Bipolar Musings: On Rapid Cycling and How Time is Never Enough

I promised myself that I’ll finish as much tasks in my head tonight. Just to clear away debris and unnecessary thoughts. Tomorrow I told macho kid we’ll watch Jurassic World again tomorrow in the cinema. Even if we already watched it last week, it’s the first time he genuinely liked a movie.

This post was written: June 16 2018

I’m writing this now as a break. I have a couple of pending ideas on my desktop notes, and a hundred in my head. I’ve been experiencing a roller-coaster of extremes these past few days. My depression and mania have been switching at a more frequent pace than before.

What is Rapid Cycling?

Bipolar disorder is diagnosed after someone experiences a hypomanic or manic episode along with multiple additional episodes of either mania, hypomania or depression.

In bipolar disorder rapid cycling can be difficult to identify, because a single mood episode can sometimes simply wax and wane without resolving. For example, in one study of people with bipolar II disorder, the amount of time spent depressed was more than 35 times the amount of time spent hypomanic. Also, people often don’t take note of their own hypomanic symptoms, mistaking them for a period of unusually good mood.

^{Source: https://www.webmd.com/bipolar-disorder/guide/rapid-cycling-bipolar-disorder#1}

How Time is Never Enough

Going back to backlogs and breaks. I only noticed it this year and please tell me if you can relate; Time feels shorter than usual. Is it a sign of aging when I hit the big 3-1?  Days seem to pass by like hours, and hours seem like minutes. It is never enough.

I finish a dozen drafts and content just so I can have more time with macho kid. Because when you don’t clear your head, you get too distracted to focus on what’s important. The present. I can imagine my life when I used to have a 9-5 M-F job. I go home on a Friday looking forward to the weekend, only to get my mind anxious with what’s to come on Monday.

We pay for it every single day by working. We work so we can have “free” time for ourselves, our loved ones. It’s another cliche I know but TIME is the most precious thing in the world. And I work each day to give Geof a good life until I await my death.