It is sometimes spoken “before enlightenment, chopping wood carting water, after enlightenment chopping wood carrying water” this somewhat traces the journey to diagnosis. In 2000 I found myself in a place I had ever thought I needed to be, let alone wanted to be. The incident itself came at the end of a yet another run, or surge of creative but chaotic energy. I was somehow chosen, predestined but being hunted down by people who had a secret communication method, They communicated in coughs. I was lucky, I could decode the messages sent between operatives, and my trusty computer that ate more often than me was there to log these happenings. Not a thing in my mind as I sat in the ED bleeding could sway me… I knew that I was being tracked, but I was a shapeshifter, I was their match.
It had been like that before, I was a publisher, I was a shaman, I was an artiste, an academic hell I was even Tim Leary incarnate. These times were larger than life forays where Social phobia of any kind evaporated and curiosity, hyperfocus and long sleepless nights blended into one. They were times when my own chaotic drive pulled others in, made them part of my narrative until they could take no more. And then, just as night into day it disappeared. Nothing was right, everyone was looking at me, my spark was gone and retreat, avoidance and shameful isolation ensued During these times another force took a tighter grip. During the high times you barely needed substance, and when you did it was a transcendental experience, but the dark times fueled addiction and the addiction fueled the darkness. In these times it was like the cosmic rug was pulled from under you, a nihlistic plane of grey lifeless thought stretching in every direction. Then there were the in between days, spent recovering , puzzling and wondering why you always seem to be that round peg in life’s square hole. These times were naive and clueless, they avoided thinking about the extremes, they were the “normal” days.
So… back to the ED, a laceration that required surgery. The coughing of the people in the hospital, and the beeping machines had me very worried. I remember not a lot of this juncture but what I do remember was counting those coughs, and without my device doing the maths in my head. The equation always came back to numerological significance. Dark times or high times, II pathologically lived my life by numbers; only certain ones were significant but every numerical occurrence, times, prices dates, fuel in a vehicle all had to be reduced to the base number. the numbers dictated what I would or wouldn’t do, who I would see, and were a window into a future only I knew. I just remember my mind almost bursting electrical energy, and pushing me into a state of darkness and unbearable agitation, so restless and lost in thought that I couldn’t take anything in, I don’t even remember consenting to surgery. The content of this river of thought was of the darkest most self destructive kind. Its hard to explain, but it is what a hell could be like if it existed inescapable inner agitation, that you cannot get away from no matter how you try.
I woke; I had no idea where I was, it was quiet. There were other people there, some shuffling about, some staring, some half asleep on couches. There were other people inside a glass cell like room. I felt like lead, so slow, my mouth impossibly dry. The thoughts had slowed… a lot. I still felt bad but in a slow soporific kind of way. In that next 5 minuted the dots started to slowly link up. A nurse finally came to me asked to check my wound. She gave me two tablets and just said “doctor will see you in 10 minutes”. A big purple pill and a smaller white one, two new drugs; Olanzapine and valproate. Before she left I asked her if I could go home, her non reply said everything, this was my first ‘hospitalisation’. My head wasn’t right, maybe it hadn’t been for a while. There I was a moment of quietness that overtook me, an “oh shit moment” that I wont forget.
When the doctor came he took his time, he took a history, then explained a new term- “dysphoric mania”, he explained the intense agitation, he talked about those high energy states the “mania”, he talked about the low times he talked about the middle too and drew me a diagram. It was a sine wave roughly drawn. It was the first time I had really taken notice of the words Bipolar Disorder and now as he described the whys and hows it settled on me; a label that explained both my successes, Self sabotage, my failings and one that made me see a life pattern, not trapped in mystical calculations, but now a waveform that flowed through me, outside of conscious control. In this moment everything made sense, I wasn’t happy but I now I finally understood, This was enlightenment. it was Day 0 of recovery.