Having Manic Depression

On November 11, 2011, I put myself into a drug treatment center - Tarzana Treatment Center. I had been on two very bad drugs although I loved them both: amphetemines and Klonopin. I loved the amphetemines for the surge of energy they gave me and I loved the klonopin for the sedation it caused me. It was as if I was ripped from highs to lows without relying on what caused me to biologically hit the highs and lows without the use of any drug or substance of any kind. Ihave manic depression and at the age of 54 I had a very long and frightening manic episode. Paradoxically, getting off the drugs caused the very bad manic episode. I spent 3 weeks at TTC (Tarzana Treatment Center.) The first three days were spent in Detox. To help me with withdrawal the Center put me on liquid Phenobarbital. On my second night I was curled p in a ball on the floor of y room rocking. I had already taken my purse apart inch by inch just in case the Tarana staff had overlooked one Klonopin. They hadn't and I can only describe what I went through on the floor as a trip again through the birth canal. It hurt and this time I remembered. I was moved to Residential on day 4. A staff member escorted me and my black Hefty bag full of my possessions to "the other side." TTC must have been designedby an architect skilled at labyrinths. The staff member and I walked for what seemed like forever just to get to the "other side." I sat in front of the nrse's station for about two hours. I watched all the other addicts move around the long corridors and nameless doors. After two hours, I was taken to my room by a 16 year old girl who was coming off of heroin and ecstasy. She would "show me the ropes." She was ery sweet and helpful. She was staying next door soit worked for the first five or so days. On one of those days a staff member caught on that she was my "den mother." Having a 16 year old den mother at age 54 was against the TTC rules and we managed to break this rule for several days. I didn't like my adult very much and could better identify with the 16 year old having spent the last 7 years of my 22 year career teaching high school students English. At TTC you spend much of your time in 12 step meetings and the 12 step meetings at TTC were phenomenal compared tot the more staid meetings on the "outside." Every speaker meeting was held in the big cafeteria at 7pm. The addicts who spoke at these meetings delivered their messages in what can only be described as the most exciting way possible for my mind was just snapping every night after these meetings. I could not shut it down and I could not go to sleep. I did not sleep for 19 straight nights. The night spend in Detox on the floor was a sleepless night for the most part. The night before I came over to Residential was a completely sleepless night due to the nervousness of the newness of the Residential program. The other 17 nights were spent in some state of limbo but I did not sleep enough to go into REM. I never really "fell" asleep. Some of my addict friends said that my brain was going through some sort of synaptic wash and that was why I wasn't sleeping. On day three in Residential I saw the psychiatrist and told her. She ordered a Seroquel for me and we spent the next hour talking about my interest in Henry VIII. Seems she had an interest too. I saw her on day 11 and told her I wasn't sleeping and could she please held. She ordered me another Seroquel and we spent the remaining hour talking about Anne Bolyn. Seroquel is a medication that is given to people to induce sleep and thus eliminate psychotic breaks. This is the important part to know: Mania can and will be brought on by lack of sleep. As a rule in manic depression if the person denies himself/herself sleep or is denied sleep externally, mania will be induced. This mania starts out harmless enough but if sleep is withheld or impossible to reach this mania turns into psychosis. Psychosis is a break with reality that can be deadly because the manic person starts believing that yes, as a matter of fact, I can fly and then dies trying. When I left Tarzana Treatment Center in December I was in such a severe manic state that I scared my kids, scared my father, scared my friends but didn't scare myself. Before U I left my brother's place in Tarzana, I bought and gave every single staff member a lucky bamboo because it was called Lucky Bamboo and would definitely work magic for all! A week later I went to Red Robin's restaurant with my son and two of his friends and insisted that after we eat we should to to the nearest Volvo dealership and get each one of the boys a Volvo truck. Why? Because I had unlimited funds and I was magic in my own mind. Why Volvo? Because they were supposed to be the safest built vehicles. When the check came at Red Robin's, my prepaid credit card had reached its limit so my son's baseball coach, who happened to be dining there with his wife and kids paid for our meal. This did not stop me from going home and purchasing two round trip tickets to Heathrow airport so I could take my son to London and Liverpool to show him where his favorite musicians came from. My card might have maxed out but I always knew where and how to get more funds. After all was said and done, I was taken by police car to another hospital because the mania was at a dangerous level. This night began a three year drop out of mania and into depression for the law applies: what goes up must certainly come down and all I did from that point on was come down. In the following pages I will attempt to explain this mental illness to you in a way that, hopefully, takes some of the meaningless out of "bipolar disorder" so that the lay person can understand just why I all myself Manic Depressive rather than Bipolar and hopefully understand the illness a little better.