Raw Writing for the Real World of Bipolar

My father's mortality is looming and I'm close to slipping off the edge. He has a tumor the size of a grapefruit in his stomach that is pressing on his spleen and his intestines. It must be surgically removed tomorrow.

I've alternated between extreme sadness, worry and anxiety. I think I'm going to lose my father sooner than expected. I was so upset today that I had to take a Xanax. I tried to talk myself out my anxiety by giving myself speeches like 'you can do this' and 'I believe in you', but it just didn't work today.

The anxiety was stuck in my chest like a heavy roped knot. Part of the reason that I'm so anxious is that I can not be there for my father. He lives six hours away. We've had car trouble this week and I don't believe it's fixed yet. The temperature gauge is reading hot when we run the car. I don't think it'll make it to where I need to go.

Thank you for all the comments about my dad. It's comforting to know that there are friends I can count on.

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© 2009 Cristina Fender

Friendships ebb and fade, even if they don't involve substance abuse or mental illnesses like Bipolar Disorder. However, no amount of therapy saves me from thoughts of the inevitable wrong I do to my loved ones. I can’t erase any hurt I cause. Logically, I know time erodes away their hardest of hurts. If I call them and act as if we never spent time apart, then we might continue where we left off, right?

Sometimes it seems only strong people with infinite patience can stand a meaningful, long-term relationship with me. I always try my best. I even seek relationship advice and tips from those wiser than me, yet I still lose the most important people. I tell myself they cannot possibly put up with my "bipolar nonsense," and in my most depressed states, my brain insists that in the end, I neglect and hurt my loved ones.

People tell me I lavish attention on friends closest to me and then suddenly, carelessly dismiss them and any feelings they have. Perhaps if anyone else abandons them, that person doesn’t come across like a bad friend. But because they began to rely on me adamantly maintaining our friendship, the lack of my attention becomes hurtful. During periods of my Bipolar highs, instead of keeping these important social relationships, I'm at the mall buying thousands of dollars in clothes or new electronic gadgets. I just "disappear."And then when I eventually run out of money and all that excessive energy, I descend into an emotional place where I don't even have the energy to pick up the phone or send an email.

Then again, how self-centered of me to think that all my friends feel that way. Perhaps we drift apart naturally. Maybe my subconscious negative assumptions push them away, and I only imagine that my chaos ultimately causes our estrangement. How narcissistic to think that all these years later they consider me important enough to harbor any permanent ill will against. Conceivably, they merely tire of my “drama” and my overwhelming affection. Or simply one moves away, and the other one never calls the other back. I personally never feel regret if we drift apart, only shame that after all these years, I haven’t the guts to call and tell them how much I still love them.

In contrast to all that, the patience and understanding of the friends I keep (or fortunately rediscover) saves me from despair. They assure me that, unlike I assume, they never find my bipolar diagnosis a burden. Instead of thinking “what a complete psycho,” they consider me open, honest and one of their true and devoted friends. They trust me to never hold a grudge or purposefully hurt anyone. They know that 99% of the time, my bipolar disorder makes me consciously work harder to maintain my relationships. They tell me I enrich their lives, and time and distance cannot truly diminish the strength of our bond. And we can easily slip back into that wonderfully comfortable rhythm of friendship.

Laura Mae works as a graphic designer for her local library. She was finally diagnosed as bipolar at the age of 31. When she isn’t off in her private cave learning some kind of new art or useless skill, you can find her with her family or at a coffee shop listening to an iPod and surfing the internet. Contact her at her blog, Crazy is the New Sane.

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My dad lost a 1/3 of his total blood supply through blood in his stool. They put him in the hospital again. The VA doctor put in an order that my dad was to be looked at as a whole instead of just in parts. I can't even count how many times he's been in the hospital this year.

Yesterday they sent a scope down his throat to see where the blood was being lost from. They found a tumor in his stomach. While they were there they took a biopsy to see if it's malignant. It'll take a few days to find out whether or not it's cancerous.

I just hope that the doctors really do a complete diagnosis on him this time. I hope they do biopsies on the rest of his tumors, too, so they can get a whole picture of what's wrong with him. It seems like they just fix a part of him and send him on his way. Dad thinks he's fixed and he goes to work and does things that a sick man shouldn't be doing. Then he just ends up back in the hospital.

Normally I would be freaking out, but I'm doing okay. I'm just waiting to find out what's going on before I freak. Frankly, I think it's probable that it's cancerous. He has five other tumors in his body. They wouldn't be multiplying like that for nothing. I've resigned myself to the fact that my father is really sick and there's nothing I can do about it. I can't make it go away, even if I wanted to, which I do. All I can do is wait.


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© 2009 Cristina Fender