It’s long been documented that artists and the creative amongst our society are quite often as mad as a box of frogs. Well, by this I mean that they carry personality traits that are synonymous with certain categories of mental illness, a term that’s as harsh as it is broad.
I feel uneasy with carrying a label that an unsympathetic society has given me in order to appease itself or place me in a box marked ‘fruit cake’. I know myself better than anyone and prefer to think of being bipolar as a heightened level of awareness. Unfortunately this also brings a greater depth of emotion which swings from one extreme to the other, almost always born out of what’s going on around me more-so than things I can ever generate in my head. Behaviour breeds behaviour.
Does this mean that when I get anxious or stressed that I produce my best work? No, not at all. I can’t ever rate work as good or bad – I prefer to let you make up your own mind, otherwise I’m the one who’s labeling you by suggesting one work is better than another. No, I’m afraid my stress and anxiety manifests itself in chest pains, tingling fingers and migraines. Despite years of ECG’s and tests I am always led to the same conclusion – you feel physically shit because your mind is doing this to you. Sort one then sort the other. Oh, I wish it were that simple.
The great irony is that in the absence of worry I still worry, often about trivial and pathetic things. I hate feeling like my heart is about to explode out of my chest or that it’s about to stop working. The slightest rattle in my car makes me want to sell it or pisses me off or stresses me out. A misplaced word in a conversation is all it takes for me to spend the rest of the day in a desperate place.
The terrible paradox is that I completely understand how ridiculous my anxiety is and that it’s bonkers to do the worrying that I do yet I am powerless to stop it. I’ve tried everything but can’t stop the panic attacks. Two days later and I’ll be lucky if I’m beginning to come out of it. Embarrassingly it’s often the tiniest thing that triggers an episode.
However, taking all the negative health issues aside I wouldn’t change a thing. I’ve done the treatments and can never go back to being a faceless zombie. That’s not what my life is about. It’s about living else there’s no point. It’s about creating, else there’s no point. If I can’t be me I’m not interested anymore. I like me. I like the person I am becoming. I just hope my body lasts long enough for me to let my core sing. I’m really close to something amazing, I can feel it coming upon me like nothing I can explain. I know it will consume me and it’s going to be fantastic but I don’t know what it is. Weird I know but sometimes you just have to listen to the core. It always knows best.
With few exceptions, I love me but don’t really care for everyone else. Not personally or generally but for the potential of what they may do. Cynical it may be but it’s a form of self-preservation. Show me any Bi-Polar sufferer who hasn’t dreamt of being marooned on a desert island on their own? That’s our Utopian dream. Not because we hate people but because we could remove any reason to hate them.
Ok so now you can lecture me on hating people. Perhaps that’s a strong word to use, after all, life’s too short to bear grudges right? Of course it is. I’m just looking to minimize the risks to myself by keeping people at arms length – not because of them but because of me. I know what I’m like and I don’t want to become a monster because of someone else’s behaviours. It’s not fair to do that to anyone. I’m a difficult and irritating man. Fact.
I’ll just be a monster in my own head, it’s better that way. For the few that get close I love and value them. Those precious few are the difference between living and being alive.
Vive le difference!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone, which is great as I’m in bed writing this! Proper Bo!
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