When I was younger, there were many things that I didn’t know how to handle. One of those things happened to be what was going on inside my head.

I am diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It is described as a disorder associated with mood swings raging from depressive lows, to manic highs. These can last weeks or months. I can tell you they are not easy to deal with. Sometimes my manic moods hit me at the worst times. I become very angry very quickly and I become very depressed. I feel like my world is crashing down around me, and then I feel like hitting someone. I can become very happy for a few hours or very sad. This is how my daily life is. It’s a struggle, especially when my medication does not work to control these massive mood swings. My thoughts race and most times I’m up for hours when I should be sleeping. Sometimes, I’m even afraid to fall asleep.

Living with bipolar disorder is not easy. It’s a daily challenge. Being unmedicated and being bipolar is hard difficult. You never know what mood will be the next after your manic period is over. Sometimes, it can be scary. There were days when my mom didn’t know who was going to come through the door. She didn’t know how I was going to be, how bad school was for me. That was scary for her too. Sometimes, she didn’t know how to handle me with my manic moods. Sometimes, she did.

Its also challenging living with someone with bipolar disorder too. Every woman in my family has this nasty illness. It’s scary, bipolar is. You never know what you're going to get. Sometimes you're confused on to why your mom is yelling at you about something so small to you, but so massively irritating to her. You wonder why all of a sudden your mom is crying. That’s a scary thing, you don’t understand it at first. Once you learn about it and see it’s apart of you, you begin to understand and you can start to help.

I can tell you that you are more then your diagnoses. You are not your illness. You are worth more then your illness. You are still you. You do not have the name bipolar or post traumatic stress disorder. You do not have the name social anxiety or agoraphobia. You are your own person.

I will tell you it is a daily struggle to be myself. Sometimes I ask myself why I’m like this. I know that it’s not something I can help. I know I can control it though. I know that makes it easier for me to know that I’m not just an endless disaster. I am me. I am not my illness.