illuminated irises

Its hard to understand why i am going through what i am going through right now. For the past 3 years things have only been going up for me and i have only been getting stronger. I have been hit with some pretty hard turbulence this year that couldve made my life rocky and hard but instead i allowed it to mold me and shape me into a stronger person. Every thing was going so well.... Then Monday hit, and it hit me hard. Like a bulldozer carrying thousands of pounds of wet concrete ready to pour over my life and bury me alive. It broke me down. It tore into me like i havent experienced in a very long time. I cried out to God. I didnt blame Him, instead i praised Him. I thanked Him for my life but i asked Him why is this happening to me? Then i read the story of Job. You see, my blogs would be pointless and serve absolutely no purpose if i didnt go through my fair share of trials too. Mental illness does not mean smooth sailing. There is no magic pill and then you are cured of every ail...

You don’t stop just because someone tells you no. You don’t stop because there is a road block. You don’t stop because of your limitations. You stop, you pause, you re- center, you re-group and you pick yourself up and you keep going. There are times that we need to take a break and take a moment to reflect and think about how we could have done things differently and what mistakes we made and how we can learn from them, but don’t stay trapped there. Don’t wallow there. You pick up your pieces and you keep trekking along and you look for the next opportunity because the next opportunity will come! There is no time to wait and wallow in defeat. There is no time to waste away. There is no time to think of the burden you bear. No you pick up the pieces and you keep moving along. Life doesn’t wait for you and you shouldn’t wait for life. I got some bad news today. It was totally unexpected. My plan A fell through and now I will have to make my plan B my new plan A. It hit me h...

When i was on my way to Eastern Va medical institute i distinctly remember after they let me out of the emergency vehicle and unchained me, i knelt down to tie my shoes tighter. I was preparing for a marathon. I did not know what i was gearing up for but i was gearing up! They led me into the wait room. I sat there pacing back and forth. Then started doing jumping jacks. Then push ups. Then the guy next to me started asking me questions so i started talking to him. He said he was sent here because he got in trouble for going to a party and getting busted for weed. That was the first time i questioned why i was there. They called my name and i was led to the back. They took my weight and blood pressure and then told me if anyone asks i am there for a period study. So i literally thought i was there for a period study. I was then led into a big room that was an activity room but reminded me of the tv set orange is the new black for God knows what reason... No one was in the room at t...

The three years I have spent working here, I have found that people tend to make you feel irrelevant and insignificant. You have to make a name for yourself and you have to make yourself significant. You have to make yourself shine. I told a story this morning about going to my brothers for a steak dinner and it was meant to be a funny story. After I finished my story, I got not a single response in a room filled with 5 people. All I heard were crickets chirping and the sound of my worship music in the background. How do you shine in a cold work environment gone stale? How do you do that with a mental disorder? Especially when you have good days and bad?   That is a question I am still trying to figure out. One thing I know is you have to be confident in yourself and not care about what anyone else thinks about you. If they sit there and ignore you when it is blatantly obvious that you are talking to them and not a single person is responding, brush it off your shoulders. Get u...

Who are you? Who am I? I can’t tell you who you are, only you can tell yourself that. I can only tell you who I am. I am saved by the grace of God. I am a warrior. I am a survivor. I am resilient. I am undefeated. I am fearless. I am bold. I am a daughter. I am a worker. I am a church goer. I have a blog. I care about my family a lot. I am an auntie. I care about my friends a lot. I have two cats. And I have a mental illness called Bipolar 1. There are a lot of other things that define me and the list can go on for days but that is just a synopsis. This is how I used to define myself: I am a walking contradiction, I wear my heart on my sleeve, I am wreckless, I am carefree, I love with all my heart, I am too nice, I am too giving. Self-talk is important. It is super critical. How do you view yourself and how do you define yourself? What do you say to yourself and what do you say about yourself? Are you always talking bad about yourself? Are you always bringing yourself down and ...

I told you my mania would die. As August ends so does my mania and so does my energy. And now i find myself lying here on a Friday because of this hurricane that closed work waking up from a nice nap and talking to a few friends on messenger. I had some very vivid dreams which is no doubt a side effect of the drugs i am on but the good news is i am sleeping and dreaming again. Mania is a fun friend, it creates some beautifully dramatic pieces of inspiration that you want to hold on to forever because for a momeny in time you felt the best you will feel for a while. Your energy was sky high, your motivation was through the roof and your confidence was beyond hesitation. Now its back to reality and i have to find that motivation to keep moving along at an even keeled pace and not slow down even though my body is dragging and relentlessly and tirelessly wants sleep. I have to fight the urge to stay cuddled up in my blankets 24/7 and fight for my goals and fight for my dreams. This is m...

If you want to date me you have big shoes to fill. My ex husband was amazing and i will compare you to him and you will most likely fail. So dont try. I am not looking to date. So dont try. I am at a point in my life where i am trying very hard to focus on my career and friendships. I want to build friendships that will last a lifetime. I want to nourish them and watch them grow. I spent all of my early years chasing boys and now i am chasing girls for friendships. I want to have a group of frienda that i can lean on and count on and that can count on me. That is my goal. Dating is my last priority. So seriously if you are trying to date me don't. Chances are i am not interested. Or i maybe interested but i see your interactions with other women and that ship doesnt sail with me. I want to feel one of a kind and special. I want to feel like you picked me out of a crowded room and i was the one you pursued. If you are flirting with multiple women your chances are zero. I am not...

