Turning Inwards and an Admission

Since the book launch I have gone pretty MIA. My book quotes still get posted on social media but lets be honest, those are planned months in advanced. No one has the energy to post everyday. Well actually that's not true. I USED to have the energy to post every single day, and pretty manically actually. I used to have the energy to do a lot of things actually. Lately though, I don't have the energy to do much of anything. 

There is a portion of my diagnoses that I didn't share in the book with all of you. Which I will admit is not authentic of me, however I don't necessarily trust doctors the first time they tell me something and I like to find patterns (the autism in me) and make myself my own science experiment. You see I gladly accepted the diagnoses of Autism, PTSD, and Conversion Disorder a couple of months ago because I had been recognizing the patterns of these disorders my entire life. I was prepared. It made me feel seen and finally understood to be able to confidently admit to the reasons why I was the person I am. 

One of the diagnoses I was also given was not one I was so comfortable about.

I was diagnosed as Bipolar. My doctor was not 100% sure at first and wanted me to get further testing done to make sure it wasn't just my PMDD looking like Bipolar. That's the thing with all these disorders. They all have so many overlapping qualities and symptoms so it can be difficult to know which is really present which is why it's important to keep diaries and logs of symptoms everyday when you're trying to get properly diagnosed so that you can get the correct help you need. Anyways, after further evaluation my next doctor told me I am Bipolar. She told me I would have to go on medication. Which I have been against for a very long time due to when I was baker acted and force-fed all different types of medication that just made me more and more depressed. 

My new doctor, she's amazing. She recognized and empathized with my fear. She explained to me that it made sense that none of the medications I had been put on previously worked. I needed a mood stabilizer, not an antidepressant. Before this I had also learned from a previous doctor that people who are ADHD are more likely to have negative side effects from SSRIs. Which is why none of the medications forced on me worked. 

I have now been on Lamotrigine for my Bipolar for four months. I have been incredibly embarrassed to admit this for many reasons that have to do with big pharma and preferring natural and psychedelic modalities of healing and not wanting to come off as a fake or phony person. But the biggest reason I have been embarrassed to admit this is because the medication is actually working, which means I have to admit that I am Bipolar. I hate this. 

I also am struggling with this new me. In my last appointment with my doctor we discussed the changes I have been seeing. I have zero anxiety, I don't feel the NEED to do anything, I'm not creating imaginary fights with people in my head all day long, I'm not singing the same line from a song incessantly in my head over and over again making myself go crazy, I don't feel the need to be places or do things to make other people feel better when it means making me uncomfortable, and I just am kind of at peace all the time. 

I can't fucking stand it. The way my doctor explained it to me was to look at people like Kanye and Van Gogh and someone else I can't remember right now. I think it might have been Bowie or Robin Williams because I remember being really excited to be compared to the last person. She explained that it would be up to me to weigh my pros and cons, and that if I looked to these other creative minds I would recognize and understand that other people who are like me when they get on medication feel like they have lost a part of themselves, more specifically the creative part. She didn’t tell me what I should or shouldn’t do, she just told me simply “it is up to you to decide which person you like better and which person you are happier being”.

Then I told her about my new sleeping patterns. My entire life I have never slept more than 6 hours, even when I am drinking. I have this internal clock that goes off every morning no matter what. My whole life I’ve been a morning person and I love that part of me because my favorite time of the day is being up before the rest of the world and it is then when I am most at peace.

I sleep everyday until 8 am now. I would sleep longer if I didn’t have to work. I haven’t been to the gym in four months and I don’t even care other than the fact that I can feel my body BEGGING to be stretched and my muscles aching to feel something other than sitting all day. I don’t care about seeing other people, in fact I kind of want to be as alone as I possibly can be. Which is difficult in a one bedroom apartment with a dog and a partner and an office in the middle of the room.

It’s hard to know what aspects are coming from where exactly. Is it the medication? Is it me finally unmasking for the first time in my life now that I know I have autism? Is it that I also went on birth control because I got sick of all the supplements I had to take to control my PMDD? So now I’ve been bleeding almost 3 weeks of every months just waiting for everything to level out. I don’t fucking know man.

I do know that if I was practicing Vipassana every single day I don’t think I would have to be on any of these medications and I would still have my energy. Yet, like a cancer patient who still won’t eat an alkaline diet to save their life, here I am.

I also think I need this time of going inward. My grandma called for a priest to come to read her last rites last week and I quickly flew to Michigan wondering if it would be the last time I saw her. She’s my best friend, and we haven’t talked enough about life yet. I wish I knew to talk to her more like we do now when I was younger.

There’s something about winter, going back home and being around all your childhood friends who now have babies and families that kinda just makes me want to sit still and take the moment in. Everything changes so quickly, everyone grows up so quickly.

I miss manic Katie. I am manic Katie. Do I need some help pulling in the reigns on this ol’ noggin and SPENDING from time to time, absolutely. But I also LOVE my mind. I always have. I’ve always loved the way people look and think so oddly yet entertained by the way my mind works. I just can’t imagine how anyone else’s mind doesn’t work like mine. Now being on my these meds I am definitely getting a taste of it. After the first week of being on them I turned to Langdon in awe and said “Oh my god, I’ve always wanted to know what it feels like to be in someone else's brain and I finally get to feel it!” It was a wild feeling! It is a wild feeling. To be a person who just wants to stay in bed, not for dungeons days but because I actually am enjoying sleep. To not HAVE to always be doing something.

I will say though as I have tried to weigh my pros and cons about being on this medication I have only been able to come up with a few cons outside of my ego not wanting to admit defeat to the pharma world. I forget everything now, and I also lose everything now. And I don’t know how to be a person who does either of those things. It’s enraging. I have never had to deal with this. I also am incapable of multitasking now. Which means the Katie that does 14 things at one time no longer exists. All traits I have prided myself in for my entire life.

My doctor asked me, “How long have you not been sleeping longer than six hours?”

“My entire life.”

“Do you think your body might be making up for all that rest you actually needed but couldn’t get because of how your mind worked?”

“Damn.”

I think I do need rest. I think I do need some time to not HAVE to be doing something. I think I might need some time to just allow myself to BE. Which is extremely difficult for me. Which is how I know it is exactly what I need. Actually no, I don’t need, I get to JUST BE.

And sometime in the future when I am ready I will start my vipassana practice, join a yoga studio, cleanse my body of all the trash I have been feeding it, and entirely refresh my soul. Then I will get off the meds at some point when I am ready. But right now, I am not allowing myself to go into any practices of self care in the mindset of self care being a chore. Fuck that. I’m going to do the things that are good for me because they feel good and because I feel ready, not because I SHOULD be. I’m cleansing my mind and spirit of every should that’s ever existed.

My mind, body, and soul need a reboot baby and it’s a reboot I can only get by never saying the word should again.

Lastly, I would like to acknowledge all the people I haven’t responded to, or have been slow to respond to, or just don’t reach out too much anymore. I still love you and please keep inviting me to things even if I say no. Ya never know when I might say yes.

I am finally allowing myself to heal in a way I have never been able to before. I am getting comfortable with accepting the freedom I have been fighting for my entire life. And I am preparing myself to only come from a space of love, moving into the future. In order to do so I get to finally let go of my past and move in a way where it no longer controls me or my reactions.

Let's manifest everything from a space of ease and joy for the journey.

Everything you've ever wanted is on it's way. But are you ready to accept it when it gets here?