. I don't feel possessed, rather I feel like if I don't keep a tight lid on everything I'm going to float up into the air, throw back my head, let loose the throaty, guttural, howls from the bowels of despair, and explode, with my body parts flying everywhere.
I feel like there's more to say, but I'll stop here.
.
.
.
.
.
.
I hate what mental illness does to my brain so much. Since I've been thirteen I've dealt with suicidal thoughts and self-harm. My bipolar began with a three-year depressive episode that started when I was ten, and I had my first manic episode very shortly after turning fourteen. I don't even remember anymore how old I was both times I attempted suicide. I'm sure if you're curious I mention the age I was somewhere in another blog entry. Right now my brain is fuzzy and I can't remember.
In the past three years, I've spent many a night crying and fighting the urge to act on swallowing a bottle of mouthwash, bleach, all my meds, or ending it with a beautiful scarf. I'm not suicidal right now. I haven't been for quite a while. But my mind, since I was thirteen, constantly makes note of the nearest sharp objects, and the nearest items I could kill myself on. I don't have to be suicidal, I don't have to be in an episode. I don't have to want to cut. My brain just automatically constantly notices these things. It's so second nature, it's not something I try to do. It just happens. It's constant and I hate it.
I've gone forty-one days without self-harm. I'm very proud of this. My mind is still on it all the time, though it gets easier to say no to the urges the longer I go without cutting. There are triggers everywhere. I feel like an addict, I think about it all the time. Sometimes the thoughts are unwanted, other times I crave it so much, but I know it's just not a good thing to do. It's a bad coping mechanism. So I fight it, I have to. I fight it constantly.
It's when I'm by alone that I cry, shake, and express how I really feel on the outside when I don't have to be strong for anyone, I can turn into the quivering and crying mess I am inside. I'm able to get in touch with my actual feelings and face them when I'm alone. When people are around I have to appear strong, I have to laugh, I have to try and look like I'm paying attention to what they're saying while in my head I'm drawing a box cutter slowly down my legs and beautiful red blood is spilling everywhere, sticky, warm, and gorgeous. It only makes the draw toward cutting worse knowing how low the chance is from bleeding out if you cut in the right areas, but it is hard to control sometimes once you start, so there lies the danger, as well as the danger of infection. That's not even mentioning unsightly scars.
This is the sixth day in a row I've been depressed, but these six days have felt more like six months. I can feel myself sliding downward, but I'm completely down yet. For it to qualify as a depressive episode in someone with bipolar, you need to have depression for two weeks. Hopefully, I can kick this before it turns into an episode. In general, I usually get hit with a depressive episode that starts sometime between September and November that usually goes away in March or April. By Thanksgiving, I'm usually fighting suicidal feelings. However, I still love Thanksgiving, though there have been two of the last ten years I stayed in bed nearly all day because I was so severely depressed I physically couldn't get out of bed. I've been feeling very anti-social, angry, and very irritable lately. My pain levels have been very high, and my fatigue horrible. That doesn't help my depression any.
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| From the movie Don't Kill It |
I feel like there's more to say, but I'll stop here.
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