I have been at Atlantic Orthapedic for 3 years and 2 months. It has given me the time I need to gain stability. It has really given me the space and grace I needed to fully develop into my mental illness. It allowed me time to grow as a person. It offered me so many different things, and I will always be grateful for that, but I always felt like I was playing the waiting game. I was waiting for something bigger and better to come along. I was waiting for my time to fly. I was waiting until I became strong enough to stand tall on my own two feet. And now that time has come and I am ready to make moves and really make something of myself. I am on my way to making those moves. This morning I made my first move and I did something HUGE! And I am proud of myself for making that bold move and stepping out of my comfort zone and really going for it. And if it doesn’t pan out? Well, I have an option B. I am not putting all my eggs in one basket. All I know is my time here at Atlantic Or...

April and August are my two hardest months to face. Why? Because the seasons change. Mentally I am strong and I am prepared for change on a daily basis. I can deal with changes easily. Chemically, in my brain, I cannot. So my brain does not want to deal with the changes of the season so it spirals into a manic episode which usually is a lot worse than what I faced this year. All that happened this year is I wrote a lot. And I lost a lot of sleep. A lot of sleep. Instead of sleeping I would think. I spend the night thinking of things instead of being able to peacefully drift away into lala land and dream of sheep. You can try reading to sleep. That does not work for people who are bipolar. We get to interested in what we are reading and we can stay up all night invested in what we are reading even if it is the most boring book in the world. I don’t even watch tv to fall asleep. I turn off all my lights and just lay there in the dark, in the silence with my thoughts. And sleep does n...

I left work early today. I got in my car and i called Kaitlyn and i lost it. I cried hysterically because of the defeat i felt for leaving work early to come home and take my medicine and take a nap. I do not like it. But perhaps our strengths lie in knowing our limitations in our weaknesses and not exceeding them and going beyond them? Funny thing, i did the ultimate shameful no no thing to do. I lowered my medication because i thought i was ok. I jumped down from 120 to 60 of Latuda. You might be shaking your head. My therapist did. So now here i am typing this and force feeding myself mac and cheese so i can have enough calories in my system to take my Latuda 60 and then 60 more later tonight to balance out my system. Why did i suddenly drop my meds? Well you see, i have been reading the bible a lot and i have been conversing with God a lot and i asked him to show me a sign that i should or shouldn't be on medication. So as i began reading the bible i read the scriptur...

It is very important to inform you, the reader of the realities of a mental illness and the severities of it. I do not want to disillusion you with the upswing of the positivities of thriving with the wellness of having one without showing you the aspects of surviving with one. I have been losing sleep for nearly a month now. I have been going through quite a bit of a manic phase which may have contributed to why I have been writing so frequently, and soon enough I will write only periodically. It is how my episodes work. It is very typical of this disorder and it is the reality of this disorder, so while I am in the mood to write, I will write and I will write as frequently as the mood strikes. And when I do not write I will reflect back on the beautiful mess I created when the beauty of my episode struck so magically and created a master piece of reflections to look back on. I am not having delusions right now, so that is a major bonus, and if you were to look at me on the ou...

This entry was written a year into my recovery when I was going through a bunch of med changes and trying to find the right combination for me and discovering myself. This is what mental unstability looks and feels like. I still have my days where I feel like this but they are very few and far inbetween. This is from a very personal blog, where I will be sharing from every now and then. The date on this is Friday, July 28, 2017. Mood Swing What’s really in my heart, and what’s really in my mind? Something is bothering me and it is much deeper than just the normal every day hassles. Something is seriously getting to me and really hurting my soul. Something is buried down deep inside my being and it’s not surfacing to the top so I can face it head on and deal with it. I am feeling intensely. I am feeling every little bit of everything going on I just don’t know what it is. I texted and called James and he didn’t respond. But that’s not what is bothering me. He is probably st...

You need glasses to see, you need crutches to walk. Some people need medicine to help their minds function properly and there is no shame in taking medicine if it is the proper medicine for you. Medicine is a very controversial topic and mental illness is a very taboo topic. I am bipolar type 1 and that is a very stigmatized label. It is very scary and often not thought kindly of. Yet I share my story boldly and proudly because I am on the proper treatment plan and I have the support system in place to keep my red flags in check. I am so well taken care of that I can literally e-mail my psychiatric doctor and hear back from her in the same day. I had to fight for that type of treatment. It took me quite some time to get to this level of comfort with my mental wellness, but I have gotten here. There is no shame in saying you need help with you mental wellness and there is no shame in saying you have a mental illness. So what, your chemicals are imbalanced? Where is there shame in th...

