Cara Lisette

The Price of Mania

Parts of mania are fun.

There’s no point lying about that. The early days of being happy and excitable and everything being fun and spending all your money and getting nice things in return and having good ideas about all the things you can do and make and write and read…is fun.

It stops being fun after a while. It’s too quick. You can’t sit still, you can’t get your ideas out, your brain feels like it’s going to explode with all the information in it and you can’t do everything it wants to do quick enough. Other people are a barrier to doing everything you want to do, like staying up all night to work on all your excellent projects and buying everything you want to buy. You don’t eat or drink because you don’t even think about it because you’re too busy thinking about and working on all your excellent projects. You become irritable and frustrated.

Mania is expensive, yes. It’s expensive in time, in money and in physical health. But for me, the biggest expense I pay is the crash. The horrible anxiety as you check your bank account and try to add up where all your money went. The extreme exhaustion that takes over your mind and body. The sadness as you reflect upon what has happened, and how you’ve got to this point again.

Often the price of mania, for me, is depression. It doesn’t always last long and it’s not always severe, but it is probably going to happen. And I truly wish, in those early days of hypomania, when I am excited and colours look brighter and all music is amazing and everyone is wonderful, that I could remind myself of the trade off I am making. That actually, maybe stability isn’t boring, and it’s exactly how I want to live. That what comes up must come down. That this feeling cannot be sustained.

But I can’t. I don’t know if I can’t because I don’t realise, or if I can’t because I don’t want to. And if it is because I don’t want to, is that because I enjoy hypomania, or because I hate having to dissect every mood I have just in case it’s a symptom?

Maybe next time I will catch it early. Maybe I’ll read this post back and it will remind me to slow down and to get help as early as possible.

All I can do is take each episode and learn from it as best I can.

I’ll remind myself of that next time.

14 comments

  2. you can usually nip mania in the bud by taking 5htp then you can try inositol everyday just a small scoop of it
    mania is caused by a build up and inability to synthesize dopamine so you balance it out with serotonin ie GABA, taurine etc but be careful of the dosage
    inositol is an amino acid and is amazing for everyday maintenance – keeping mania at bay – bc it helps neurons communicate correctly
    but big Pharma don’t want you to know that

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  3. I experience the same type of mania almost, though mine is hypomania. I spend money and stay up until 4 or 5 in the morning to work on things, and I get really productive when I’m at work. It makes me feel “normal,” or that I’m functioning like other people. I definitely get where you’re coming from.

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  6. I have what I call memory blocks. When I’ve had a bad episode, mine is primarily depression nowadays rather than hypomania, it’s like all memories of the experience are packaged up and locked up somewhere hidden away. Only when I get I’ll again that box opens with a massive wallop and I remember the pain and trauma of what it was really like and what I’m going to go through again. It really sucks big time. Jo

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