All About Bipolar

Posted By atorturedsoul on September 21, 2009

It never ceases to amaze me. The advice some people give people with bipolar disorder is often outlandish and laughable.

I ran across a website this morning that suggested that you talk to yourself. Talk to myself? You can’t be serious.

I do talk to myself at times. In fact, I have lengthy conversations with myself some days. I also have times where I want to shut myself up because I am constantly criticizing myself. Heck, I even have a name for it-psychosis. My doctor and I agree that psychosis should be treated with medication. I certainly don’t encourage people to talk to themselves.

Let me clarify this. As you get older, you do tend to think out loud and I don’t consider this talking to yourself. A few years ago, I started talking to myself and I said I wouldn’t worry about it until I started arguing with myself. Then, once I started arguing with myself I said I wouldn’t worry about it until I didn’t win the arguments anymore. It went way beyond me losing the arguments.

Well, I suppose this isn’t actually talking to myself either. You see, the other side of the conversation was not me. I had no control over “it” or what “it” said. (I call it “it” because “it” would never tell me it’s name.)  ”It” provided me with the most intelligent conversation I had ever had for some time. Then “it” started arguing with me and trying to convince me that I couldn’t do anything right. That’s when I wanted to stop talking to “it”, but “it” just wouldn’t shut up.

Where did this end up? I became suicidal and a psych eval, multiple therapy sessions and several prescriptions later, “it” became silent. “It” reappears every now and then but I can’t understand what it is saying. It’s a mumble like a conversation somewhere in the distance. Even if I strain to hear it, it’s just too far away. When this happens, I run back to my doctor because I really don’t need one more person criticizing me.

So you think I should talk to myself? I might…if I had anything nice to say.

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Categories: About Bipolar Disorder, Bipolar 1, Bipolar 2, Cyclothymia, My Personal Experiences, NOS, Psychosis
Tags: about, advice, all, arguments, bipolar, criticizing, medication, psych eval, Psychosis, therapy, voices