cheese making therapy

Another thing that I do to add structure and discipline to my days is to make cheese.  In Idaho, it was legal for us to sell both raw milk and artisan cheeses.  We can still sell milk in Oregon, despite pretty draconian restrictions.  We are definitely not allowed to sell cheese.  One thing we are thinking of doing is offering cheese making classes or lessons.  I enjoy making cheese and our product is generally excellent.

Making cheese is a relaxing and meditative art.  It also gives a structure and routine to an entire day.  Making a cheese requires attention all day long.  It's not that I'm crazy busy with it all day, but I need to be here watching things develop.  The cheeses need cultures and enzymes added at specific times.  Temperatures need to be watched and raised or lowered at various times throughout the day.  The curds need to be stirred, drained, or pressed.

I've currently got a Guoda, two cheddars, a pepper jack, a Romano, and a Parmesan aging in our "cheese cave."  The cave consists of a wine refrigerator with cutting boards substituted for the wine racks.

There are several great cheese making resources. Two that we use are, "Home Dairy" by Ashley English and "And That's How You Make Cheese" by Shane Sokol

I also believe that enjoying good healthy food is good for managing my bipolar disorder.  In our case at least, that involves drinking raw milk and eating raw milk cheeses.  We make, grow, and raise as much of our own food as possible.  I get the double enjoyment of both making and eating our own farm raised food.

Disability

I've talked with a number of people who are disabled either physically or mentally.  Part of a definition of being disabled is that you can't do the things that others are "able" to do.  In my case, I slowly lost the ability to do the things I used to be able to do.  Part of accepting my  mental illness has been accepting that I am not able to do everything I'd like to do.  In some cases, I am not able to do things I used to love to do.

The most obvious example in my life is the end of my career as a teacher. I taught for almost twenty years.  I have a Masters degree in teaching and am still certified to teach.  I loved teaching.  I feel an incredible sense of loss that I am no longer able to teach.  At least not in a public school classroom.  It's really been a number of years since I was really consistently excellent as a classroom teacher.  I continued to try to teach, but I had become less and less able to show up to work on a consistent basis.  I was still a pretty good teacher when I was there, but I was taking more and more medical leaves of absence until it finally became clear that I couldn't do a good job.

I'm sure the sense of loss that I feel is the same for anyone who loses the ability to do something the love to do.  I used to be a great teacher...twenty years ago.  I continued to be a great teacher for quite a few years.  I loved teaching.  I loved working with kids.  Making a difference in their lives.  Helping them learn to read and write the English language.  I loved writing and literature.

Later I became a special education teacher and was great at that too.  I found special education to be an extremely rewarding field.  Helping kids achieve things they never thought they'd succeed at.  Helping kids overcome their own disabilities.  I guess I had an inkling that I would someday become too disabled to continue as a teacher.  I knew I had occasional depressions.  I knew I had an abnormal relationship with alcohol.  But I didn't then know that manic depression and alcoholism would turn on me like a boomerang and cut me to ribbons.  I didn't want my teaching career to end this way.

I'm sure we all have things that we love that we can no longer do.  After all, we all are getting a little bit older every year and can't physically do the things we used to do when were in our twenties.   I have lost so much as a result of bi-polar disorder and alcoholism.  I feel robbed.  I didn't ask to be this way.  It just happened. 

On the other hand, I have been blessed in so many ways by my experiences with mental illness and addiction.  Having learned to live with both conditions and come out the other side, I have a lot of healing experience to share with others.  I don't know if the rumors are true about the creative energies of those with bipolar. (See "Touched With Fire" by Kay Jamison)  But I know that in my case I have experienced times when I felt incredible bursts of creativity.  My life and lifestyle have been marked by times of spontaneity and daring.  Hypomania can be exhilarating, until it turns on me and I inevitably crash and burn.

Would I trade my life for one that was not marred (or blessed) by mental illness and addiction?  Not a chance.  It is a part of who I am.  And I'm pretty happy with who I am.

