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A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

@RainbowAuntie - thank you for your words of encouragement. Have you found a way to drop the anchor in the Hark Moments? I have, some days I can do that. I love your name here, I m having a rainbow enthusiasm at the moment. I bought rainbow fingerless mittens, a rainbow knitted hat. I bought a new large cut crystal and it shines and shines across the room sending moments of now, remember the now. 

Hope you are well.

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

I am going to write and make an image every day so as to CREATE myself into wellness.
I will share them here. 
______________________

undefined


Pierce the heart of the past so it may die.
Colourful the tale, told.
Wise to cast the story to the abyss.
Alas! I have a deep sea vessel for a brain.
That takes me to the past's watery grave, to pick over the bones.
Then rising, bobs to surface in the sun.
Momentarily, I breathe, laugh and play.

Here comes the past again.
Again.
Pierce it's heart, so it may die,
_____________________________
Image and Words. (Me). 27.6.17
 
 

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

undefined
 
There must be a way in.
Into the girl who slept soundly
loved without boundary.
 
For whom blue bear was
the centre of her universe.
Her only friend.
 
There must be a way past the spikey walls
built year-by-year of a hurtful childhood.
 
There must be a way into the gorgeous girly sleeping…
She who may have grown to be a surgeon,
or world renowned poet.
 
There must be a way to bring peace
to her and her older mind and body.
 
To me! To me!
A rallying cry in the battlefield of life.
To ME! A standard raised.
 
I will to find a way to breach the gnarl.
And bring peace to her.
To find all the pieces shattered,
scattered and left along the way.
 
I will stick us back together again.
Again.
And form us new from the old clay.
Lumps, bumps and all.
_______________________________
Image and words. Me. 28.6.17
 
I am writing and illustrating every day... to heal.

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

Hugs @MoonGal Heart

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

So the last week has been a progress. I have gone from wanting "to pierce the heart of the past..." and then trying to find a way back to the locked in, harmed, child - to want to be clear in how I set off on that rescue mission. So I made a Packing List to ensure I took the best of my adult self with me.

I am pretty sure that what keeps her (the little one in the image above) locked in is shame.

I have often confused guilt and shame and they are distinctly different. According to Paul Gilbert's "*The Compassionate Mind" Shame is self-focused and Guilt is other focused. The journey is just being revealed day by day. Pencil stroke by brush stroke. This way of approach, with a very good psychotherapist, my own deep desire to heal and using art/words to help me bypass the critical self, has a different qualitative feel to any work I have done before.

It is exciting and scary.

 

undefined
Image and words by Me. 2 July 2017.

__________
** a book I am listening to as an Audible - but which is also a print book see more at link - 

Compassionate Mind: https://compassionatemind.co.uk/individuals/audio-for-individuals

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

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My heart and mind keep coming back to this blue bear whose photo I took in a shop last week ... You see, he is an almost exact replica of my Blue Bear I loved since I was born. He who accompanied me through my tumultuous childhood. Then - at sixteen years old, two years after running away from a hard-home to live with a narcissistic, violent bastard... Blue Bear was burned (to death) on a revenge bonfire.

The man, let's call him Bruce, burned all my childhood books, my whole set of Winnie -the-Pooh, my Trixie Belden set, my own stories and poetry written in exercise books.

A conflagration of his uncontained rage.

I think it was because he could not stand to think that I had a self, a life, a centre that was not him. Just another tool in a toolkit of emotionally and physically violent control. "See what I can do?" .... "This could be you."

(He must of had a very hard childhood too.)

So, I lost the few of my own things of meaning, the slim little bit I had of mySelf ... Back then. So long ago. 40 years ago now. I am on a Rescue Mission going back even further than that too, but visiting my 16 year old is important, she was just a hopeful child, still.

Maybe it is enough to just tell the story, grieve for the girl. Grieve for the bear, the books, the poetry.

