Touched with fire

by Emma-Jayne Saanen

As featured in the Winter 2008 and Spring/Summer 2009 edition of Luciole Press

Lots of people are afraid of what they don't understand. Manic depression is one of those things. Emma has what doctors term a bipolar disorder. This is how one manic depressive has learned to live with being touched with fire.

I am mentally ill. I don't know for sure what illness it is. It was suggested by counsellors and psychiatric nurses I've encountered that it is some sort of bipolar disorder, which I prefer calling manic depression - it sounds so much better.

I did not get a complete diagnosis. The problem is that the psychiatric profession, in order to diagnose and cure, requires their clients to be passive. That shit doesn't fly with me. In fact my last attempt at being diagnosed was such a failure, I tried to kill myself. That was about 2003-4. It's now 2008. I'm not sure exactly what makes me different from most people. At first the thought of being "not normal" terrified me, but now after several years of simply being, I can embrace this part of me.

On depression

Most of you can understand depression. We all get depressed.

For me, it starts as a dead weight in my chest, just behind my sternum. Behind my sternum is an empty space, a heavy empty space. It expands, and takes up a lot of the area my lungs need.

It physically pulls me down. I carry my body differently. Everything slumps. My arms and legs become heavier and heavier. The weight in my chest spreads through my body, from the tips of my toes to my head.

When it hits my head, it mentally pulls me down. The physical empty space becomes an emotional empty space. I may as well be dead. Then the flood comes in: every negative aspect of my personality, my relationships and my lifestyle becomes magnified. I begin to question myself, and believe that all of the horrible things I've done define me. I suddenly wonder why people bother with me, and why I even bother with myself.

I lead a worthless existence. I withdraw from the world, rather than subject people to the disgusting, pitiful poor excuse for a human being I am.

We all experience this, in varying degrees. But imagine having it without a trigger, without a cause. Everything is marvellous, then snap - your world is at an end and nobody can save you.

You are trapped in every terrible thought of deed you've ever had or done.

On mania

Mania. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?

I feel a little bit buzzy. Ideas spring to mind faster than you can grasp them. I talk to people, try to explain, but they don't understand. In frustration, I decide to charge ahead and get on with things myself. But then, in the midst of that, I forget what I was doing. But it's okay! A far grander plan has formed, and I charge head first into that instead.

I don't need to eat or sleep. No really, I don't. It's all rumours. Trivial things like that just get in the way! Things need to happen and they need to happen now.

Other people around me can't see it - they can't see the bigger plan. But I know how important my task is, and it must get done. I can't wait around for people to catch up with me.

Then the flaws start to appear, and I tear up the plans, curse the gods and start again. Hours become days, and by the end I have nothing to show but discarded drawings, a pile of torn through books and a half-tiled bathroom.

It sounds very amusing, but in reality it's terrifying. I become locked into a thought pattern and can't get out of it until something else comes along, tempting me with whatever glamour it possesses. I have been trapped for days considering insignificant things, while my work, relationships and health go down the drain.

Mania works really well with depression. You obsess over the tiny details of your life, you become panicked, you run to people for help and snap at any suggestion they make. You lie awake at night, planning on how to make yourself disappear. You cannot settle, the weight of the depression constantly fights with the restlessness and agitation of the mania.

On self-harm...

I cut myself with a razor blade on my left forearm or on either thigh. Recently, I've taking to biting and pinching myself, and twisting my joints in a way to cause extreme pain without leaving marks. My favoured place is my left arm.

Even the people closest to me, who accept the depression and mania, do not accept the self harm. I try not to blame them - I mean it must be scary to see someone so desperate to feel better that they would harm themselves.

Self harm, unpleasant though it may seem, is sometimes the only way I can escape the locked-in thought patterns of my condition. It's quite beautiful.

I become so overwhelmed with my feelings, so stressed and so trapped and so locked-in to a thought pattern the only way out is a short, sharp shock to my physical body .It re-awakens my normal consciousness. Depending on the balance of mania and depression, this can help me feel happy to be alive, to still be here, and can help me feel in control of my own life. It really is a wonderful feeling, to be free.

I do tell the people close to me that I will stop hurting myself, but really I have no intention to. People who say they love me do not love me unconditionally. They judge me. It's not their fault, we all judge others. I'm seen as a failure, for having to take such abhorrent action to deal with things everybody else can take in their stride.

But who are the real failures? I'm not. Injuring myself is my survival mechanism. One little cut is all it takes to be me again. I'm surviving. I'm still here, in spite of things that are thrown at me. The real failures are the ones who get knocked down by life and circumstance, and don't have the tools to get back up again.

On suicide...

I have tried to take my life once. I deliberately walked in front of a bus after a frustrating session with my psychiatrist. He couldn't help me. He could drug me up, and could watch me as one watches animals in the zoo, but he couldn't fucking help. I needed advice and assistance, and he just sat there, with his clipboard, taking notes.

Was that how my life was going to be from now on?

So I took what I deemed to be reasonable action, and walked out in front of an oncoming bus.

I was saved that day, for some reason. The bus driver did mange to brake, and (quite rightly) gave me dog's abuse. I was jeered by passers-by, and stared at from shop windows. I went home and went to my bed.

I've never seriously considered killing myself again.

However, I do feel suicidal on a semi-regular basis. For me, there are two different types of suicidal feelings: you want to die or you don't want to live any more. I am lucky, nearly all of my feelings are of the second type.

At times, I feel my life is so unbearable that it would be great if everything could just stop. I'd like to hide in a bubble, and hibernate until I feel ready to face the day again. Perhaps to some of you, describing this as suicidal might seem melodramatic. Maybe it is. But the feeling of wanting to completely disappear from the world is real. Unlike depression and mania, I usually cannot help myself out of this frame of mind. I need to be reminded by the people around me that I have to keep going.

Suicide can be a selfish act. Individuals are never really individual: they are a part of the lives of others. Taking yourself out of that human network affects more than just you. Remember that - the concept of an interconnected web of relationships has saved me numerous times.

Why I deal with it all

In the introduction, I said I had a mental illness. I dislike the word "illness". I am ill, but it's not something that can be cured. My brain is wired differently, that's all. The word illness implies that by medicating and bandaging, everything will be a-okay. This simply isn't true.

I've always been this way, but it only came to light after dealing with several issues in my life. I struggled with accepting it. I was made to feel abnormal - someone who needed to be fixed in order to function. But that's not true.

I may feel broken at times, but I am not broken.

I may feel incomplete, but I am all the person I need to be.

It can be scary, and it can be lonely. But there are silver linings in this storm cloud. I am at my most creative and expressive during my bad days. I have a unique view of the world, which I value. My depression offers me introspective skills and my mania offers me drive and passion - the touch of fire. I can focus my condition at times, and I wouldn't want to give that up.

Being like this does get me down sometimes, but I have the support of a few good friends who offer me additional strength. I'll admit it, without them being this way would be a burden I could not carry. The beauty of being like this is that you do see who your true friends are.

I embrace my mental condition because it is me. It's not something to be hidden away, or something to be cured - to do so would be changing an integral part of who I am. Any suggestion that I need to go and be fixed, I take as a personal insult. You may as well ask me to stop being white, or to not have a female body. Something clearly isn't right with me, yes, but that doesn't mean there is something inherently wrong.

I am an intelligent, amusing, bewildering and downright silly person, who just so happens to have a mind that functions differently from the status quo.

There's no need to be scared.

Visit: www.depressionhelp.org.uk

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