In my experience, there are often times when bipolar depression makes it so that I can’t do anything. I’m a lump. A rock. A blob. I literally can’t do anything because of bipolar depression. And because this happens to me, quite frankly, on a not infrequent basis, I’ve learned what to do when bipolar depression makes it so that I can’t do anything.

You Can’t Do Things or You Don’t Want to Do Things Because of Bipolar Depression?

I want to make something clear: it’s not that I don’t want to do things (I Want to Be Happy; It’s Not My Fault I Can’t Be Happy), it’s that I can’t do things because of bipolar depression. It’s an absolute inability. It’s a brick wall between me and everything else. I can try as hard as I want and I, literally, won’t be able to do things. This is not mere disinterest and this is not simply a lack of motivation (Bipolar Depression: Anhedonia, Lack of Pleasure and Motivation). This is impossibility at its finest.

How Can You Not Be Able to Do Something Because of Bipolar Depression?

I know people don’t get this, because they think their brains are slaves to them and not the other way around, but this isn’t true. Really, without your brain working with you, you wouldn’t be able to do a thing. Check out someone with brain damage some time. There are things they can’t do because, really, we are slaves to our brains.

And in the case of bipolar depression, your brain physically changes and, to me, becomes my enemy (The Mind-Brain Split). I find it’s like asking a computer to compute pi to the 245th digit but with the computer being powered by a gerbil. It’s like asking a person with severely atrophied leg muscles to run. A computer can do that, legs can do that, just not that particular computer or those particular legs.

What Can You Not Do Because of Bipolar Depression?

Um, everything?

Okay, that’s not true. My basic vital signs remain, even in a very severe bipolar depression. But bipolar depression can make it impossible to shower, cook, work or even eat. Those are the things people think of when they think of not being able to do “things.” But there are other things, too.

Because of bipolar depression at times I can’t use a phone; I can’t change the channel on the TV; I can’t even move to make myself more comfortable on the couch.

So What Can You Do When You Can’t Do Anything Because of Bipolar Depression?

Bipolar depression can make it so you can't do anything. But you can fight this. Do this when you can't do anything due to bipolar depression.So when you’re trapped in a body with a brain that won’t work and only sends pain signals, what can you do? Can you fight the inability?

It’s like everything: you need to focus on what’s left. You need to focus on what you can do.

You can breathe, so take a deep breath. Take a few. Use breathing techniques.

You can blink, so close your eyes and force thoughts that you want into your mind.

You can think, so choose to deal with the present moment and not be a complete victim to it.

You can take the small amount of power you still have back. Bipolar depression is holding you down with the weight of a thousand worlds but it still can’t have you.

I know what it’s like to be trapped in that place and I know what it’s like to be controlled by a sick brain (A Sick Brain and a Mind Trying to Deal with It). But I’ve found if I take what little I can do and focus on that, I can build on it. I can’t make the pain go away – nothing can in that moment – but I can find it within myself to fight it.

I try to accept the pain. I try to acknowledge the pain. I try to say to myself, “Yes, walking to the kitchen to get a glass of water is impossibly painful, but maybe I could try anyway.” Because maybe if I acknowledge how much pain there is and how much I really hurt, I can take its power to control me away. A bit. A little, tiny bit.

But even if I can’t build on it, and let’s face it, sometimes the impossible is just the impossible and there’s no working around it, at least I can still say I tried. I didn’t give up. I did what I could. I blinked, I breathed, I thought. And some days, that just has to be good enough.

Image: [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.