Hello all you soulful words wizards, my normal routine of blogging posts are reserved for Wed and Fri weekly. Whatever I written over the course of Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday if it’s any good I hold over until the next go-round, however, today post is different in the since that I can’t hold back this nagging itch. Its safe to say that at the start of this AM I was utterly discourage and outraged. In other words, my empty bowl became filled with lemons in which case I turned into a homemade lemonade.

“Lemon juice makes all cocktails better”

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EMPTY BOWL

This week have seen many ups and downs. The low point is the constant shaking California ground the earthquakes are nerve racking. The high point is reading the answers of bloggers who participated in the 73 Questions challenge hosted by Rachel her blog is Yamte. Featuring fellow bloggers Vanessa thewellbeingblogger, Catherine shatterthesilence, Kristian lifelessonsfromaroundthedinnertable and of course me 73 Questions. Another high point this week is reading all the beautiful touching blogs one particular blog stood out Alone Versus Loneliness by Kevin his blog myunexpectedlife. The low point is me coming off from another episode. If you read my blog posted on Tuesday you know that I barely crawled out of the hole with my mind intact. As for the trigger that’s unknown. That statement alone is scary because if you don’t know what started this then how can you prevent it from happening again? Make since right? Stay with me I didn’t digress Kevin blog does play a role in all this.

“My bowl is empty and I don’t know why”

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Sometimes I feel like my life is one big bowl and right now my bowl is empty and I don’t know why. I have no motivation move forward. People seem to think they have a pulse on mental illness. Most people seem to mistake sadness for depression and therefore give messed up advice like “get over it” or “there’s nothing wrong with you” or my personal favorite “it’s all in you head” um yes it is all in my head it’s called BIPOLAR aka my Chum. Sometimes I feel like people say things to make someone struggling with mental illness or disorder worse for wear. I touched upon this yet again in Tuesday’s post Closed For Business. Mental illness or disorder comes with a uncertainty of not knowing what’s around the bend thus the empty bowl.

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BOWL FULL OF LEMONS

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday it’s Friday, the earth still shakes letting us know she’s alive and bigger than any of us. The aftershocks of motion ripples like rocks skipping over the water but nothing prepared for me for the aftershock of what to come. My bestie T-Dog called me actually she texted me Thursday then follow up with the phone call this AM. We had a brief and I mean a brief convo, shortly after my besties Cam Cam called doing his check in again had a brief convo my other besties the love of my life Nance called, in which voicemail will answer. As I stated I’m coming out of a episode I need to decompress no distractions so I turned on my do-not-disturb believe me it’s not that I don’t want to talk to anyone but any of you know all to well that when coming down from an episode it drains you energy takes a toll on your psyche and turns your body into mush. Early in the week a discussing was had about the different between loneliness and taking time off, in which a friend fellow blogger Katricia (simplykatricia.com) mentioned how she use to feel bad for wanting time to herself. That twitter thread inspired to simply turn off the world. A much needed break. Both the conversation with Katricia and Kevin post really got me to not feel bad for turning on that don’t not disturb button and enjoying some me time.

“Pausing to heal doesn’t mean you are giving up.”
“It means you need the time to heal.”

Coming into work something happened that changed everything. At lunch as I was sitting enjoying my Starbucks and the sunshine, a person comes and sits next to me. I know this person but not well enough because we don’t hang. We see each other in passing in the work space. We start to talk and he begins to tell me about his “symptoms” and wanted to know if I had any suggestions for him. The reasoning is because it’s a known fact that I struggle with bipolar disorder. I explained to him that it’s best to seek professional help. I don’t feel comfortable giving diagnosis and I’m not a licensed doctor. As I was telling him it’s not good to self diagnosis he looked at me disappointed walked away. This took me by surprise, I never encounter this type of dealing before. Being a bipolar I have an addictive and obsessive personality. I will spend the next 2 hours obsessing over something that is pretty much sour lemons.

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SOUR LEMONS

Speaking of sour lemons about 2 1/2 hours later I get a message with a link attached. The message asked do these symptoms sounds familiar because I think this is what I have what do you think? Again I politely tell him it’s not wise to self diagnosis. If you feel that something is wrong the best thing to do is contact your insurance company and seek help. They will direct you in the direction you need to go. The next message comes back with this brutal rant with a lot of anger and terrified rage. Now this behavior I am familiar with. It’s not the behavior or the words he tried to articulate, it’s the one word he used in describing me. He referred to me as “crazy”. I thought this is interesting concept a mentally unstable person calling a known bipolar person crazy. Then I thought damn it’s too late in the afternoon for this. I haven’t had my 2 o’clock espresso for him to come after me like this.

“When life gives you lemons use them to make Martini’s”

In that moment I seen myself in this guy. It brought me to tears. You never know what a person is going through until you walked a mile in their shoes. I am reminded of my favorite song Feel The Love Go by Franz Ferdinand in which the lyric goes “think of a friend and wish them love”. He was having a very public breakdown and everyone including myself was walking around him as if his breakdown was non-existing. I contact my doctor as for assistance. She being the best of the best spoke with him. Getting him to change medical groups so she can treat him and introduce him to a team of doctors that will help manage his mental illness. I told him because we work together the possibility of me going with him is no bueno but if he needed to talk I can do that. Also I got him a journal so he can start writing his thoughts down.

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SOUR GRAPES

I was told my actions was “noisey-ness” and was over stepped. In other words I was outta-of-bounds but really I don’t give 2500 rats asses because this person was in pain. Its funny no one walks away from a dog getting hit. No one walks away leaving a cat in the road to die or leave a cow drowning in freezing water. We shouldn’t walk away from someone who is in pain. You don’t have to have mental illness to have compassion or empathy for someone plight. In hindsight if the situation comes up again I would do it all over not changing one thing. Why have we become a society of disconnected people? We care for animals, the environment, objects like cars etc more than we do humans. It’s a question I keep asking myself time and time again. It only takes one act of kindness, one brave smile, one tightly hug to turn everything around. We only got one shot at this life why have lemons when you can lemonade.

For more reads in my Confessions of a Depressive Mind Series try these…..
Repair My Armor
Crying In The Shadows
My Beloved
My Big Brother
Big Lips
My Chum
Confessions of a Depressed Mind
Over The Hump
Something Interesting
Welcome to the Dance
In the Trenches
Diary of a Manic Depressive
Uncontrollable Chaos
Bite Your Lips
Chicken Soup for the Soul
The High Card
#likeoneanother
Closed for Business
Stranger Things

Until next time….