Nihilist Cowboy

A Sick Man, A Spiteful Man, An Unattractive Man
2021-01-22 20:25:00 (UTC)

Manic Musings

My doctor believes that I have bipolar disorder, but I am not 100% convinced. Manic episodes have popped up in my life in 2012, 2017, and now in 2021. This feeling is absolutely dreadful; my depression spells are manageable, but this is hell. Wednesday morning, I woke up just like any other day. The last few nights I have not exactly been sleeping right, yet I woke up feeling refreshed about an hour before my usual get up time. I threw on my shirt, made sure my tie was on straight, and I even made sure my face had a clean shave. I felt invigorated for the first time in months. At work, I absolutely excelled throughout the day; I finished my paperwork early, and even was able to teach an attractive intern how to write group notes without losing my cool. My nerves still get to me when talking to a beautiful woman. For the life of me I cant figure out why something as abstract and arbitrary as beauty can completely ruin my composure.

Anyways, I left full of energy and went to my regular Wednesday doctor's appointment. My vitals were slightly elevated, but I did not see a need for concern. That night, I slept about 5 hours, dreamed about the beautiful woman, dreamed about just killing it at work, good dreams, intense but good. 4:30 hit and I was laying in bed wide awake. I felt jittery, like something was wrong. At work my mind was racing about yesterday's discussion.

Last night, my sleep totaled less than 4 hours; my resting pulse was 105, and I was short of breath. My mind was working so fast I could not keep any thought in my head for more than a minute or so. There was no way that I could get any work accomplished today. People were talking to me in the hallway but I just walked in what felt like a trancelike state and could not even acknowledge the folks in the hall. at 12pm, my watch read my resting pulse sitting at my desk as 125; while sitting there I started to dream with my eyes wide open, thoughts of taking over the world, thoughts of walking up to the beautiful woman and ask for her snap (I really wanted to get her snap). Finally, I felt my mental faculties declining and I realized that I have been entering a state of mania. My boss was off today so I could have snuck out and went home. Absolutely no way that I could have talked to patients and conducted an assessment today if the need arised. I guess I finally "snapped" back to reality when my phone went off. An emergency situation happened with a patient's legal status and I had to change a patient's discharge plan.

5:30PM Resting heartrate 113bpm. I was again walking in what I can only describe in a trancelike state. This time I was standing in the produce section at walmart. My mind was racing, this time it was about the meaning of life. I want to explore this subject when I am more mentally awake, but something on my mind was the apparent misery. I scanned my eyes around the drowning florescent lit room; almost everybody looked absolutely miserable. Couples were arguing, screaming children across the entire monstrosity of the store, and the eyes of the people just seemed dead.

Why does the entire world seem so miserable? Why would people sacrifice their life and dreams to serve others? Is it because they do what is expected of them instead of what they actually want? These are the thoughts running through my head. Maybe it is the capitalist consumer society that makes everybody just lose the will to live?

I want to explore these topics in more detail when I am feeling better. I am worried because of what happened the last two episodes I had. In 2012, I slept a total of 5 hours in a 72 hour period. I had a massive panic attack and ended up driving off in the middle of nowhere about 60 miles from where I was living and about 100 miles from home. In 2017, in my manic state I cheated on the girl I was dating at the time by having a long makeout session with a friend of mine. This friend was having some sort of rhythmic issues and asked me to drive her to the hospital. After spending half the night in the ER with her I took her home. She pulled me in and pushed me against my truck kissing me. I was very attracted to her, but felt guilty about doing that while dating someone. Now after writing that down, I have never told a soul. Holy crap I am an awful person. Just a few months after this incident was my incident with Elizabeth that I discussed in the "Projects" entry.

I plan on hopefully falling asleep and returning to some sort of normalcy. While I love feeling top of the world, I do not love having the feeling of losing my mind. I emphasize with the patients that I serve who go through the same thing. This is my worst mental health episode since becoming a professional.

Am I going crazy?




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