Latuda is name-brand fancy medicine for bipolar depression, and I was able to go on it once for a month. It worked really well, better than any of my other medications, but it was too expensive so I switched to generic brand Latuda, Trintillex. Trintillex is fine, but it's not the same. Regardless, I've been off my medication for months. Why? Because I'm God's perfect idiot and am unable to stick to any regimented plan since the history of ever.
I hate the lady in the Latuda commercial, not because I want to go back on it-- although I do-- but because the way she acts stereotypes depression and doesn't characterize what depression is like at all. Another thing: Every bipolar depression medication commercial I see has the actor acting depressed, it never shows the mania. Mania is ugly, it's hard, it's excruciating ecstasy. But if they misrepresent the depression so badly, maybe it's best they leave out mania.
I've been in mania for a few days, although I've just now realized it. I haven't been able to sleep at night at all, most nights (mornings) I fall asleep around 6 am, never before 5. I've been so intensely focused on the things I'm doing I've become unable, or at least struggle a lot, to do the things I need to do. I've played apps I hate for hours on end for days, impulsively bought things, deprived myself of others, it hasn't been good.
Last night my mania peaked and I had a moment of euphoria and feeling on top of the world, and I ended up coming out as trans to my dad. His response in the morning was very kind and supportive, and I'm glad my mental illness hasn't gotten me into something terrible and unsafe this time.
Today I've dropped back to the low that always follows a mania, but I'm still riding the coattails of what was. I'm proud of myself, I guess?
It's taken me three days, but I've taken a shower.
It's taken me four days, but I've changed my clothes.
It's taken me two weeks, but I've done my laundry.
It's taken me months, but I've cleaned my sheets.
My whole body echoes with the vibrations of a vague unspecified pain, and my head and heart especially hurt-- intrinsically linked. I'm trying to release what's pent up in my brain down through my neck, to my shoulders, to my arms, out my fingertips onto the keyboard. But the more I type, the more low I get. I started fast, now I'm trying to keep myself from becoming stuck. My body keeps freezing and I have to shake the ice from my joints; Oiling the hinges, like a Tin Man with too much heart finding out too late the Wizard of Oz doesn't take returns or exchanges.
