Maybe you're the ones who need help...

My perspective on manic depression is quickly turning from feeling bad for myself to feeling bad for others. When I was growing up I didn't fit in and was picked on quite a bit. I was tall, overweight, and came from the city to an all white suburb. After a few years of attempting to fit in I began purposely ripping my clothes, writing offensive things on my shirts, dying my hair etc. (this began in the 6th grade). I was sick and tired of making being different MY problem. It wasn't MY problem. I was a good kid. I got good grades, and was polite. I was kind. I was generous. I would jump in front of a bullet for a stranger. I forgave and forgot. At some point I realized, this is not MY problem, it's THEIR problem.

Now here I am after officially having Bipolar disorder I since I was 17 (almost 8 years now), thinking again "this is my problem, I'm doing something wrong". Well, they tell people to just "be themselves" and anyone who doesn't like you isn't worth being friends with anyways. So I say again, this is no longer MY problem, it's everyone elses.

When I first started showing signs of mental illness I had some problems. I had to learn to control my anger, and not kill myself during depressions. I had to learn to stay away from people when I was in a heightened state, and try and control my impulses. I had to learn to recognize my delusions and hallucinations as "not really there". But now that I've started to get a hold of these things (without medication) I feel quite positive about my illness. It has made me the person I am. On medications I was an empty shell. I rather be dead.

This is who I am. This is who I will always be. If you don't like it, then don't sit around waiting for it to change. It won't. In your eyes "I'm crazy"! If you don't like "crazy" people then why are you around me?

Up until this point I have never hurt a person (who didn't truly deserve it) on account of my illness. If I ever do, then maybe I will consider medicating myself again for the safety of the public. But as of now the only "problem" with my illness is that people just don't get me most of the time.

For my entire life I prayed that I could just be "normal". But I have seen what this "normal" is. It's cruelty, closing your mind, going along with the way things are, never standing up for yourself, never having the guts to say something that people don't agree with. It's repressing human nature, and human liberty, and human potential for the sake of safety and acceptance. Just like I prayed for all those years to be a normal kid, I now pray to be as far from normal as possible.

I can't say manic depression has been all fun and games. It hasn't. I've had some truly frightening experiences, and have gotten very close to suicide. I don't recomend people with mental illness to refuse meds on any political or religious reason. I only recomend those who feel different but not better to explore the option of going unmedicated. While I have seen death and hell in my experiences, I have also seen new life and paradise. I have seen glowing colors refracting from the sun, each and every vibrating atom in sight split apart into trillions of balls and then condense back together again. I have seen the other side of life, and what may be after death. I have heard the voice of god tell me that no matter what, everything will always be okay.

You can read this and call me nuts. "He's just another manic depressive thinking he's an alien or the son of god or whatever". But I'm not in an altered state of mind right now. I am sane and sober. I am simply looking back at my experiences and seeing value in them. Some people try to shut these things out. The voices and the visions and the emotions are called "abnormal" because the majority does not experience them. So in the time of Elijah Mohhamed or Jesus Christ or the Aztecs would people like Paul or Quetzacoatl be shunned for their unique minds? No! They were revered for their special communications with the divine. These days if you say "I'm the son of god", you get put away.

Is it possible that maybe this is just a part of our evolution? Is it possible that we will all wind up needing this ability one day? Is it possible that maybe just a few need this ability to direct the rest? Why is it that we hear voices? Why is it that we seem to believe we are other people in other places sometimes (astral traveling?)? Why is it that we have these bursts of energy and creativity? Are these simply malfunctions of the brain? I believe certain disorders such as anxiety, ocd, and depression are most likely malfunctions because I cannot see how these things serve any greater good.

But manic depression and schizophrenia (and even some forms of autism/aspergers to a certain degree) have so many signs of high functionality. Autistics and people with aspergers are often very emotionally withdrawn, yet amazing at things like math and puzzles. Manics hear voices (god, extraterrestrials etc.). Schizophrenics get obsessed on an idea that we call strange, but may very well be something worth listening to (how would we know since we ignore them on the street and give them medication to shut them up?).

There are many levels of intensity in these disorders, and I understand that sometimes the illness can be too intense for some people. It also depends on their outlook on life, prior beliefs, life situation etc.

Maybe instead of doping and locking up these "nutjobs" we should give them the coping skills they need to survive with the disorders and study the things they have to say, and the things that they create. Is it possible that maybe we are the future of mankind? Is it possible that maybe you're the one who needs help???