Tristram

It’s been a long time since I took charge of a team and led, I found I hadn’t lost my touch, three staff down and the busiest day we have had at work so far and this was very much my litmus test.

I got compliments like “we’re blitzing it, we’re going to  be just fine without G” and “Don’t lose it now, you’ve been a star all day” along with others told me I was doing a good job, I’m tired as hell right now and for an hour was the only person in the entire office handling everything.

I like it when it gets like that, my ability to process dozens of thoughts at once means I suit situations like that, I drive people, I motivate the team by competition, “let’s kick the other office’s ass today” and “we spend on average one minute longer on the phone per call than the other team and it’s US that keeps this place running” I like to tell people they CAN do it, you WILL get your target today, I believe in us and I know we can do it.

It was nice after what has been a hard week to hear people say that despite how busy it’s been they have had fun.

It was a worth while day, a satisfying one too but boy I need a drink now!

Yes, it’s a strong title and yes it’s a strong subject and once again, I need to be vague, I will probably re write a fuller version of this over at Blogspot but for now, those of you who know me and know the people I’m refering too, please comment but don’t use any names ok? After all, her journal is set to private for a reason, I don’t mind people seeing and knowing but I have to protect her privacy above all else.

Yes, I’m metnally ill, call it a condition if it makes you feel better, call it all in my head and an excuse to slack off if you like too (it is after all IN my head that is the problem) I’ve heard it all before and the phrase “water off a ducks back” is pretty apt.

I’m Bi Polar and for the most part the very definition of the word “Manic” in fact, a medical journal describing manic behaviour could have been written about me, it sounded like it was talking about me personally!

But I’m not here to talk about me and my illness, I’m here to talk about how it takes it’s toll on the people you care about, the people who ultimately care for you, love you and have to deal with you on a day to day basis.

You become insular when you’re Bi Polar (well I do at least) you become very self dependent, you make everything about you, your rules, your way, everything is structured, it helps keep a mind that is prone to flick from thought to thought like a bored channel surfer in order.

You also become used to people tip toeing around you, after all, don’t want to rouse the crazy guy right? it’s easy to get your own way, you usually win all the fights, because you can always fall back on your “illness” you have to have these rules because you’re the ill one and how dare they not obey them and follow them to the letter all the time!

How do you argue with that? I mean you want to have your say but the other person has a huge episode and you feel like it’s your fault. It’s the ultimate in emotional blackmail and you can fall into a routine where you sometimes use that as a weapon without realising it.

Another thing about being Manic is you sometimes don’t realise you even are Manic, it’s like being in the centre of a storm, everything around you is a whirling torrent of destruction but you are right in the eye of it and it’s calm and mellow, why is everyone panicking? you can see nothing wrong, why are people so upset?

It’s tough on the people around you, VERY tough, in fact it’s damn hard on them and as you repeatedly bash them into the floor and make them feel like they always have to take a backseat to you and if they protest? well you can play the mental illness card and then they look like they’re just being mean.

So it’s hard for me to keep friends, most get fed up with it, can’t handle it and back off and I don’t blame them one bit, I wouldn’t want to deal with me either, I’m selfish, self centered, direct, aggressive, have a high opinion of myself and my own importance and I am guilty of not listening to the people who matter the most to me.

This weekend, I took a long, hard look at myself, viewing myself from the outside in. Part of my condition is that how I’m feeling inside can have physical manifestations and me throwing up at what I saw in myself should give you an indication of how I felt about it.

I have been hearing but not listening, putting myself first, treating the person I love the most so badly, I’m shocked now that she is even still around, I would have kicked my sorry backside to the curb long ago.

I have said some truly nasty and unforgivable things, screamed at her, shouted, just not been nice and then fallen back on the all too easy excuse of “I need” and “I have a condition” something I swore I would never do, yet I was doing it as if on auto pilot, I hid behind it, I made her feel like her voice wasn’t being heard, she might as well not say anything because it’s not like I would listen anyway, no point in fighting if she knew she couldn’t win.

I despise people like that, yet I was one all along, it’s a harsh lesson to learn and a real slap in the face, call it a wake up call but we never consider how we effect people around us, we don’t think about them and how hard it is to just love us, correction, how hard we MAKE it for people to love us.

