YOu are being awfully hard on your self.
Please try to not judge yourself.
YOu sound like a wonderful woman and it sounds like you are gaining some insight to the areas that aer of concern.
This is a huge accomplishment!!!!
recognising the areas then consciously making efforts to break the cycles.
This takes a long time to figure this out.
Keep at it...keep talking, the people in your life who love you understand....
keep on keeping on....
fall down 7 times get up 8.
bizi

I am mainly concerned with how this catches me off-guard- how my percpetions of the world get completely "wonky" and I don't catch it. I really do feel as my mind is not my own at these times. And yes I tend to be too hard on myself, but what I feel when I write these things is "I feel crazy how can I learn to stop it before it happens?" I think this is futile maybe- fixing things before they happen. Ugh.

When i say "I cannot deal with myself this way", I mean that it is literally difficult to be ME- or even IN my body- when I am feeling this way. It is physically exhausting and mentally wonky. I don't mean I don't LIKE myself. I like myself just fine. I just don't have a grasp on reality when these happen.

I talked with a friend of mine. One thing I discovered is that I fear losing those whom I love- maybe even worse, those who love me. Even when they show that they will not leave.

May I ask what mood stabilizer you are on?
and other meds...PM me if you don't want to answer here.
Do your meds seem to help? You sound like those are kind of hypo manic episodes or perhaps you are haivng a hard time with social cues?
Which may have nothing to do with being bipolar...
just a thought...I don't know...
bizi
I do know that I have a very hard time making friends...I joined a gym here about 2 months ago.
Am trying to make friends with some of the ladies in cardio class. I am so eager to make friends that I am afraid that I am scaring them off.
so I am trying to show restaint....
anyway...I think this is more of a personality issue with me...not really a bipolar thingy for me.....
bizi
Edited to add that I have had to say I am sorry many times in my life....for unacceptable behavior......my real friends and family forgive me.

hi. I am on Depakote and Celexa. They have seemed to help, yes. Social cues are not usually an issue for me- I just get confused sometimes. I make friends very easily- lots of people like me. I blend in at judo and I am a very likeable person.

Christopher just stopped by. We talked in the car for an hour. He had dropped off his daughter at practice and had to go get milk. So that was nice of him. I didn't ask him to. We had a chat. I got off my chest- even if a round-about way- what I needed to. So I hope he understands now. Lately it boils down to "Will you love me even when I feel crazy? Even when I do bad things? Will you stick around? I feel so wonderful around you- I fear you don't feel the same." We talked about stuff in general. I told him again "I am through having sex with other people. That is over." As in "I am exclusive". Well, anyway, it made ME feel better. Tired of talking about it now.

I am glad that you guys talked and that you feel better!
Keep talking!
bizi

I have been working with fear lately. I fear failure at jobs. I fear the reactions. Sometimes they are horrid! I fear that if I said what is REALLY on my mind to him, I'd get back "I know..." a sad look and then "I just don't see that between us". Or of being seen as pushy. Am I obsessive, or do I have a right to say "this is upsetting to me that you are not rightly called my boyfriend - that you are the only one who does not call yourself this- as we have been seeing each other for a year now and at least 6 months as dating several times a week, taking our children out together to do stuff, etc.?" See- I only hinted around the fact that I see us as exclusive and he has made comments about me having sex with others. I can't tell if he's joking or not. he said I seemed to overreact to him saying I should trade sex for rent with a friend of my sister... all I could manage out was "I don't like to talk about having sex with other people". *sigh*

If I do not say what is on my mind, it will keep coming back to get me as it has. This "taking it slowly" is all fine with me, but I don't know what is joking about "others' and what is not. I don't feel like emotionally I want to see others- and definitely not sexually.

Thanks for letting me vent. Kinda OT. But I'm so balled up with what is what lately since discovering being bioplar and what it means.

These 2 things stuck out to me.
YOu have the right to have expectations in this relationship. YOu may ask for the truth and for him to be honest with you.

You have the right to be respected.....
Sex is not something to joke with you about...it sounds hurtful and ask for him to drop it....you do get to ask for the perameters of the relationship.
YOu are a person first and happen to have bipolar....remember this...don't let it define you.

Saw my primary dr. today. She wanted to try upping the Depakote, changing the times I take the Depakote and Celexa (i.e. swapping them so Depakote is at night), and adding Trazadone at night for my recent sleeplessness. I said I know that is from anxiety and my mind racing. Other idea is to get a job so my mind isn't always thinking thinking thinking! Just like Wanda Sykes said in a stand-up routine, "Women. We AL-waaaays THINKin'!" lol The med changes are a bit unnerving to me, honestly. up, down, add, subtract.... I would welcome something to help me sleep, of course, when my mind gets to racing, but I would rather have it not race in the first place.

Oh yeah- and I did exchange a few emails with Christopher last night and this morning. Communication is happening. No magic "fixing"- but communication.