Posted by Atticus on January 8, 2005, at 0:50:52
In reply to Atticus you sound peppy....all better? :) Ja* (nm), posted by Jai Narayan on January 7, 2005, at 16:10:19
Hi Jai,
Definitely over the worst, thanks. The antibiotic killed the pneumonia, and the pleurisy has subsided to the extent where I no longer need find myself on opiate/psychotropic walkabouts to handle the pain in my left lung. Back at work two days now! Time for another two-month disability leave, I'd say. It's actually very weird, because people I scarcely know at the university seem to know all about the fact that I'm bipolar, and are saying how good it is to see me back and how glad they are that I'm doing well. Universities are such astonishingly gossipy workplaces. None of this stuff should have gotten beyond the university publications and PR office, where I work, and personnel, who had to know in order to put me on disability leave in the first place. On one level, I'm kind of p*ssed off, but on another level, I have to admit, not having to tote around my medical condition as if it were some terrible dark secret from a trashy gothic novel feels incredibly liberating. It's been just exhausting, feeling the need to hide my condition for the past eight years, constantly fabricating less stigmatized reasons for the sick days it has required me to take from work, slouching around under a black cloud on the inside while glad-handing administrators and bureaucrats on the outside at university or media functions. When I think about the kind of pressure I was putting myself under for the better part of a decade, in retrospect it's not surprising that I bought a box-cutter and opened up my left wrist last June 2 (you don't forget calendar dates involving events like that) or that I crashed from a supersonic hypomanic high into the flaming wreckage of a crushing depressive low and ended up on illness disability last fall (Nov. 5).I'm hoping that I be able to put being "out of the closet" in terms of being mentally ill to some good use in some way. I'll certainly give it a try.
"Nobody told me there'd be days like this/Strange days, indeed." - John Lennon, "Nobody Told Me"
See you in the Martian Social Pages. Ta. Atticus ;)
poster:Atticus
thread:437772
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20050106/msgs/439274.html