Depression/Mixed Mania Episodes in Mental Health

It’s been a rough few days/weeks/months/year.

I’ve been manic for… I don’t know how long. Awhile.

If only it was the kind of manic that allowed me to accomplish many things.

It has been that kind of manic at times. I’ve gotten more boxes packed and laundry done and I’ve cooked some amazing meals.

But I’ve also experienced the sort of manic depression that has decimated my interest levels in… well, pretty much everything that’s usually interesting to me.

I haven’t painted in months. I have new, incredible paints and paper and I can’t even bring myself to use them. It’s not that I’m no longer interested in painting, because I very much am. I’m still watching tutorials and following artists on social medias and being in love with watercolors. I just can’t seem to push myself over that edge into actual painting.

Because that’s what mixed episodes do. When I’m manic AND depressed, I’m really, really depressed. I cry all the time at nothing, I’m disgusted with my own face in the mirror, I can’t bear to look at my own body, and I think terrible things about myself. Things I know aren’t true.

And I have little to no interest in anything. Well, with the exception of my kittens, but even now, I’m alone in my room, no kittens, and I think, “Well, who can blame them, I don’t want to be around me, either.”

I’m focusing as much energy as possible (and it’s not a lot, I have almost none, I am all out of spoons and working from a deficit every day) on self-care and health. I’m changing my diet and hoping to find the motivation to at least do some yoga or something. I’m wearing a nicotine patch because I don’t want to be a smoker anymore, though I’m still smoking. Trying to use my vape more because it’s better than cigarettes (and don’t even come at me with any horseshit about it being just as bad because it’s not and you’re an idiot if you think it is).

I do my nails to never leave my house. Myself, my kids, and my kittens are the only ones who see it and they really couldn’t care less, I’m sure. But I see it and it makes me happy, this physical evidence of me trying. I’m pushing myself every day to at least wash my face if I’m not capable of showering (and some days I’m just not capable). I’m eating better and more and I’ve gained back some of the weight I lost because I was not eating much at all.

I’m focusing on the positives as much as I can, which is hard when the world is on fire. But I have so many positives in my life that this is actually the easiest aspect of everything I’m dealing with right now.

I am loved and that is an undeniable fact, no matter what my brain says.