Category Archives: Anxiety

Review: Rethinking Positive Thinking

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Rethinking Positive Thinking: Inside the New Science of Motivation by Gabriele Oettingen

I don’t know how many times I have listened to people in support groups declare that they have decided to apply positive thinking to their lives and then watched them crash and burn. People declare all kinds of objectives for their affirmations. They will lose weight. They will master their drug problem. They will control their anger. They will grow rich. Money will come to them without effort. They will find a millionaire and marry him. They will find a fabulous new job and leave all the cares of the old one behind them. Some goals are realistic. Others are simply fantastic.

Studies show that plain old positive thinking drags people into a depressive rut. Oettingen cites the example of her work examining the attitudes of East Germans versus West Germans. East Germans spend a lot of time thinking positively. They see themselves as rich, as coming into opportunities of a lifetime which change their life situation for the better. But they still end up at bars trying to drink their melancholy away, and they never get anywhere with these plans. West Germans set reasonable objectives, put in the work, and succeed. Even though their goals are less grandiose, they are happier than their former Communist counterparts.

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Writing Helps to Heal

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I know it sounds cliche because we have all heard it before, “Why don’t you write about it? It’ll help” Yet, few of us really take that advice and implement it. Most of us take it as psychiatric mumbo jumbo, and continue with our pain alone for fear of burdening our close friends and relatives, those we have left anyway.

I was one of those non-believers in the power of writing and it took me a good nine years after being formally diagnosed to take finger to keyboard and just type. I started with a Twitter. Yes, I took to social media with my angst because if I was gonna share with the world, I was doing it loud and clear and on the internet. And lo and behold, I found a whole community of people like me, fellow sufferers and survivors of mental wellness. I could not have been more surprised at feeling a sense of camaraderie on the internet of all places. I was so overwhelmed that I started crying after one of my Tweets got retweeted, a personal Tweet I must say.

Maybe it sounds lame to you, but after that first reTweet, I was hooked on writing. I quickly found venues to express my thoughts and opinions, and somehow for some odd reason, people were listening to me. And not only listening, but commiserating, it was as if I had come home, finally.

Now, whenever I feel any slight anxiety, mania, depression, whatever, I take to writing. I love it. Everything about it. And I love and appreciate the people that have given me the chance to use my voice for good.

Stigma

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Happy World Bipolar Day!

If someone asked me one word that pops into my head when asked the question “What does bipolar mean in your life?”, stigma would be the first thing that pops into my head.  “An association of disgrace or public disapproval with something, such as an action or condition”, according to Google.  It’s stigma that keeps me secretive.  Stigma that requires me to keep what I consider to be such a large part of my life a secret to all except those really close to me I know I can trust to keep it to themselves, and to not judge me for it, to see me in a different fashion.

Even to those I do tell, the response seems to be the same, “Wow, I never wouldn’t guessed that about you.”  Partly because I’m medicated to function.  Partly because I’m required to act as if it doesn’t exist, even on days when I’m all over the map (I’ve grown increasingly more skilled at masking it).  But I think largely more than anything else, they just don’t know what it MEANS to be bipolar.  They know the stigma, they know that bipolar people are crazy, that they’re moody.  They don’t truly know what that entails in detail, how it effects your life, etc.

I will openly admit that I suffer from GAD, OCD, because those are “socially accepted” mental illnesses.  I can even joke about them.  There are some I know who suffer from anxiety and can relate, but none with bipolar, aside from my support group.  I wish for a day to come where the stigma could be lifted, that people would understand that with the proper treatment, someone with bipolar is no different than anyone else (for the most part, we all have our challenges), just like someone with OCD untreated can go completely off the reservoir.

Bipolar in my life means medication.  It means secrecy.  It means never truly being able to be myself, to not fully fit in with my colleges, with my friends.  I wish a day would come where stigma was not an issue, and people would become more educated, that the illness would gain more limelight.  Perhaps it will happen in my generation, but I don’t see it happening any time soon.

Bipolar Disorder in a Time of Hate

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Faces

Shortly before my hospitalization for a mixed state came the 2004 election. I crashed and crashed hard after the results. Politics is a fascination of mine but obsessing about it is not my friend. When my expectations are high as they were in 2004 and the hope I feel is unrealized, I take it very hard. The mix of anger and disappointment plus certain medications I was taking for depression at the time pumped me up into a mixed state. One day, when I had enough of it and of other life issues, I texted my last will and testament to my wife and sat down on a log to study my veins for the right place to cut. A timely phone call from my psychiatrist saved me.

The 2004 election was cordial compared to what has happened since 2008. Elements on both side but especially the right have been whipped into a frenzy by their respective leaders. We hear stories of blatant racism and sexism, two faults that have been hidden until the recent elections. We see them not only in the political arena but also in the news media and on the streets of our cities. Some such as Fox News are instigating their viewers to greater and greater heights of denial and fear while others just give the demagogues air time by covering them without comment. We see black men strangled or shot dead with no justice leveled against their killers. And respect for the police — even the good cops — sinks lower and lower.

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