I used to have a lot to say when it came to mental illness. In the last year or so, I feel like I’ve talked the topic to death and now stay quiet whenever it comes up. So, when a friend invited me to write a post for this blog, I had no idea what I would actually say. What value could I add to a conversation with so many diverse voices? What unique perspective could I offer people that hasn’t already been said?

I’ve stared at this blank page for a long time. I’ve started maybe 12 articles and deleted just as many. I decided to write this and while I know it won’t be relatable for a lot of people, I’ll continue with the story for the same reason I’ve done so in the past: for the chance that someone who is going through the same thing will read it, and so they won’t feel as alone.

I was diagnosed as bipolar when I was 18 and have been on medication ever since. For those of you who don’t know, Bipolar disorder is the cycling between mania (a period of extremely elevated mood where the sufferer experiences rapid ideas, decreased need for sleep, and engage in ‘risky’ behaviour ((excessive spending, unprotected sex, drug use))) and depression (like a Dementor is near). I have type II, so I cycle between hypomania (lesser form of mania, a period of elevated mood in which productivity is heightened and I feel invincible) and depression. As well, for those of you who don’t know, switching or starting medication is something akin to throwing a basketball backwards at the net and hoping it gets in.

Brain chemistry is complex and weird and different medications work differently for each person who takes them.

I didn’t realize how much medications can affect you until this last month. I’ve been on antipsychotics and antidepressants and benzodiazepines and amphetamines and anticonvulsants and blood thinners (because for some reason a few work on ADHD as well). I’ve been given medications and told “we don’t know why this works, but it does, so here, try it” more times than I can count and side effect lists read like a bad poem to me now.

Emotional stability seems like one of those dreams where I’m running after something but with each step I take it moves one step away. It’s come to the point where I don’t really know what normal means and I certainly don’t remember what its feels like.

And it’s got me thinking: who am I?

I know it sounds like a stupid question asked on the first day of an intro to philosophy course. But in my 21 years I can, for the first time, with certainty, admit that I have absolutely no idea. I started medication when I was 16 and before that my personality was still developing. I was moody and idealistic and I thought I had a firm grasp of who I was and what I wanted, but lo and behold, I had no idea that my interests and likes would rapidly change throughout university.

When I was 18 I started noticing that sometimes I would be happy and elevated with tons of energy, while other times I would be the absolute opposite. I would be alone in my room for days, ghosting my friends and sleeping for more time than I spent awake.

I went to the doctor after my first terrible depressive episode. I remember it so vividly, I was feeling very down and tagged along with my sister to the local mall because nothing made me feel quite like a new pair of shoes did. However, as I walked I struggled to keep up with my sister and eventually had to rest on a bench while she continued. I found my way to the pet store and it was then that suddenly what little energy I had left was gone and I had to sit on the ground beside the bunny cage. I called my mum, told her she had to come get me, and ignored the looks I was getting from the staff.

From that point on I became bedridden. Meals were brought to me and my limbs felt like they had weights tied to them. Moving was hard and sleep was easy. So that’s what I did a lot of. I remember when I woke up feeling like I’d been hit with a train, my first thought was always “How do people do this all the time?”

The only thing that kept me going was the knowledge that in two weeks, or whatever, a switch would be flipped and I would be up reorganizing the house, painting walls, making things, and talking off the ears of whoever I could find. It was temporary. It would go away. I was put on medication shortly after and I became a semblance of normal. That lasted for a few years, and unforeseen circumstances caused me to switch meds. In short, the meds I’ve been on have failed. They’re not working and I’ve got an appointment this week to up the dose.

I know they haven’t worked because two days ago I was up at 5 am rolling and sorting the laces I have (I like to sew) according to colour and length. I did 60 meters. I slept a combined total of 6 hours over the course of 3 days and I didn’t notice. Today I woke up and I felt a feeling that had become strange to me. I’ve been in bed for the last 6 hours and the only time I moved was to reach a saltine cracker box at my bedside table. Two days ago, I loved being around people. I felt happiness from the top of my head to the soles of my feet and I radiated optimism. I felt good. I accomplished a lot. I did several days’ worth of work in a few hours.

Today I felt the opposite. I could barely think of anything besides how the heaviness in my limbs and the despair I felt in my soul echoed in every step and reverberated in every breath I took.

Among that, the thought of who I was lingered unanswered. I barely remember what it was like pre-meds, and during my time on the medications, how much of what I was genuine and which was a side effect? Was the irritability and the fatigue a part of who I am or was it an ugly side effect? Was the creative energy and the positivity I felt genuine? Or was it something the medication didn’t filter out? What do you do if you can’t trust your own thoughts because they change like I do when I can’t decide what to wear before I go out?

When you take a medication for your asthma, your headache, your motion sickness, you’re still you. When you take something that alters your personality, you really don’t know anymore. A lot of people associate their mental illnesses with who they are because it’s so deeply ingrained in their thoughts, or that it’s been there for so long that you can’t imagine your life without it. It gets hard to separate the disease from the person, and even harder to tell where that line can be drawn. And when you take medication to treat the illness, what if you think the illness is a part of you?

My illness is my personality. With it, I don’t have likes and dislikes. Everything I do is determined by whichever extreme I’m poorly handling. Right now, I don’t know where I am under it all, if there’s even any of me there. Maybe my best and worst traits have been divided into two, and I cycle through them in overdrive. Maybe I fall somewhere in between the two extremes. The only concrete thing I’ve got is that I’m making the choice to take medication with the hopes of treating it. That’s where I am underneath all of it. I want to be better. I want to be healthy. I know that maybe this isn’t the easiest thing to relate to.

Not a lot of people will be stuck going from med to med with the hope of coming out normal at the end of it. Actually, maybe I’m wrong, and maybe more people will experience this than I think. If you are experiencing this right now, I want you to know that I know it’s scary to lose yourself. But I also want you to know that if you hold on, it won’t be like a dream where you’re running to reach the end of the tunnel but the tunnel keeps getting longer. If you keep running, you’re going to come out on the other side better and stronger. And it doesn’t matter how fast you go, it doesn’t matter if you slow to a walk. It just matters that you keep going.