Its hard to let go of the past and move on to the future when your past holds on to so much of who you are. But when you hold on to the past you don't allow the future of possibilities to enter into your life. There will always be nostalgic moments of reminiscing of what used to be and who you used to be. There will always be a special place in my heart for the person i was, but if we allow ourselves to be held captive by the bondage of who that person is we can never shed our skin and become who we truly want to be. We can never grow. I have never once said change doesn't hurt. Infact it is one of the most emotionally painful transformations there is. I used to hate change. I despised it. I hated when the seasons even changed. And now i literally face change on a daily basis. The only stability i have right now is knowing that my life is constantly changing and i have to embrace that. I have to let go of my past, let go of who i once was, embrace this time of transformatio...

I was bound up in chains from head to toe. Literally from my ankles to my wrists. Hours before hand i was in Chesapeake Regional with my parents and i was threatening to strip naked for the police officers if they didn't let me out of the room. My parents stood there in grief. The officers said they couldn't do anything but restrain me unless my dad signs me over to the magistrate and if that happens my life is no longer my own i become commited. My dad kept asking me "Mel is that really what you want me to do or do you want to calm down and go home?" We waited for an hour. I didnt calm down my episode only escalated and my dad did the only thing he could do and the thing no dad wants to do, he signed me over to the magistrate. The moment he did that two men stabbed me in the thigh with a high amount of geodon and i finally found sleep. The next morning i found myself locked up from head to toe bound in chains as i was being transported to Eastern Virginia Medi...

Mental illness is difficult, but you often fail to realize the toll it takes on those surrounding you. How does it effect their life? During my first break down my mom was in the Philippines. During my second breakdown my mom was in the Philippines but during my third? My God was she here! She lived through it! And you know how she told me she survived? She said she survived because she is a mother who prays. And i believe i am as strong as i am now today because i have a mother who gets on her face and cries out to God for mercy on her childrens lives. All those years I lived a wreckless life. All those years that I spent living on the edge unmedicated having episodes surving on Gods grace alone? I have a praying mother and I believe that is what got me through. Relentlessly she prays for Gods blessings to pour out on our lives, even if we dont go to church and say a blessing over our meal before we eat. And God has always protected us and provided for us. When i say us, i mean my...

It is so important to draw boundaries and that is what I am learning. Life is all about relationships you build and in relationships you need to have boundaries. If you don’t have boundaries you allow people to walk all over you and that could be a cause of your unhappiness. You need to teach people how to treat you and how to respect you. You also need to treat and respect others the way you want to be treated and respected. It is a two way street. It is important to stand up for yourself and build those boundaries. Tell people how you feel. Be honest with people without the fear of disappointing them. So you hurt their feelings? If you keep it bottled up, you are hurting yourself. I wish I would have known this when I was going through my recoveries, when people were asking very personal questions that were none of their business. I am very much an open book, but to the right people. I am a closed book to people who are going to openly criticize my life. (I am opening ...

My life flashed before my eyes tonight. I was driving on the interstate and a car was tailing me and another car was to the right so as soon as i could move past the car to the right i did, but the car that was tailing me had the same idea and we almost collided going 60+ on the interstate. My life was at stake tonight! A few minutes before that I prayed to God that i would make it home safely. I have been having trouble with my car for a few weeks. It has been making a put putting sound. All of this put into perspective the Sovreignty of God for me tonight. We learned about it in bible study a few months ago. I am not an ultra religious person, but i believe in God and I believe Jesus is my Savior and i really enjoy reading the bible. I am perfect by no means, you can catch me dropping the f-bomb here and there. The sovreignty we learned about was found in the book of Habbakuk. When the people were doing wicked things and Habbakuk was crying out to God asking why are you blessing...

If you fall down, get back up. So much easier said than done. I fell three times and I have had my heart immensely broken five so getting back up from falling down has become quite a skill for me. I do understand how people fall and can get stuck in that stage, because I have been there before. After my first episode, it took a whole year for me to get back to normal. My mom can testify to this, I would sit in my room and I would watch Netflix, specifically Greys Anatomy from morning until night unless I had work or school. When I had work I wouldn’t even make conversation with anyone. I would just awkwardly walk around pacing in boredom in between serving my guests. It was a very difficult year. I would go out very seldom. After my second episode the recovery rate was around 8 months to get back to normal. So it was still lengthy but not quite as long. I still had the same job at buffalo wild wings so it was quite awkward facing the same people that I told I was going on vac...

At my support group that I go to, they asked me what my bad days look like. I guess I am such a happy go lucky person that it almost seems like I am super human and incapable of having bad days. I have them. I just don’t have them as often as I used to because I have such a great style of coping now. This is what a bad day looks like for me: I self doubt. I believe I have no friends. I believe no one likes me. I believe that I am doing everything wrong. I believe that I am worthless. My coffee spills. I don’t think I am pretty. I am tired. I am self deprecating. The list goes on. I don’t allow myself to have bad days as much anymore. When I have bad days, I go to my support. I enlist my support system and I transact my coping mechanism. I call my brother, my sister in law, Kaitlyn or my mom. I cry to them, or I call Kaitlyn for a plan of action. If no one answers then I immediately turn to my coping mechanism where I scroll through pinterest and look at self growth quotes unt...