Mania and Depression

The last couple weeks have been somewhat challenging but manageable. I’ve been dealing with some hypomania and mixed states. Hypomania is marked by an elevated mood, increased goal-driven behavior, and increased gregariousnes among other symptoms. It is not as severe as mania. A mixed state includes symptoms of both mania/hypomania and depression.

I usually notice something is wrong when I start sleeping poorly. Symptoms of hypomania include a decreased need for sleep and sleep difficulties. During most hypomanic episodes, I have difficulties falling or staying asleep. Thankfully, during this episode my sleep hasn’t been great, but I’ve only had one night that I slept less than six hours. 

Having sleep problems used to really bother me because I thought my poor sleep was making me manic. And though poor sleep can aggravate or cause bipolar symptoms, the doctor that manages my medications told me it’s more likely that the hypomania is causing the poor sleep and not the other way around. By thinking about the poor sleep as a symptom rather than a cause of hypomania, it helps me relax a little more about my sleep and not stress out about it, making it even more difficult to sleep.

For the last couple weeks I’ve been in a predominately mixed state with hypomania being most prominent. I have moments where I want to seek out conversation or do all the talking in a conversation. Thankfully, after going through bipolar cycles for years, I’ve been able to cope with these symptoms better than I used to. I try hard to say to myself, “Do I really need to talk to this person right now? Is this the best time to talk to her or him?” Then, when I’m having a conversation, I try to focus on listening and asking questions rather than thinking about what I want to say.

And while the hypomania can be bothersome, I’m sometimes able to focus enough that I can harness some of that energy and get more done than I normally would. Unfortunately, when I’m in a mixed state, I also fall into a depressed mood, which makes it hard to get anything done and generally has me wanting to do nothing but sit back in my recliner and do nothing.

While dealing with my latest mixed state hasn’t been fun, it has given me the motivation to go over some of my DBT skills and to use those skills to help get through it. In some later posts I might write about which DBT skills I’ve been working on and how they’ve been helping me through this episode.

Thanks for reading.