Ray
My Life is Mine and I Value It

I am a 47 year old man with rapid-cycling bipolar disorder.  I am a professional engineer and teach math part time for the community college.  As a child I was chronically abused, physically and sexually by my older brother. I received permanent head and neck injuries.  If I told my parents, I was punished as severely as he was.  I learned to keep quiet.  That lesson may have helped or hurt me in my dealings with bipolar disorder.  I started rapid cycling when I was nine years old.  I was known as friendly and energetic, but moody.  Along with my mood instability I had what are now diagnosed as chronic complex migraines.  I believe there is likely a connection between the migraines and the bipolar disorder.

My first prescriptions, of antidepressants and stimulants for adult ADD, put me in drug rehab.  While I learned a lot in rehab, I also felt dirty and deficient.  I gained 70 pounds, lost substantial amounts of hair, had worse migraines, and developed a facial tic and a tremor.  Mood stabilizers slowed my cycling to a seven to ten day cycle.

Ultimately I rebelled and started discontinuing medications.  I was literally yelled at and scolded for 45 minutes by a Psychiatrist for this.  I am fortunate to be somewhat educated, taking organic chemistry, and biochemistry for fun while in grad school.  I started to become an informed patient, and found doctors who appreciated this.  I suggested a new medication that I had learned had few side effects. Everyone was strangely satisfied by my choice.

I have learned a lot more since then and have gone through a number of doctors, although I have retained my primary care physician.  I have kept track of my moods and headaches intermittently for years and have found that there is a very close correlation in me between migraines and bipolar switching. 

I am migraine-free one or two days a week, corresponding to my hypomanic phase.  The rest of the time I am plagued by various migraine combinations.  The only pain relief available to me is the endorphins from aerobic exercise.

Frustration has been a big part of life for me.  I have given up most elements of basic societal life.  I am pretty satisfied now if I can eat, drink, work, sleep, and ride my bike, and be sick less than four times a week.  I have pretty much had my fill of western medicine.  My primary care physician is willing to listen, but unable to help.  I have yet to wear out my welcome with my psychiatrist, and he tries hard to help.  Four neurologists and two neuro-opthamologists have given up on me, as have two allergists.  I suppose that should be depressing, but it is not. 

I am turning more and more to eastern medicine and philosophy, which have been very beneficial.  The reality is that I will probably always have chronic complex migraines.  My current mood medications conceal the moods and rapid cycling.  I have chronic low-grade depression, punctuated by days when I feel really good, but I can maintain control.

I hide my bipolar disorder the way I hid my childhood abuse.  No coworkers and few friends have figured out that I have it.  The effort in maintaining this front is substantial.  I guess I have learned that bipolar disorder will not kill me, and I won’t kill myself.  Working off of that base I have had to reformulate my belief and value structure.  I accept that I use up my vacation time as sick leave as fast as it accrues, so I have had three vacations in the past 17 years.  I am generally happy, at least I smile a lot. 

I wish I could have lived a life free of chronic pain, mood swings, and major depression.  But I am me and that isn’t.  My life is mine and I value it.  Bipolar disorder has forced me to learn many things that I never would have learned otherwise.  Some good can occur from anything; that is what I believe.