-Your lithium levels are fine, you’re fine. You’re keeping up with school, you’re eating. You’re alright.

–Well, why am I so sad then? It obviously wasn’t that deep. He doesn’t even care. And I do, a lot. So, something must be wrong.

Throughout my life, I have often been at odds with my emotions, or more accurately, at odds with their intensity. I experience too much or nothing at all, I care excessively or insufficiently. I get too excited, I fall in love too fast, sorrow hits too hard. Unregulated emotions are a symptom of bipolar.

Whenever I was manic, I struggled for my feelings to not be all-encompassing. Being manic, for me, meant that my body, my mind, and my soul aligned to where I was only capable of experiencing, thinking, expressing one thing, regardless of what thing it was. Being manic, for me, has never (exclusively) been euphoric; often, it was the opposite. All my senses – touch, taste, hearing – feel shatteringly piercing. If what I’m sensing is good, it feels enthralling. If it’s bad, it’s like a prison I can’t escape. Everything is just raw. Immesurably overwhelmed by my own sensations, by my body’s reactions, my anxiety skyrockets to unbearable degrees. When I had been heartbroken in the past, even if it was not that big of a deal, it meant that I was incapable of feeling anything else. I was not capable of thinking, talking, doing anything but dwell on my state of mind. Depressive states, on the other hand, meant feeling absolutely nothing, which honestly, can be just as exasperating.

The one thing they had in common was that I would do anything to make either go away, even if it was destructive. The way I saw it, there was no way that it would be worse than what I was feeling (or the fact that I was not feeling anything) right that moment.

I had been told that once I was medicated that would improve, and largely it did. My emotions are not all-encompassing or completely lacking anymore. Now, for the first time in my life, I was capable of being heartbroken and feeling fine about (and even enjoying) other aspects of my life.

However, I foolishly thought that meant my emotions would now become more logical. I thought that once I wasn’t overcome by them, that I would be able to control them, that I would be able to logic my way in or out of them.  Apparently, (and this is news to me), by definition, emotions are not logical.

My reasoning here was pretty sound:

• Logic reason not to care and stop being sad #1: I went out with this guy for not very long, I moved cities without a real plan to come back.

• Logic reason not to care and stop being sad #2: Even if I were to go back to that city, he doesn’t want to talk to me. I didn’t do anything wrong; there was no big fallout. He simply didn’t want to know anything about me anymore, and I would not want to be in a relationship with someone who is unwilling to communicate.

• Logic reason not to care and stop being sad #3 (the more damning one): He doesn’t even care, and therefore I shouldn’t either!

However, it doesn’t matter how much I keep repeating these reasons to myself, my emotions don’t seem to be dissuaded by them.

–Ok? Can you tell me why I care then?

-I don’t know.

-Can you tell me a way not to care?

-There’s no way not to care… You care.

-How do I make this sensation go away?

-We’ve being over this: You can’t make feelings go away… You have to feel them.

She is wrong there. As I have stated before, in the past, I have very successfully made my feelings go away. When I was very young, I discovered that If I got people to tell me I’m smart and accomplished, then bad sensations went away. Then, I got older, and I found out that being hot was easier than being smart, and compliments on your appearance worked just as well. In my teenage years, I learned that piercings and tattoos do the trick too, but that becomes harder once they are not only 3 dollars behind a supermarket’s parking lot. You can also get drunk, but then someone has to take away your phone, as you could be a drunk texter like me.

I also realized that you could run very very fast, until your lungs start feeling like they’re getting punctured, and you can’t breathe, and then you’re unable to feel anything else but your lungs burning. That led me to come across “hitting yourself with your bedrom door”, which has a similar effect, but you don’t sweat, and you can do it at 3 am. You can also not eat – You can’t really think about anything if you’re hungry or if you’re dizzy and anemic. This also helps you with the compliments part. Conversely, you can eat too much as well (not only because eating yummy foods feels good on its own but because you also can’t think about anything else if you have a tummy ache) (This will not help you with the compliments’ thing). And lastly, there is also always Xanax (but not really: they will not prescribe it to you in the US even if you had been taking it for years as “it’s absolutely insane” to “give 18-year-olds benzodiazepines”).

Anyway, according to her, those were not valid ways to make your emotions go away on account that “they are not ACTUALLY going away” as much as “they are being pushed along”. Considering I had plenty of mental breakdowns across the years, I can see how she might have a point. But then again, I had undiagnosed bipolar disorder? So, was it really the piercings’ fault? When I was in those states, it really felt like my own body was killing itself from within. It felt like I was in a constant battle with myself: I was losing either way, but at least the self-destruction felt good, even if for a fleeting moment.

But here I am at 23, not only having promised my therapist I wouldn’t push my emotions away, seek validation, get piercings, get drunk, hurt myself, not eat, or do drugs; but also, in a place where I don’t really want to: I am not on a battlefield anymore. I no longer need to run away from them, I can go through them… I just don’t know how. Here I am at 23, and today more than ever, I’m painfully aware that I have little to show for the 20+ years of therapy, other than an almost annoying self-awareness and never having (successfully) killed myself. But no coping skills, no healthy ones at least.

I took my ukelele out. I know some people play instruments as a coping skill. I bought a ukelele when a guy I was in love with told me I needed a hobby so I wouldn’t be so insecure (because I thought he was lying to me). The only thing I think about when I see the ukelele is that I bought it to prove to a guy that I was trying to be better, even if I had nothing to be better for, since I wasn’t insecure: he WAS lying… and also that I am actually insecure.

I took my paints out: Painting is a coping skill, I think. Mindfulness and the sort. But the smell gave me a headache. I also don’t know how to paint. And It makes a mess, and I never clean it up.

And so, I started writing. I have historically hated journaling. Mostly due to the fact I do feel better when I do it, and I hate other people being right. But also because it feels like it just gets lost in space, it feels inconsequential. There’s something about putting your thoughts out in the universe, even if nobody else reads them, that makes it feel a little more transcendental, like they matter. And most importantly: journaling is not a hobby, but writing a blog is. And that guy from my past was right about one thing: I do really need a hobby (not the ukelele, I suck at it).