I was told today at physical therapy that my affect and my energy seem a lot better… not better, but I guess more bright. I always struggled with resting bitch face, ya know where you frown all the time and look kind of angry. But I told my physical therapist that I was on testosterone for the past month for my lack of lady hormones such as estrogen , testosterone, and progesterone, and I said it helped with energy levels and with injury healing.

She asked how I figured out my hormones were so low and I said through bloodwork after they established I had such low estrogen and was getting a period only twice a year. I told her I saw a DO who took a more naturopathic route than my OBGYN who kind of ignored what was happening to me because there was nothing physiologically happening for me to experience the mood shifts and other symptoms.

My physical therapist who I see for pelvic floor therapy for my bladder disease was pleased that the DO dug further and found a cream that would help restore my body’s health. I am pleased too.

I have been tracking my moods with color coding on my habit tracker sheet and out of ten days this month I have had 3 manic days, 3 “normal” days, 1 depressed day, 1 anxious, 1 agitated, and 1 where I felt ill. So I feel like this can be broken down into hypomania, depression, and other which can be good/normal/bad/anything in between. 3-1-6 is a good ratio in my opinion. Because my basis for the charting is how I feel for the most part of the day, not all the part. In my other category that is even more variable. So I usually took what I was feeling at the time of filling out the chart to be the basis of my color coding system.

It’s not a perfect or exact system by any means but I like having a chart I can look to every month to see hey I did this 36% of the time and the other thing 64% of the time, what gives? If somebody asked me tomorrow how my month has been so far, I could say inconsistent at worst and pretty normal to almost happy at best for at least 60% of the time. I like the latter answer better because it gives more detail into how I am doing day by day. As for my other habits I am tracking, in ten days I:

• I got an average of 7 hours of sleep (not necessarily restful sleep) per night
• I worked out once at the gym (PT not included) in ten days
• Half of the days I got at least 72 ounces of water
• I took my meds everyday, twice a day, every pill with a delay in one night’s medicine when I unexpectedly spent the night at Diego’s after dog sitting.
• Daily devotional was 3 out of 10 times
• I wrote 7 out of 10 days
• I had 3 no spend days meaning I spent no money at all
• I have completed only 1 skincare routine this past week and a half.. gross need to work on that
• Had an average of 16 ounces of caffeine in a day. Usually paired with a redbull and a Pepsi
• No alcohol 8 out of 10 days; 80%
• I made my bed first thing in the morning 1/5th of the time

I am trying to put my energy into positive things and I think tracking these particular items is really good for me. It’s not even about doing the items but staying accountable by writing what I did down every day. I am trying to show myself love and discipline at the same time if that makes any sense.

Self love with bipolar is difficult because every part of you think it is another act of sabotage against you to love yourself. It may not be for everyone but it sure is this way for me and maybe for some neurotypical folks too, I don’t know. The delusions can become so great that things always have to be about other people when in reality nobody gives a shit about anybody else but themselves. Maybe that’s jaded but it’s true. So if that is truly the case, why am I not spending a little more time on myself to become a better person for my friends and family? You know how long it takes for me to do my chart every night before I go to sleep? Not even five minutes. It takes maybe a hour at best to wash my face, read my devotional, write, make my bed, and go to the gym. A hour out of my day that I am doing nothing but better my physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual but that is too much time in the grand scheme of things when I am binge watching Hulu every night instead. The math doesn’t add up.

Before I go on another tangent, I’ll end the blog post here.

much love,

Dani