Sometimes, when I have been feeling really good for awhile, I begin to think that maybe I have made up all this depression and bipolar stuff. Maybe I am faking it or making it a bigger deal than it is.

Those thoughts were rolling around in my noggin recently when I found the blue folder. I had been looking for something – I can’t remember what – and a saw a box on a shelf in my closet. I pulled it down and opened it. There were some photos, my old newspaper clippings, legal papers – the usual stuff you find in boxes on a shelf in the closet. Then I found the blue folder.

I recognized it right away. It held some of my teen writings. I journaled a lot when I was a teen. I found most of my teen journals several years ago. Reading them was so painful that I stopped and gave them to my therapist. I didn’t want them in my house. But I had forgotten about the blue folder.

I’m not whole. I have to do something for myself. I try to tell myself I am not tired. Try to convince myself. It used to work but now it is no use. I need one minute to think. Everything is going so fast…I am always alone yet never. My mind aches to be alone. Not to have anything to think. Wishes never come true. Die.

I was 19 when I wrote that. There is much, much more. I knew I was not a happy, well-adjusted teen. I drank. I took drugs. I wrote horrible poetry. I wanted to die and gave it a couple of lame attempts. I cried when I read what I had written so many decades ago. But I am glad I found these writings. Now I don’t have to wonder whether my depression and bipolar are real. They are real and they have been real for a very, very long time.

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From Psych Central's website:
PsychCentral (July 9, 2009)

    Last reviewed: 8 Jul 2009