As it relates to breastfeeding versus formula feeding, you’ve probably heard that breastfeeding is the preferred way to feed your baby. You may have also heard the phrase, “fed is best,” meaning that regardless of how you feed your baby, he or she will be fine so long as there is food in that tummy. I’m not here to argue […]
Planning is a big part of managing bipolar disorder, from scheduling your days and developing a routine to creating a crisis plan that prepares others help you in your time of need. I resumed therapy last month. Nothing new occurred to prompt this. Instead, I have been trying to find practical ways to manage anxiety and to ground myself. I’ve […]
Bipolar disorder is a complex and unpredictable mental illness affecting millions worldwide. Those with bipolar disorder endure intense mood swings that can swing between the depths of severe depression to the heights of euphoric mania. The manic episodes can bring forth feelings of overwhelming joy and excitement, accompanied by a surge of energy and a decreased need for sleep. However, […]
As a former facilitator for the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Connection Recovery Support Group, I began each meeting by reading a list of objectives provided by NAMI. One of the objectives states: Understand that mental health conditions are no one’s fault and can be traumatic experiences. To be clear, not everyone who lives with mental illness has experienced […]
I began writing this post on March 5, 2022. That was over a year ago, y’all! I didn’t get far. Besides the title, all I had written at that time was this: It’s time to start tracking my moods again. I stopped because day-to-day was the same thing, so it seemed pointless. Now, there’s been a shift in my emotional […]
Sometimes you don’t know you need a crisis plan until you do. Or until someone who cares about your well-being does some homework and encourages you to write one. My then boyfriend (now husband) encouraged me to create a document called a crisis plan that would help him help me if I ever had another mental health crisis like the […]
It was not until the end of my 36th week of pregnancy that I was diagnosed with gestational, or pregnancy-induced, hypertension. To my knowledge, I had never had any issues with my blood pressure prior to the late third trimester of my pregnancy. I did not even know that my blood pressure was high – who knows for how long […]
In my last blog post, “Am I a Fraud?“, I discussed imposter syndrome and whether I am bipolar at all. My former psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner considered me so stable that she said I did not need to come back for another appointment for six months unless, of course, I felt there was a need to see her sooner. […]
Dating is hard enough. You find somebody that you like only to find out that they have a mental condition can complicate the matter. Often times when we date, if the other person has a condition or circumstance that society tells us is wrong to have, we immediately abandon ship and start looking for another person to date. This story […]
One thing my psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner (PMHNP) said at my intake appointment a few days ago is that sleep is one of the most difficult things to treat in individuals with bipolar disorder. I can certainly relate, as I have had issues with sleep for years now. Sleep disturbance can present itself in a number of ways. I […]
