For the winners amongst us.

I case it had escaped your attention, though I wouldn't know how it could have, I do like my cups of coffee and tonight is no exception. I am guzzling down my first cup as if my life depends on it and will have the second one very soon. In reality it's not so much that I am not clear of mind, as well very thirsty, and it is as if I have trudged across the desert and have not had anything to drink for a long while and have stumbled upon an oasis. I may have to resort to drinking several glasses of ice cold water to take care of this great thirst.

 

I think it must be the spicy fried potatoes I had for dinner that are the cause for it, but I must say that they were a treat and the potatoes were almost the last edible thing I had left in the kitchen. I was supposed to have gone grocery shopping in the afternoon, but decided to live dangerously and postpone that until tomorrow afternoon. I had forgotten how much I like fried potatoes and how well they agreed with me if I fixed them just right. I could have posed for Vincent van Gogh's 'Potato Eaters' except that they were so poor that they ate their potatoes boiled, not fried in olive oil and butter.

 

I had an appointment with my psychiatrist and he answered all the questions I had about my hypomanic episodes before I could even ask them. He had apparently given the whole thing a lot of thought, especially this last destructive one. Together we made a list of my particular signs of hypomania that people around me would recognize an upcoming episode by. We are also making an emergency plan that I have to involve at least one close family member or friend with who can watch out for the signs and take the necessary measure on, which consists of notifying my psychiatrist. I am also going to take a course in managing bipolarity. We're in to the serious business of it now.

 

I curse the fact that I have this disorder and wonder very often why I should be so unlucky. Did I do something out of the ordinary to deserve this? I do feel despair at times and there are moments when I want to throw in the towel, and say, "Oh, to hell with it." The battle of finding an equilibrium a hundred times a day does get tired and old. Extreme moods are scary and exhausting and you've got to have the mentality of a pit bull to hang on. Even being extremely optimistic feels desperate and as if you have to guard it with your life. Megalomania is like any delusion and only a pipedream.  

 

I would very much like to have a quiet mind and not one that is only at rest sometimes. I pray for longer periods of serenity, but they are elusive. If I were not a cynic, I would turn to a religion.