Shut up and take your pills

I’m not against medication for bipolar disorder per se. But I’m against ignorance. And if you think medication is your only route to relief from bipolar then you may be ignorant of your other options. If you learn of those options from someone with proof that they work and don’t investigate further? Well, now you’re just being plain ignorant.

My symptoms worsened every year for almost eight years. I ate medications like I was being paid to do so. They did not work well or at all depending on the scenario. Desperation drove me to find other answers outside of the accepted norm. Not only did I find them but they also gave me my life back. I learned to address what the medication does not.

This brings me to the issues surrounding medication that bipolar people can come up against:


-You hate how your meds make you feel. I personally took so many combinations and types of meds that I think I got to experience every single side effect there is to be had. I was lethargic, numb, emotionless, impotent, groggy, too hungry, too thirsty, tired and my body malfunctioned physically from reactions to some of the meds. I dealt with all of that. I met many others who said they felt the same things over time. We all hated the side effects.


That hatred then leads you to stop taking your meds out of pain and disgust. You don’t know whether you feel worse from the illness or the drugs you take to fight it. But once you stop, your really bad symptoms return with a vengeance; the symptoms that compel you to do life altering evil things. You go from lethargic to feeling shattered, frayed. You act like a disaster and you feel like one. So you go back on your meds. The whole crappy cycle repeats.


-You stop taking your meds out of a false sense of “I’m cured!” This is the flip side to the above point. Your meds are actually doing just what they’re intended to do and you feel fine. So fine in fact, that you trick yourself into thinking the illness has passed. You actually believe such a thought is valid. It’s proof in itself that you are NOT healed! Quite the load of irony this disease.


I did it more than once. It’s as simple as it sounds. I felt fine. No need to further medicate. No amount of talking from my family or friends could convince me otherwise. “They just don’t get it”, I’d think.


A few hours, days, weeks later, I’d hear the air horn blowing on that log truck of returning symptoms right before it psychically slammed back into my mind. I would then perform just the absolute worst show of mental breakdown that you’d ever care to see. Life would then become ER visits and desperate calls to doctors, maybe some cops, who knows? I used to get pretty creative in these moments.

It’s painfully common for the ill to fall for their own lies this way.


-Can’t afford meds. This I can’t even imagine. I will say that when a Force Ten panic attack hit, it was nice to have a large jar of tranqs of some sort on hand. To not even have that safety net, I can’t imagine the horror. I suffered so badly WITH medication that it’s beyond me to try to envision having no help whatsoever. But that’s the sad reality for many bipolar people. They’re too whacked to hold a job, so no insurance. From there many have no family or if they do, the family has no money. They just tough it out. That, all by itself can go straight to full blown insanity or suicide.


I never was without access to meds but I experienced something similar. When I finally discovered what would ultimately become the first step in my system for getting well again, I only had enough money to cover a few months of care. I had weaned off my meds and was feeling health and wellness slowly returning to me like I hadn’t felt in many years. My head was clearing; my symptoms were weakening; I was becoming human again. Then I ran out of cash.


In desperation, I returned to taking meds as they were covered by the Veteran’s Administration (I’m a Marine Gulf War vet) and I had to have something in there to do battle with. All my symptoms came back or returned to full strength. I was broke and on meds for six months and mentally I was a wreck like nothing had changed. My family said the transformation was a nightmare and happened almost the moment I went back on meds.


But in month seven I became flush again and returned to the more healthy practices and weaned off my meds. Almost immediately I began to improve. And from that point on I just got better and better in measurable fashion. Now let me be clear: do NOT stop taking your meds! That is a train wreck of an idea. Unless…you have an option that replaces them. These options exist and thousands have proven they work. I am but one of those thousands.

Ken Jensen is the author of "It Takes Guts To Be Me: How An Ex Marine Beat Bipolarism". Sign up for his free newsletter: www.ittakesgutstobeme.com