A mellow day

After a couple of choppy days, I had a really quiet day.  I was in the groove with my routine.  The chores seemed pleasurable rather than inconvenient. I milked the goats morning and evening.  I went to town for an NA meeting.  Ran a couple of errands.  Came home and hung out with the family.  Worked on a couple of cheeses that I am aging.  Made my stepson dinner.  Played a little rock-and-roll while doing the dishes.  Took a little cat nap...with the cat.  Took my medications at their prescribed times.  I didn't feel bored.  Nor did I feel fired up and excitable.

Days like this are a blessing.  Only problem is that for someone with bipolar disorder, or at least for me, days like this feel strange.  They don't always feel right.  I wonder if I'm losing my edge.  I wonder if I'm overmedicated.  You know, maybe I should do something to stir things up.  Ask the doctor to lower a medication.  Leave town.  Abuse caffeine.  Maybe even take a drink...  I hear from others that this discomfort with the feeling of balance and normalcy is common.

The more quiet days that I experience, the more days of recovery I amass, the easier it gets to accept the blessing of balance.  The less boring normalcy seems.  The less attractive chaos appears. 

Prosaic

I thought about my last post and realized that it was prozaic in tone.  That is to say that it was, "lacking in poetic beauty."  This, not suprisingly, comes from years of expository writing with very little narrative writing.  There is no real problem with expository writing except that it fails to accurately convey the emotions and thoughts present during a manic or depressive episode.  Bipolar disorder is, by definition, a mood disorder and not a cognitive disorder.  Therefore I will attempt to intersperse some narrative style into my writing.  This will be a stretch for me but probably a good experience.

The other night, when I forgot my medications, became hypomanic, and stayed awake all night I felt awful.  My mood was rapidly cycling between euphoric and dysphoric.  Because of the forgotten dose of Paxil I was having a physical as well as emotional reaction.  My arms were tingling and I was having periodic, panicky sensations.  I like to call them "fear fantasies."  I was feeling that I might be having a heart attack.  Fantizing about the collapse on the floor, the ambulance ride to town, and the frantic dying phone calls to family members as I was preparing to be airlifted to the nearest city with a cardiac unit.  Needless to say, I was not actually having a heart attack except in my mind.

During sections of my hypomanic episode I was feeling as if I could do anything.  Stay up all night, make a batch of cheese, write a fabulous blog post, clean the kitchen, read a novel, and or write a new song on the guitar.  In reality, I accomplished very little.  My mind was racing and wouldn't slow down.  The euphoric feeling that I could do anything and the world was at my fingertips alternated with the dysphoric feeling that I was dying, losing my mind, may never sleep again, and may have to be locked up permently in a psychiatric unit.  Of course, none of these things actually happened.  The weird thing about symptoms of bipolar disorder is that they feel they are going to last forever.  Or, more accurately that life has always been and will always be crazy.  That applies to both depressive and manic episodes.  The idea that, "tomorrow is a new day" or that "this too shall pass," makes no sense to someone who is experiencing symptoms of mental illness. 

I was trying to find words, either my own or someone elses, that encapsulated the feelings I was having.  I thought of the Yeats poem, "Second Coming", and the line that the "centre could not hold."  The stanza goes like this,

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

William Butler Yeats

This is exactly how it feels to be having a mixed state manic episode.  My brain is whirling in ever tightning circles, going in a faster and faster inward spiral until in ultimately implodes.  By the same token, the real world also seems to be imploding as well.  Spiraling out of control, falling apart, and eventually self destructing.

How did I snap out of this episode?  Well, getting back on my medications most certainly helped.  Eating and sleeping didn't hurt either, getting into some meaningful work, and trying to be of service to "God and my fellow man."  This last meaningful work part involved a trip up into the mountains to cut firewood for next winter.  It was a long, sweaty day of splitting rounds of wood and loading them on to the truck.  By the end of the day, I was physically exhausted and my mental state had ironed itself out.

With that, blessings and good night.

Lack of structure and routine...

Had a rather hectic day yesterday.  I forgot to take any of my medications until about 8:00 pm.  Not only that, I drank two cups coffee at a 7:00 pm Narcotics Anonymous meeting.

I had a pretty good day despite the forgotten medication.  Kind of pumped up and jazzy (hypomania?), but I  didn't think anything of it. As is always the case with hypomania, it always ends badly.  I did end up taking my medication after the meeting, but by that time it was too late to have a peaceful, relaxing evening and a good night's sleep.

