Tag: crazy

Why It Doesn’t Matter If I Call Myself Crazy

I call myself crazy. I do. I’ve written about it before. I also say, “I am bipolar,” so shoot me. It’s not that I say these things pejoratively, I don’t, I say them because they’re correct usages of the English language and they are accurate. Other people have a problem with this. But you know what, their problem is not my problem. If I want to call myself crazy, or bipolar, or a redhead that’s my business, not yours.

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I Can’t Have Bipolar – I’m High-Functioning, I Have a Job

I started thinking about alcoholism the other day because of some stuff going on with a friend and I started to think about how high-functioning people often don’t consider themselves alcoholics because they’re high-functioning. How can I be an alcoholic; I have a job? A family. A wife. Friends. Money. A house. And so on…

And the same is true for people with bipolar disorder. People think to themselves, “I can’t have a mental illness – I have a job.” Or, “I can’t have a mental illness – I’m a good mother.” Or, “I can’t have a mental illness – I have a degree from a top-tier school.”

But as I have told audiences over and over – mental illness happens, and it can happen to anyone.

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Mental Illness Words You Can’t Say

As a writer I take claim to any and all words. They are mine and I do with them as I please. This includes mental illness / mental health terms. However, some people would argue that as a mental health writer and advocate, it is my responsibility to promote certain language and verbiage.

I did not agree to that.

I agreed to be a writer. I agreed to be opinionated. I agreed to be passionate. I agreed to be well-researched. I agreed to be intelligent. I did not agree to push a political agenda.

Mental Illness Words You Can’t Say

Nevertheless, people still insist that I not use the following words / phrases:

  • Whackjob
  • Nutjob
  • Nutbar
  • Crazy
  • Bonkers
  • Off his rocker
  • Mentally unstable
  • “The mentally ill”
  • Bipolars
  • “I’m bipolar”

And about a million other things. The politically correct people have told me I’m not allowed to refer to anyone’s mental capacity in anything but the most politically correct way. Which is, in case you were wondering, a person with a mental illness or a person with bipolar disorder, etc.

Again, not to flog a horse that happens to be dead, but I have poetic license which means I get to do whatever I want with words.

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Bipolar, Hypomania, Depression and Looking Crazy

I can feel the post-depression-bounce-back hypomania beginning in my brain; not in my body, only in my brain. Hypomanic symptoms started yesterday evening. Things started seeming clear, perhaps just a little too clear, and certainly a little too fast. Bipolar fast. Gospel music (yes, oddly) played in my head intermittently while I guided an old tourist couple to the park, I drafted my upcoming novel, planned a conversation, and I investigated the fallen tree branch in the middle of the baseball field. Rapid fire thoughts, hypomanic thoughts, took over.

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Dissociative Identity Disorder Goes Crazy

As I mentioned last week, Holly Gray of Don’t Call Me Cybil is writing a guest post for me here this week. Well, that got kicked off because she asked me to write the inaugural guest post on her blog. My guest article was posted today and is about the label “crazy” and why us crazies shouldn’t be so afraid of it.

A little about Holly:

My name is Holly Gray. I’m 36 years old. I’m a writer and DID awareness advocate. I live in a stunningly beautiful area of the Pacific Northwest United States.

I am a real person with dissociative identity disorder.

Check out her dissociative identity disorder blog and check out my entry on my favorite word, “crazy” and how Words Don’t Hurt People, People Hurt People.

I’m thrilled to meet a real person with such a misunderstood disorder and it doesn’t hurt that she’s bright and articulate. Thanks to Holly for the opportunity to lend a few words.

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My Bipolar Symptoms Aren’t Your Symptoms: I’m More Bipolar Than You

If you’ve been reading me for a while, you’re probably familiar with the symptoms I typically experience as a bipolar:

  • Fatigue
  • Sadness / depression / tearing
  • Hypersomnia
  • Anhedonia
  • Lack of motivation / concentration
  • Slowness in thinking
  • Thoughts of death
  • Decreased need for sleep
  • Excessive speed talking / thinking
  • Increased productivity

Each symptom depending on the mood of the moment (blue being depression, yellow being hypomania).

However, did you know that someone’s list might look like this:

  • Irritability
  • Weight loss
  • Insomnia
  • Restlessness. agitation
  • Feelings of guilt
  • Indecisiveness
  • More goal-directed activity
  • Spending sprees
  • Inflated self-esteem

That is totally different from my list, and yet we’re still both bipolar. The diagnosis “bipolar” is more of a big-tent thing. It’s the clumping of people with group of symptoms into a group called bipolar, but each person in the group is still unique.

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I’m Damaged. I’m Bipolar. Love Me. Save Me.

Last night I watched Crazy for Love a very bad movie wherein a man, Max, is put into a mental hospital for attempting suicide for the tenth time. When he’s there, he glimpses a very ill, schizophrenic, Grace, whereupon he instantaneously falls in love with her. She too is determined to kill herself. His life’s mission then is to “make her better”. To “make her happy”. Having found his new mission in life, he no longer wants to kill himself.

Well, pin a rose on his nose.

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I write a three-time Web Health Award winning column for HealthyPlace called Breaking Bipolar.

Also, find my writings on The Huffington Post and my work for BPHope (BP Magazine).

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