We push too hard, we want too much, we expect perfection, we critise and pick at people and worst of all, we don’t even know we’re doing it.

Of course by “we” I mean “me” but I know others with my condition, my illness, who are just like me, I liked to think I coped with things better than they did, didn’t snap, didn’t punish but I do and BOY am I good at it.

I used to brag how I had never raised my voice to her, well I raised it for the first time a few months ago and then tried to make excuses as to why I wasn’t raising my voice, she was wrong, I was right, so she did all she could do, shut up, because I wasn’t listening anyway.

You can’t control everyone, they don’t dance because you’re playing a tune, they’re not puppets they’re people, I have been grossly unfair, I thought fancy dinners, gushy writing, sparklie jewelry and big vacations were the answer, the key to making her feel special.

What was more important was listening, understanding, helping, making her feel an equal, a partner, that what she said was no less important than what I said, in all that, I was a hideous failure.

Those of you that know us, only usually hear of how great things are, you only ever here of the good things I do, it paints me as the big Saint, a great guy who treats his fiancee like a Princess and it’s not totally untrue, I am capable of being that, I do, do those things.

But what you don’t see, because I don’t want to admit it and because she is too nice to say it, is how down right nasty I can be, how my mood can turn on a dime and then turn again, how I can attack and beat you into the floor (verbally, I have never and will never strike a woman) 

I honestly don’t know why she is still here sometimes, why she sticks around, this is the effect Mental illness can have on others, this is how hard it can be, yet it’s you that gets the sympathy because you’re the ill one.

It’s not fair and she doesn’t deserve it, my soul searching will be followed by me getting help, because for all my bragging of controlling this thing, in so many ways I don’t control it at all.

Sometimes we all need to see beyond ourselves, take a long hard look at the damage we have wrought and stop blaming everyone else or a condition we have and do something about it,  because underneath it all, I love her more than I have ever loved anyone or anything and I have done a crappy job of showing it.

Right now, at this very moment, I have been given a chance to start afresh and I intend to take it, being alone with my thoughts can drive me insane (literally) so it’s ironic that my thoughts have pushed me to spend so much of my time alone.

I’m not going to be held a prisoner by my mind anymore and more importantly, I’m not going to hurt the people around me anymore.

She has given all she has and done her best to make things easy for me, it’s time to return the favour…maybe this post will be a start in that and showing her that I love her.

I’m not writing anywhere near as regulary as I was on the old JS, I think it’s a combination of a lack of motivation to write and also not knowing whether to write here or on Blogspot.

This place still isn’t feeling like home, although it is nice to be in at the very begining of something new, there are a lot of bugs to be worked out and it still feels like a new house, without that lived in feel but it is good to have reconnected with so many old and new friends from JS (as my 67 friends so far can atest)

There are still a good few people missing who have yet to make their way here but it is nice that between here and Blogspot most are still accounted for.

My problem is though, that I grew to like writing at Blogspot and writing here doesn’t feel the same, however I’m not sure who is left at Blogspot to still read my ramblings, so I’m not sure what to do.

Write here and be as vague as possible until the privacy options and friends and faves options kick in, or write at Blogspot and keep this place for the social side of things or try to manage both places?

I’m not sure how I feel about the new JS right now, I’m not sure if I can write what I really want to here, so I guess I will just be as vague as I can be and put it out there anyway.

I’m feeling not quite good enough right now, not the person I thought I was, not enough or maybe too much? I dunno, I just feel like I failed.

I came home from work sick today, I couldn’t stop throwing up, then I slept for a little while and went to the Doctors, I let the flood gates open, I’m not managing things well, I’m not coping like I know I should be, I’m not doing that I should be doing, I’m not there for someone like I could be.

It’s funny how silence can shatter you, worse than words, silence says nothing, it doesn’t get angry or sad it just hangs in the air and knocks the wind right out of you.

I thought I was one person and then recently found out I was another, I didn’t know what I was doing to people by the way I was being, I saw myself as the big hero, Mr Fixit, who would just wrap you up in his arms and make it all better.

I’m not though, I’m the big scary ogre who you watch what you say around otherwise he may just bite your head off.

I’m just hoping I can be the hero again and wondering if it’s too late.

So Js it seems is back and I have one thing to say…IT’S WEIRD!!