“Like oil on canvas, so too my tears take forever to dry.” -JuJu @ bipolarenlightened

Hi I’m JuJu and I have Bipolar. It’s taken me five years, 13 stints at hospitals and treatment centers, to finally come to a radical acceptance that I have Bipolar. It has been a devastating journey, yet a healing one as well. There is comfort in knowing that I’m not alone. 40 Million people worldwide live with BiPolar (-WHO), and I not only have the disease itself but suffer from the stigma in society that comes with having a mental illness. My diagnosis did not come quickly due to it being rare that BiPolar onset appears later in life. I guess the positive aspect is suggested that Bipolar is linked to high intelligence and/or creativity (-PsychCentral.com). I’ve been through many diagnoses: BiPolar I, ADHD, Major Depressive disorder, PTSD (Trauma), Depression and Anxiety, Insomnia, and Schizophrenia, Schizo-affective. The list goes on, and the labels become confusing and tend to blur together.
When receiving the BiPolar I diagnosis, I was in denial due to the stigma that surrounds this disorder. I lived the majority of my adult life without this disorder, but then, when COVID hit in 2020, everything changed for me. I had manic and psychosis episodes while losing my family to separation and also losing my 20 year career due to this mental disability. COVID years entailed many changes for all of us (that’s another topic for a blog and podcast). The last five years have been a journey of radically accepting my diagnosis. Without a proper diagnosis, health providers don’t know how to treat the illness. All the different medications and their side effects came with all the changing diagnoses. If we’re going to end the stigma of mental health, we have to first come to radical acceptance that we are mentally ill, get the proper diagnosis and get treatment. However, when being told there is no cure for BiPolar, I want to seek research and development to find a cure. To find medications without such harsh side effects that hinders people from taking their medications. To research and develop medications that don’t block the creativity that most people find during their “mania” episodes. I find creative outlets like drawing and poetry while I’m in Mania, and painting and writing during depression. I find myself less inspired and over medicated when I’m stable.
I believe the years of searching, relapses, and heartache could be avoided if there wasn’t such a stigma around mental illness. It’s not like being diagnosed with Cancer because usually when one gets diagnosed with Cancer, family, and friends gather around and lend support. People even start “GoFund” me pages. But, when someone is diagnosed with BiPolar, Schizophrenia, Depression, etc., everyone tends to scatter or live in hiding, and even worse abandoned. It’s silenced. It’s a very lonely disease. But, there are millions of us mentally ill and BiPolar. I hope you will join me in our mission to end the stigma, bring awareness to the creative aspect of having Bipolar, even help find a cure (that doesn’t inhibit creativity would be a plus), and if nothing else, know that you are not alone.

I know I’m not alone. In sharing my diagnosis and journey with you, I hope it will help at least one person before they come to the point of suicide, that there is help and hope. Let’s BE.