To The Bipolar Parent In My Life,

I used to hate your disorder. I knew who you typically were, yet in the midst of an episode your warm smiles and lighthearted laughter seemed like daydreams I’d imagined, lost to the caustic words and cold eyes focused on causing the most damage to the perceived threat: me. I knew that the person you became during an episode wasn’t who you really were, yet the cutting words and icy looks hurt all the same. People would tell me that you couldn’t control your actions when your disorder took over and reared its ugly head, yet that simply made me hate your disorder even more, because it took you away and left a shell in your place.

I used to fear your disorder. Not because of the ways it could and did hurt me, but for the ways it could affect me. Knowing in my mind that a mental disorder is not contagious never seemed to assuage my fear that I might wake up one day and see my reflection in your anger, in your sadness, in your seemingly unending excitement that always seemed to be followed by a crash twice as unending. Seeing how normal you appeared on the outside combined with your insistence that your behavior wasn’t a consequence of your disorder never helped to convince me that your behavior was a result of any disorder, yet as I look back over the years it is clear to me that your actions could be the result of nothing else.

I used to avoid mentioning your disorder. Hearing the word only made you angry, while it made me sad and resentful. As I’d lay in my bed at night wondering about what I did wrong to make you snap at me or shut me out, I would always come across the same explanation, an ingrained excuse provided to me by aunts and uncles, family and friends: “It isn’t you, it’s the bipolar disorder.” The only problem, however, was that I couldn’t shout at the bipolar disorder, couldn’t force it to change, couldn’t appeal to its humanity or force it to leave me alone. I felt useless, yet looking back, I see that--for you--staying by your side and barreling through the last 18 years of your disorder with you has helped tremendously to illuminate your strength and will aid you in amplifying it in years to come. Over the years, I have managed to not only come to terms with your bipolar disorder, but to also appreciate what it has taught both me and you about internal strength and resilience. I do not blame you for the behavior caused by bipolar disorder, in part because I know that it is all caused by a mental illness, but primarily because I understand that as much as your illness hurts me, it hurts you tenfold.

Looking at the people both you and I have become as a result of you raising me while simultaneously struggling through the mental and emotional battles that come along with mental illness, I can see that you are not your illness, you are not defined by your illness. Like me and others in your life, you are a victim of your disorder. Bipolar disorder is just a word, defined by symptoms such as “insomnia,” “depression,” “impulsiveness,” or “defensiveness.” You, on the other hand, are defined by your strength and your resilience. You are defined by the tears you hide in your guilt and confusion following an episode and by your ability to wake up each day and live despite your body’s pleadings for you to simply lay down and submit to your disorder. You are defined by your perseverance, not by your reaction to the symptoms which you cannot control

Love,

The Daughter Who Learned to Say the B-Word