:Instead I feel agitated, sick to my stomach, and wide awake.  Agitation and irritability can all be symptoms of the downside of hypomania.  Trouble with insomnia is a chronic problem for me.  It is made even more problematic because insomnia is both a cause and effect of further bipolar symptoms.

Caffeine is another problem for me.  I had been abstinent from caffeine for 3-4 months and found that living caffeine free resulted in an improvement in some of my bipolar symptoms.  About a week ago, I started drinking a little coffee and tea.  Now, in the grand scheme of things, a few cups of coffee is not the end of the world, but I do notice a difference.

So, as much as I would like to spend my time writing about my successes, there are always setbacks as well.  Tomorrow is a new day.  Hopefully one which involves a more stable routine, attention to detail, and less caffeine.

structure and routine

One of the lifestyle changes that doctors recommend for those with bipolar disorder is to develop a structure and routine for your day and stick to it.  In my case, the structure and routine of farm life is extremely therapeutic for me.  The first order of business in my day is to get the goats milked.  I milk the goats and my wife milks the cow.  I wake up early and usually milk by 7 am.  Goats need to be milked at the same time every morning and every evening.  Milking usually takes me at least a half an hour.  I not only get to milk, but to spend some time feeding and caring for the animals.  This routine, rain or shine, morning and evening, helps begin and end each day.

A more seasonal routine is the breeding and birthing of goats, cows, and sheep.  The birthing of the new kids, lambs, and calves gets me involved in the incredible cycle of life...and sometimes death.  This year, despite checking on our goat Carrisima hourly all night long, she had one kid that died in birth.  On the other hand, she had one that survived.  Our other goats all kidded successfully.  Our Jersey cow calved successfully a year ago, and   our sheep lambed successfully as well.  Not only do I get to participate in the birthing process of our animals, but our children get to witness it as well.

What a blessing it is to be a part of this incredible miracle.  These routines, both daily and seasonal are all a part of my treatment for bipolar disorder.

stigma

The word stigma comes from a Greek word meaning a mark or tatoo.  These marks were of the sort used to brand an animal or slave.  People with mental illness are stigmatized in our society in many different ways.  A person with mental illness is looked on with distrust or fear.  Taking medication for mental illness is considered a sign of weakness.  Collecting Social  Security Disability pay is thought of as "freeloading."  The mentally ill are considered unfit for certain types of jobs.  I've been stigmatized nearly my entire adult life for being mentally ill.  For most of that time I tried to hide my mental illness.  This  only served to make the symptoms of the illness worse.  It delayed appropriate treatment for years.

I am a teacher by trade.  I taught English and Special education for almost twenty years.  I  have a Master's degree in Education. In the beginning, I  was able to teach while hiding my mental illness from my employers and friends.  Later, as my symptoms became more pronounced I may have said to my employers that I "just don't handle stress well", or "I'm having a little trouble with depression right now."  In the end, I was taking regular medical leaves of absence.  Eventually it became clear that I was no longer able to fulfill my duties as a teacher. 

I loved teaching.  I would still love to teach.  It is just no longer an option.  Finally I decided to leave teaching and apply for Social Security.  I had, after all, paid my hard earned pay into the system for twenty years.  It seemed like it would be a simple matter.  Right.  After another two more years of humiliation at the hands of the Social Security Administration, after being driven into poverty and bankruptcy waiting for my benefits, I  was finally awarded disability insurance.  As one final insult, however, the judge ordered that my benefits be paid to a "payee" because, he reasoned, my mental illness rendered me incapable of managing my  own finances.  Just one more example of the stigma and misunderstanding that exists surrounding mental illness.

So, how can I fight the stigma associated with mental illness?  I can "come out of the closet." Not just to friends.  Not just when it feels convenient to be out. But out in all of my affairs.  Out whenever the illness comes up.  It means having hard conversations with family members, father-in-laws, church acquaintances, and whoever else comes into my  life on either a casual or intimate level.

So, I'll get into how the  whole farming concept plays into my recovery as a person with mental illness soon. 

Blessings.