Manic Depression Blows

♬ ♪ ∞ ♥ ☄ ☮ ★ ...
http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/pix0/ups_n_downs/manic_depression.html

Great Aunt Althea

Rose, 'Are you the brown one?...Are you Jewish?'...Great Aunt
had a way of blowing your mind...(1977)
(update) I didn't figure out we were underground jews until 2019.
Yup, that is what happens when Father
let the me figure things out for myself.
Autism Spectrum = Aurtism Spectrum
I also figured this out in 2018.
I know, I know, am eye D.U.M.B. or whah?
not any more

Aunt 'Althea" had been a brilliant mind, medical student, studying to become a doctor in the 50's. She had a manic depressive related breakdown, in her twenties, and her father had her lobotomized. She was institutionalized the rest of her life. Her sister, our 'Bubby, would bring her home to spend the holidays with us.

Althea was tall and had girth to her, with a bobbed hair do, horned rimmed glasses, possessing a mysterious intelligence behind her (?wounded?) views on stuff.  (She really loved my father.)  We'd all kind of try to interact with her quick while being nice to her - then scoot away as she ,,,kind of ... admittedly intimidated a little sometimes.  It became a ...kind of... fun game for us to do the 'try to be nice then scoot, thing.  Would bring the Newsweek magazine a few inches from her face to read, and seemed to read at the speed of light, animatedly moving her face along the pages, scanning at top speed, taking only a few seconds on some pages but seeming to take it all in. She'd ask really weird questions and cared mainly about over eating and drinking. Bubby had to make sure she did the simplest things.  Poor Althea.

Thing is, we all loved her, especially because her sister our Bubby did, who us kids adored of course and looked up to, what kid isn't thrilled to have a grandmother dote on you smiling.  Bubby Florence had a very strong, deep heart.  (We were heartbroken when it was her time to go, and especially for Althea.  She and her sister succumbed relatively soon after one another.)

Althea had a way to come up to you and ask in a very 'ad alta' (top of the) voice, 'oh, are you the brown one?' Or 'the 'blue' one, or whatever the color of your eyes or hair were. This was just another reinforcement of the (internalised) terror of could happen to one if anyone found out you too were manic depressive.  Even if it had happened a few generations before, that sick kinda stuff has been known to be perpetrated by some leftover sickos posing as docs.  All kindsa horror stories about it, yada yada yada but there were real life Nurse Ratchets still hunting the night shifts of hospitals for us kinds of folk even in my day (70s).

Althea had a conventional lobotomy, I think, but her eyes were wall-eyed, like it could have been ocular.  I don't know. There were more terrors lurking out in reality... 'nuff said.  Poor Althea.

We loved you very much even though we were a little intimidated by you, old girl.  Here's a bouquet of roses to your memory, 'Althea' ~ Great Aunt Rose

Year 11 'Child Onset Bipolar' Labeled

No.  Just turned eleven when the hallucinations began. The first day of sixth grade, in stupidville snot town, assatwoshetts...cringing, (despised school) sitting like a brick in homeroom and a huge sound/visual burns a path down from the back of my head to the bottom of my vision. I was already completely terrified, hated being forced back to the States, totally unaware of what the hell was happening, and this just escalated. Talk about blowing your mind.

That study that just came out about kids interpreting neutral facial expressions as hostility and reacting with fear through some deformed part of the brain. I totally relate to that. I was like that since a tiny child - painfully shy. It was painful to look strangers in the eyes till about 27.

It's been 34 hellish roller coast years since that day in sixth grade, but still kicking, having learned so much. I accept the hallucinations now, even embrace them. See 'Covert Hallucinating' post next. At first it was bewildering - in a constant state of terror. Panic attacks, racing heart, blushing. ptsd?

Now, can actually either hold on for dear life, or enjoy them. There is this hallway room in this old ivy school that has wooden walls and in the last century it was a dining or ball room. When I walk through there get the strangest feeling, like there are people from the olden days all over the place in bustles and victorian outfits, smoking cigarettes. Now, it's totally strange and I feel so self conscious walking through there - can see them, it's such a head trip, it's comical. I love the diversity of the students there, it's been such a long time that I've taken that breath of relief. There are some real putzes that go to that school as well. Hated school. Try, get sick, lose the year and start over, and over and over, with nothing but the debt and trying to forget bad memories embarrassed as hell of my own behavior.

It's been a long crazy road.

I digress...have come quite a ways and want to give some pointers to bipolar child onset kids. A little experience with bipolar goes a longer way. Always had this dream to help kids - but alltheseyears afraid of coming out and blackballing myself from getting work, getting ostracized, etc. And also the awesome responsibility of trying to teach precious kids, when I was and am still a mess for so many decades. What a kick in the butt. Carrying around secrets hurts your heart*Chest pains. Bipolar child onset can be heartbreaking if you don't have good help, and a little luck. It takes a special education, which these kids can sometimes be gifted in ways that can be utilised to compensate. And these kids can at times develop or have other complications as well. Could some suffering be ameliorated, please?

Want to somehow help kids. How about by helping their care givers? My mind reaches out to the universe, for the greater good, so be it, and so it is.