Trial

"I hate going through this again, starting all over..."
"What?" my mom asked.
"Separating the wheat from the chaff."


She knew what I meant. When I'm manic everything is a puzzle, a joke, a rebus, and I often think that people are teasing me in a conspiracy or providing insights about me, (for example, that I am pregnant) through a maze of allusions. I respond accordingly. Unfortunately in some ways, I am often coy about it and people are not attuned to it until I get way into the stratospheres of manic delusion, dangerous territory. Then I do things, act out in public, write things on social media, all kinds of "crazy" behavior" that has no grounding in that shared agreement that we call reality.

By the time I'm actually vocalizing the weird stuff, I am beyond not being o.k. I need a hospital. It's painful because I can't explain the social anxiety it produces to have harbored the crazy behavior and then have to look people in the eye. I am never sure whether to own this "alter ego", parts of her, or none of her. If my brain was lying to me and my faculties hijacked, how can I truly apologize? I do to some because it was some part of me that did that stuff, just one I can't control.

I have pride though, and I struggle not to get annoyed with people asking if I'm "o.k." I understand the intention, but how would you feel? My brain recently and publicly robbed me of my sanity. Time will provide comfort. Time and art. With restoring relationships, trust takes time. I have to restore myself before I can genuinely be available to people, not pasting a smile on a cardboard self as you must in the therapy-less hospital to be released.

This part is the trial- of my ability to pick myself up with my battle wounds and show kindness and understanding, first to myself. Then, frankly, I observe. Who won't care. Who will let it fall away. Sometimes things can't be fixed. And that's understandable too. Unfettering can be freedom. My impulse is true-- I'll see who helps me pick up when I'm ready and I already have an idea who those wonderful people are.

But first I have to be compassionate enough to myself: to forgive myself so I can accept the good intentions of others.