Cathy-Anne McClintock: Growing “Up” with Bipolar

By Joe Kraynak
July 14, 2009

Folk singer-songwriter Cathy-Anne McClintock has just released her self-titled debut album, which includes a track entitled “Up” based on her personal experience growing up with her mother who has bipolar disorder.

I wrote the song because for as long as I can remember my mom has suffered with Bipolar Disorder. It wasn’t until I was about 16 that it was given a “label.” We just always thought she was beautiful, smart, flamboyant, spontaneous, spiritual, very energetic and productive until suddenly she wasn’t. That’s when she’d spend weeks alone in her room crying.

“Up” talks a little about my mom’s childhood and the euphoric “escape” that the manic side of the disorder can bring. It also talks about how we wish we knew more so we could have handled some things better.

If anyone has heard the song, please share your insights.

In 1999, my wife, Cecie, experienced her first major manic episode. She ended up in St. Vincent’s Stress Center, where she was diagnosed as having bipolar disorder. She has been hospitalized a total of three times – all for mania. She rarely experiences the debilitating depression that many people with bipolar disorder struggle with. We have two children together, both of whom are pretty much adults at this point. Over the past decade or so, we’ve struggled to coexist with this disease. At times, it seems to be a cruel puppet master pulling our strings to act out some demented drama on the stage we call our home. Most times, we manage to keep this beast chained up, through a combination of medicine and therapy, but occasionally it escapes and turns our home inside out. In 2005, I had the good fortune to co-author Bipolar Disorder For Dummies with Dr. Candida Fink. In the process, I learned a great deal about bipolar disorder and strategies for treating it, preventing major mood episodes, and dealing with the fallout when preventive measures are ineffective. Through this blog, I hope to share what I’ve learned about bipolar while I continue to discover even more.

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One Comment to
“Cathy-Anne McClintock: Growing “Up” with Bipolar”

Jessica Mondres at 8:33 am on July 27th, 2009

Thank you for posting this. I am an outreach director for Erasing The Distance, an organization based in Chicago that uses theatre to shed light on mental illness. We use true stories of people’s experiences with mental illness to ignite empathy and understanding, and dispel stigma and myth. I am always glad to learn about other artists who are using their art to shed light.