From guest writer Bipoar Notes

Today was rough.

A friend pointed out yesterday that my hands have started shaking. I looked at them and saw a tremor. Don’t know what that’s about, but today I started to feel agitated and a little angry.

Right now I am tense, a little upset, somewhat frightened by it. The fear creeps in; will it happen again? I have been doing so well; can’t it just stay this way?

The ephemeral stability. Never quite within my grasp, never able to be locked in, or protected, like a candle with glass around it.

No, my candle is open to the air, and the air is always gusty, at best — a gale force most of the time.

I am sometimes surprised I have been able to sustain romantic relationships. But then, none of them have lasted.

So often I feel like I am tricking the person in the beginning: “Here I am, I’m such a great package, so much to offer”, and then the truth comes out. “I am a nightmare”. “My life is a hellish vortex and you’ll be drawn into it”.

I try to warn them, but how do you warn someone about something they have no way of comprehending? “This will be like what it feels like to be submerged in icy water until you almost — but not quite — die; Instead you’ll have to endure this pain for as long as you are here on earth.”

How can they understand that, or prepare themselves for what is to follow in the weeks, months, years ahead?

I really feel sorry for them. I also feel guilty about what I put them through. I mostly only care about the one I have now, but I have some guilt about the other ones, the ones who were drawn in and couldn’t take it.

Sometimes I was very angry, though. “I can’t get out, how can you just leave me here and save yourself??”

I mean, when someone loves you, how can they leave you in that hell? It’s like, “Ok, well, there’s only one life jacket, and it’s my size; I have got to get out of this icy water.”

And I am angry; “I can’t get out. How can you save yourself knowing I will drown in this?”

But I also understand them. It is hell. The pain is unbearable. Wouldn’t I end it if it were at all humanly possible?

What is it like to love me? So often I have nothing to offer except anguish and despair. So often I feel empty, with nothing to give, as if someone opened the drain, and all the water ran out.

The rest of me, the beautiful me, the talented me, the unique and wonderful me – it’s not able to shine forth. My light — the unique and totally Julia light – is being obscured by this horrible illness.

It’s as if the rest of me is trapped inside, struggling to keep my head above this frigid water, a prisoner below the ice.