Christmas and Family

I do like Christmas.   Not the commercial side of it, but the spending time with the family, seeing friends and using it as a way of relaxing and enjoying spending time together.

However, this year, I don't know if it's because I'm in the wrong head space or what but I did not enjoy it this year.  I mean spending time with the niece and nephew is wonderful but the only thing that was talked about was my sister's family, her pregnancy (yep I'm going to be an aunt again), what the niece and nephew are up to, what her husband is up to and how his job is going, where they are at with selling their house, what me Mam is up to, even what my uncle is up to.   Not once was I asked how work was, Mam has asked me not to tell my sister about my Bipolar, I'm not allowed to talk about it at all.  I can't talk about work as I've been to work in a month, but my sister doesn't know any of this.  I actually forgot to take me medication to me Mam's and had to rush home to get it, but again I was not allowed to tell anyone why I had to disappeared.  When I did take the meds, I had to do it in front of my sister and my brother in law because there is not privacy to take it anywhere else.   It wasn't talked about, it wasn't mentioned.

I know I haven't told me Mam just how ill I have been this year.  She has no idea I attempted suicide in May, or that I planned it again in August.  She has no idea that I have cut myself so much this year that I've actually got scars.

I'm meant to tell my family this as they need to know what my moods are to help me deal with it, but I can't tell them.  Me mam is just one of those people where you just don't talk about mental illness.  If I had cancer or broken a leg she would be happy to tell other people and get support.  Because it's Bipolar we don't talk about it, we don't mention it to anyone.

So it was an odd Christmas for me.  I also had to double my dose of lamotrigine to 50mgs yesterday so we'll see what that does.  I'm still not sleeping too well.  Only a couple hours a night, the rest of the time all I manage to do is doze.  But still fully aware of what is happening around me.  I'm really tired, but not feeling depressed nor an I hyper.  I'm too tired to do anything.

In better news CD and I are talking again and hoping to meet up.  He's feeling better but I don't know how I feel at the moment.  I want to see him, and I have missed him but I wonder if he is the right person for me.  He needs someone who's supportive and I need someone who's supportive.  If we keep getting ill at the same time it's never going to work.  If we get ill at different times it won't matter so much as we can support each other.  The medication is also making me horney so I don't know if I want to see him because I want the sex.

Everything is so confusing and I don't know how I feel about a lot of things.  I don't know if the medication is a good thing because I don't feel like I'm me.  Without the extreme moods I feel like most of me doesn't exist.  I don't know who I am without the swings.  At some point I have to go back to work as I'm having money issues and without a full months pay I'm screwed.

In some ways having a diagnosis of Bipolar has been like a weight lifted from my shoulders, the mood swings I've gone through and the horror I've been through is not my fault.  It's not something I could control it's all part and parcel of being bipolar.  But now I have this diagnosis and I'm not sure what I should do.  I have to change my life style I'm sure of it, but I don't know what I should do.

I have many people who said that I can talk to them about stuff but none of them are bipolar, and not sure what to say or how to help me.  Someone asked me what they could do to help me and the truth is I have no idea.  I don't understand myself, I'm not sure I know who I am any more.  I know I don't really want to cut and I don't want to commit suicide so these are good things but other than that I don't know anything.  Having spent years trying to learn who I am I have to start again.  At 35 years of age and feeling so alone I'm not sure I can.

This is week 3 since diagnosis.