To the Man Who Loves Me Through the Good and Bad Days With Bipolar Disorder
Although this is a letter to my husband, I wish all men and women with a spouse struggling with bipolar disorder could read this. I know it is hard. I’ve seen it in my husband’s eyes when the days get worse, when the fights erupt and my illness rages. I can see him wonder if it will ever end.
• What is Bipolar disorder?
But, I want to promise you, it does get better. With medication, doctors and support you will get better, maybe not cured, but better. You can live again. You can be stable and happy. It is a process that can take a very long time, but it does get better if you stick with it and if you stick with your partner. The reward of being with the real person you love in the end, to me, is worth all the hard times. Please, don’t give up.
Dear Steven,
We started off young in our love, with giggles and flushed cheeks. I lived to be in your presence. My bipolar diagnosis from a few years back wasn’t under control yet, and I often stayed in a hypomanic high.
Being with you made the bad days seem good, and the good days seem euphoric. But, on the ugly days, I could hide the depression away by telling you I was busy. Back then, I didn’t realize how much I was actually struggling. I don’t think you did either.
It is strange now, as I become healthier, how I can look back on the years before and see how far gone I actually was. I can see how my mania and depression made me at my worst. And yet, you loved me just as I was.
Once we were married, things got rocky, as they always do when you mix two totally different lives (even more so with my illness). Yet, you loved me. Over the next three years, my bipolar disorder became more manageable, and I learned how to cope with a mixture of psychiatric help, cognitive therapy, family support and medications.
You loved me through it. You loved me on the good days, and you loved me relentlessly on the bad ones. You kept me in check when the mania overpowered me, and you lifted me up when the depression threatened to drown me. You helped me get closer to a place of mental healing.
But, with healing, there is never a constant upward slope. Sometimes, you fall back a few steps, and sometimes those steps are huge. I was doing so well, living a balanced life. Everything was in check, sleeping, eating, exercising, laughing, loving and managing the illness. Yet, I cracked. My world caved in.
The nightmares happened and the sleepless nights. You became the culprit, the enemy. I tried so hard to distance myself so I wouldn’t hurt you, but I hurt you anyways. Then, the next diagnosis came.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
My rape and abuse in college had finally come to the surface, as I healed in my bipolar disorder. I couldn’t run from it any more. My mind no longer suppressed it. I grew anxious to be touched and scared to be hugged. I cringed at being kissed, and I fled from the idea of sleeping in the same bed. It wasn’t you, it was him, and all he did to me. And yet, you loved me. You loved me endlessly.
On the days when I couldn’t take it, when I yelled, shouted and sobbed, you held me strong until the pain went away. On the days when I couldn’t be touched, you gave me space and let me talk. While my new medication kicked in, diminishing the nightmares, you didn’t budge an inch.
You loved me, every part of me, the raging, the desperate, the hopeless, and ultimately you saw me for who I really was. You saw the woman harbored deep inside of my illnesses. You waited patiently until the real me came back to you again, until I was myself. You continue to love me through it all.
I am your wife. I am your friend. I love you more than life itself. I’d give anything to be with you, and even when I try to push you away, just know this is when I need you the most.
You are my constant, my anchor. On some days, you are the only reason I continue fighting. So, to the man who has loved me through it, through everything I have unintentionally put you through, I owe you everything. You are my hero.
And I love you with all my heart.
My name is Elissa. I’m in my thirties and I’ve battled bipolar disorder for a long time. I now have a handle on it. I believe recovery from mental illness is possible, but not in the sense that it will go away - more in the sense that one learns to manage it while still having a wonderful life. Is this hard? Yes, unbelievably so. Will it take time, time, and more time? Yes. But, most importantly, is it possible to live again despite the hell ravaging your brain and life? Yes. Absolutely. I'm living proof that it is true.
elissa-farmer