the beach episode
Whenever I descend into a mental health episode (often, but not always, triggered by cycle-related hormonal changes), there’s very specific signs both my wife and I pick up on. She usually notices it earlier than me, though.
The pattern is always the same:
- Issues falling asleep, feeling inexplicably sad and without energy, not finding joy in anything I usually like, or possibly sleeping almost all day.
- Getting up the next morning with a very, very low tolerance for clutter, or even owning anything more than bare necessities.
- Being extremely sensitive to dirt, smells, messes, crumbs and so on. The entire living space and my body starts to feel contaminated.
- This causing me to spiral and feeling overwhelmed, ranting about how the apartment is hopeless, that I wish I could just leave it or burn it down, that I wanna sell everything, what needs to be done etc.
- I start cleaning and tidying up for hours in a really tense way, maybe even decluttering, if I can manage and am not frozen in overwhelm. If you step in at that moment to tell me it isn’t even that bad or that I should keep whatever I wanna throw out in that moment, my laser eyes will turn you into dust (I wish).
- Everything feels very urgent, like I need to do it now or else something really bad will happen; as if I will lose control and this is the last moment to turn it around. Being able to do nothing to alleviate the situation makes me feel sick. My thoughts race and I am stuck in a loop.
- I’m coping with fantasizing about drastic decisions: Emigrating to a different country, quitting my job, booking a trip on a whim, suicide, selling everything, rearranging my apartment, ending relationships or friendships, deleting accounts, redesigning my entire website and blog from scratch, exiting groups, and so on.
Because it is all so repetitive (been happening for over a decade) and well-known to me by now, I see it for what it is and it doesn’t actually cause any harm, as I do not end up even close to making these drastic decisions. I am still in control. At worst, I used to unfriend people or exit groups, but even that has stopped.
I wouldn’t say my opinions snd obsessions during that time have no leg to stand on; I have a high standard for what my apartment is supposed to look like, and it’s not always up to par. I really wanna switch jobs, move, or change some blog design things some time. But how I feel about it is dramatically amplified, and introducing a very unfitting level of urgency, life-or-death panic about it all.
It almost feels like it’s taking a similar pathway to a phase of hyperfocus, but in a cursed way. It also feels like seeking validation and good feelings/a feeling of control from changing things or cleaning, which would make sense for my brain to wanna do when I feel depressed. Like it’s searching for anything that could help.
Since some people might be wondering: It doesn’t fulfill the criteria for mania. My anxiety just gets elevated, and my brain decides to handle it in a weird way. I don’t feel happy or energized. Since it is hormonal, I imagine it is related to what some pregnant people go through with their sensitivity to their surroundings.
As this is a largely offline thing, I can usually isolate it well and not say a peep about it happening online. I hope I don’t seem weirdly different in my blog posts during it, I genuinely can’t tell.
I’m actually going through it again right now, since last week. Dienogest (hormone medication for this mood stuff, PMOD and endometriosis) bought me a while of stability when I tried it from March to mid of May, and I appreciate that; it showed me how often it happened and how bad it really was. I stopped taking it since then because it caused some excessive bleeding, but am restarting it now after a doctor’s appointment today.
It’s not all bad. The things I am so inappropriately upset about are true/exist, it’s just my reaction that is a problem. I can harness the sense of urgency and tackle these issues in a constructive way and get things done that I have put off for too long.
For example, the sneakers I wear the most have been falling apart so much that walking in them causes blisters and chafing and stuff to poke me while walking. Still, I kept procrastinating on buying new ones. Today, after a particularly exhausting morning in this mental health episode, I bought two new pairs of shoes and was able to discard the broken ones.
I also lost my mind about the clutter so much that I ended up discussing new shelf units with my wife, who kindly measured everything out and had good ideas, so we ended up ordering some together and will pick them up tomorrow. It wasn’t a compulsive purchase I’d regret for something I don’t actually need, but instead, I used my tumultuous emotions to finally tackle the issue of needing to use my space more efficiently now, and the decision was made deliberately over the span of a couple hours. I need more storage for more hobbies I acquired over the last years, and things my wife keeps here that don’t yet have their own proper spot. The way things are right now was supposed to be a temporary state until we can move somewhere bigger, but I’ve accepted that this could take years, so I wanna invest into making it comfortable now. In the near future, I also wanna have more storage in the kitchen and bathroom, finally donate the clothes I decided to get rid of, and tidy up the basement.
I also felt equally compelled to switch email providers and get 98% of account/newsletter email switching done, updated all saved passwords, and removed saved passwords for accounts that no longer exist.
I’m happy that I was able to use my struggle for good today. I still hate everything else about it, and that it’s so uncomfortable and stressful in my head right now, but at least I got that. Can’t wait until I’m stabilized again.
Reply via email
Published