Just Another Part Of Me

I'm many things.  I'm a gay man.  I'm a dad.  I'm a husband.  I'm a son.  I'm a brother.  I'm a grandfather.  I'm bipolar.

I don't talk much about being bipolar.  With so many people diagnosed with the disorder, many people believe that the condition is only used for bad behavior.  Believe me, without three different kinds of medication, I can exhibit very bad behavior.

As with many people who are eventually diagnosed, I dealt with depression for most of my teens and twenties, and then suddenly, one day I completely rocketed off the deep end.  I quit going to my job, but I would call the office and talk with co-workers about wildly inappropriate matters, like what kind of sex they had with their spouses.  I visited a previous place of employment, a retail establishment, and jumped up on the customer service desk in the middle of the store.  And as if that was not enough, I jumped up on a table in a restaurant as a friend tried to coax me down.  That lead to my being admitted to a local emergency room, where I was talking wildly about dogs in truck beds on the freeways of Houston, and how their negligent owners should be shot.  I broke out of the ER by insisting that they could not keep me there against my will.  I stormed out, as my sister, ex-wife, and former boyfriend chased after me.  But I was quick.  I threw off my shirt and my shoes, and ran around the Texas Medical Center with no clothing with the exception of a pair of white jeans.

Excuse me.  It's 9 PM.  I have to take my meds.

Done.

My would-be saviors (sister, ex-wife and ex-boyfriend) eventually caught up with me, after my paranoia had ramped up incredibly high.  Every driver in a white car was my ally.  Every dark car, my enemy.  And when my saviors caught me, I desperately asked them not to turn me over to the UFOs.  They settled me down with a couple of Xanax, passed off as "vitamins."  I woke to a strapped-down ambulance ride back to the ER, while I told the medics that I just wanted to go to the beach and see "Jesus in the Sky" (reference to Jackson Browne's "Rock Me On The Water").  I gave away a Seiko watch in the hospital cell where they housed me before my trip to a three-week stay at County Psych, where the medical staff tried to find the right combination of pills to keep my feet on the earth.

This was all about 20 years ago, and I am still bipolar, but functioning.  One of the medicines, Seroquel, makes me comatose.  My husband practically has to drag me from bed in the morning, even after a full 8 hours of sleep.  I hate taking the medicine, but know it's not optional.

As recently as two weeks ago, after a morning argument about waking up too late to go to our weekly breakfast with our friends, I told my husband that I was either going to kill myself and get it all over, or I wanted to go off my meds and be hospitalized for the remainder of my life.  Selfish Drama Queen.  Yes, I know.  But it's hard.

I see a psychiatrist every three months.  I see a psychologist every three weeks.  I will have to do this for as far as I can see into the future.

Yes, it's difficult.  But I make it.  My husband.  My son.  My sister.  My friends.  They all keep watch over me.  And I'm extremely lucky.  I won't commit suicide (even when the depression is so crushing that death seems the only way out).  I will not spend the rest of my life institutionalized (even when the simplicities of life seems too much to handle and when my medicine makes it difficult to function).

I'm a gay man, who is a dad, and a husband, a son, a brother. grandfather.  I'm bipolar.  And I find my strength in all those things.  I'll always be two steps above O.K.