(He also killed my dog when I was 17, but that is a tale too hard to hear.)

Maybe... I don't need the blue bear, just need to honour the spirit of the child who loved him, who watched him burn.

Maybe it is enough to acknowledge the losses. I tell the tale here so it can be witnessed. Some things need to have the spotlight shone. Telling the truth. Some may say this is too personal to share. I say it is LIFE and I share it, lived in shame for too long. I am glad I survived to tell the tale ❤️ I am now loved and love. And surrounded by real lovely beings - my lovely wife and furkids, a garden full of plants to tend.

No, I do not need this bear, I have all the love I need right here, Now.
________

Moongal. 5 July 2017. Creating wellness - painting, story telling., poems.... Hope it may be of benefit to others too... Love. Is. All. There. Is.

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

Thank you for sharing your story here @MoonGal. You have nothing in the world to be ashamed of. Smiley Happy

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

 Hello lovelies, hope you are all as well as you can be and have found something to smile or laugh about today, sending you deep hugs. I can't spend time browsing because I am trying to stay offline as much as possible and rest my shoulders, I have capsulitis, and it got worse and worse even with physiotherapy, so I had an injection in one yesterday, wailed a bit, it is a horrible thing to have, thankfully pretty quick though.

Sending love and hugs and sisterhood to @Shaz51@Appleblossom@Phoenix_Rising@Faith-and-Hope

here's a bit of a burble... 

I read a quote that shook my chakras the other day that I am repeating to myself every day...

"The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in."

~ Rumi ~

I mentioned I am listening to Paul Gilbert's book "The Compassionate Mind" which was recommended to me by my fabulous psychotherapist*. I am practising being compassionate to myself... here below are some quotes and notes I have made in listening to this book so far, I share because other's may find this helpful, and if the idea of making a friend of yourself, and extending compassion to the inner being, who struggles, and who wants to be at peace, if finding a pathway that may help... I have looked my whole life, and shall always be a seeker I think. But I feel I am coming closer and closer to the whole, as whole as I can be anyway - maybe there are permanently broken off bits that will never get stuck back on, and that are the bits that I can accept. Acceptance is a way of life, a deep philosophy that I have struggled with because I have been so damaged and hurt, I arc up when I think I must accept some terrible thing, but that is because I have been afraid to love my broken bits. I am starting to love all of me. wow.

"Experiences in consciousness are co-constructed in our relationships with each other"

Paul Gilbert 
'The Compassionate Mind'.



~ We make and can help unmake each other...
~ Criticism and shame activate threat systems.
~ Fostering kindness and compassion creates and activates CONTENTEDNESS SYSTEM
~ All people need compassion and kindness. We co- regulate people's brain states.
~ The kinder and more compassionate we are towards ourselves the more tolerant (kind) we are towards ourselves when experiencing distress - loss, grief, ***anxiety***.

There is audio for individuals on his website here: https://compassionatemind.co.uk/individuals/audio-for-individuals
________________

 

Not only just doing my own artworks... I find strength, inspiration, ideas and help from artworks, from people who share the anxious life, or are deep thinkers. Sam Cannon in the UK is one such artist...
"I AM OUT WITH LANTERNS LOOKING FOR MYSELF.... "

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and this one...

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*My psychotherapist is going the hard yards with me in a way that has allowed me to stay with it. I abandoned therapy again last year when it all hurt too much, but kudos and love to myself that when things got horrible for me I reached back out to her. I am really gaining ground in a way I never have before. How good is that! 

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

sooo wonderful to hear from you my wonderful sister @MoonGal xoxo

Hello @Jacques, @RainbowAuntie, @Phoenix_Rising, @Appleblossom HeartHeart

Re: A Poem: On living with bi-polar affective disorder

sooo wonderful to hear from you my wonderful sister @MoonGal xoxo

Hello @Jacques, @RainbowAuntie, @Phoenix_Rising,HeartHeart

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