At the Crossroads

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I have been living with Bipolar Disorder for about the last 7 years.  Well that’s not really true…I have been living with Bipolar Disorder all my life but I only learned of my condition 7 years ago.  Since then I have been surrounded by a number of professionals: psychiatrists, a family doctor, psychiatric nurses, a CB therapist, and of course the pharmacists.  All of these individuals have played an important role on my road to stability.  I would say that I am much more stable now than I have ever been in my life.  I don’t drink, I don’t take illegal drugs, and I don’t smoke cigarettes so I feel stable…but bored.  The problem is that I am dealing with some very powerful urges to go back to self-medication, the street, to return to the world of addiction.  These feelings even invade my dreams.  So now I find myself at the crossroads.

The first prescription drug I took made me fly so high and yeah it was great and I loved it.  I have never had so much fun as I did that summer.  On the downside though, I also completely freaked out on a very good friend a couple of times.  I am lucky she understood and forgave me.  So they took my off the lamotrigine.  And to be honest I miss it.

Now when I go to the pharmacist I pick up 13 bottles of pills, and every day I swallow 23 pills.  So I have no more highs and the lows are manageable.  Instead of flying high I have gained a lot of weight, about 80 pounds in 2 years.  My self-image and self-esteem have gone awry.  I used to run 2 kms a day and now I do nothing.  I also had plantar fasciitis for about a year which was crippling so even walking any distance was extremely painful.  I still managed to do 40 sit ups most every day, but somehow that got lost to.  My healthy routines were shattered.

Now I watch a lot of TV but it is just a way of passing time.  I don’t feel any interest or motivation to do the things that I used to love doing: writing, reading, photography, woodworking, walking.  Even my sex drive has been adversely affected; I just have no libido.  In fact, I just don’t feel much at all.  The only thing that gets me excited for a few moments is online poker and online sports betting.  Fortunately I am not gambling high stakes…I do understand how to win…or at least not to lose too much.  But how long will that last?

This isn’t the life I thought I would have.  Lots of people live off my salary…a very respectable one but one that I only see of about 30%.  My present spouse cannot work (bipolar disorder and fibromyalgia), and I have 4 children who have all pursued post-secondary studies (and I’m so proud of them all) so I still have a very high child support payments to make every month and I pay the taxes on that.  It’s depressing because I can’t put away much money for my retirement.  I am 52 and I want to retire when I am 60…I just don’t know if I will be able to afford that.  I have spent 23 years of my life in small rooms filled with 25 teenagers and with only one door out (the escape hatch).  Such is the life of a high school teacher.  Maybe I can get a job as a greeter at Walmart when I retire.

So what is this crossroad?  Well, this is the way I see it:

If I turn left, it leads me back to self-medication.  The urge to drop all of the prescription drugs and go back to self-medication is very strong…wrong but strong.  The consequences would be huge…it would destroy my relationship with the woman I have been living with for more than 4 years.  She would be immensely hurt if I decided to turn left.  It would destroy all the years I have put in to regain my children’s trust.  And to be honest, I don’t know if I could survive that nether world either.  I don’t want to die and I don’t want to go to jail either.  Fortunately the closest big city from my home is about 1600 km (1000 miles) away.

If I stay the course and just go straight ahead, I will just have to accept that I am obese and bored, the status quo.  I hardly take showers anymore because that means I will see myself in the mirror and see that old fat ugly guy staring back at me.  I will continue to provide for all the others and continue to countdown the years to go until I can retire, ennui being the flavour of the day.

If I take a right turn, well, it is the most daunting of them all.  It requires motivation.  I will need to improve my diet, exercise more, pick up my camera and go for walks even if it is painful, make a workshop in the basement, read, and take Viagra if need be.

As I read over this blog with my therapist I noticed something, something important.  Subconsciously I think I decided to make the best choice, a right turn…right because perhaps it would be the right decision.  But I am just so tired of fighting with myself.

Do I have the strength?  Should I just grin and bear it?  Or do I go looking for desolation row…