sunshine breaks

It's been a surreal week this week.

Tuesday evening saw me absolutely devastated that I had to decide if we could actually make it for our fully booked and paid for flight to Darwin. I decided at that time to hold off and wait.

Wednesday evening saw me alone and afraid and a poofteenth shy of implosion myself. It was only thanks to friends and Second life I was able to wrench my attitude and self from sinking into the "Dark night of the soul".

Thursday dawned, after two days of very minimal sleep, the drapes drawn and the world essentially cut off unless it was absolutely necessary to engage with it.

I was feeling surprisingly very well within myself Thursday. Despite the lack of sleep along with the heavy sense of foreboding and gloom, things felt somehow different. A friend came and helped with a bunch of welfare paperwork I had to get done. The decision about Darwin was still in limbo but at long last I felt very comfortable with the Either/Or arrangements. Good news about some small financial windfalls from our Tax Dept. brightened my outlook considerably.

That afternoon, I went shopping and bought baz a gift for christmas. Something I don't normally do. He's getting an iPod nano (shhhh!). I also sorted some stuff for my forthcoming trip to germany in Feb 08. The paperwork went smoothly at Centrelink.

I was given the most humbling experience of my life in being granted a hamper from our local Christian Emergency Food Centre. We've donated product to this place for years never expecting we'd ever be recipients of the service but it is deemed that we are worthy being small business owners who are currently income-less.

I feel a little bit guilty I guess...after all, I did just spent a weeks worth of grocery money on a frivolous "toy" for my husband but hey? What goes around comes around. It kind of feels a bit like being "paid back" for the years of generosity. I'll not complain. We'll pay it forward soon enough.

Spoke to baz on the phone and it was the first "normal" conversation I've had with him in well over a month. He sounds almost himself again and it was such a pleasure to be able to laugh and enjoy his good humour and wit again after such a long period of "crazy talk". His speech is a bit slurred and he is very heavily medicated right now. Hopefully, we can ease back in time to a place where the meds work at a comfortable and manageable level. I'm pretty much convinced now having lived through this that this is a genuine physiological illness and as such isn't "just" about someone who is simply highly "creative" and a "genius".

Bipolar Disorder in the Mania stage is a beast. An ugly snarling animal caged inside the body of a human being. It takes over their mind and rules their every function tossing reality aside like an empty tin can. It shows no mercy and its only claim to any right for existence is that it makes a person "More" of what they already are. Thing is...when a person is so much "More" than they normally are... they cease to be the people you know and love.

We pray of course that we'll never see the opposite of this Mania in baz though too. Another beast of equally horrible and dangerous proportions. Depression so vast and so encompassing as to rot a person from the heart out.

So anyway, I got all the bookwork done for our business and it felt good to have much of that stuff sorted and dealt with. Even though it was quite late when I finished, I still spent a long while in Second life again, just talking with new friends and it was good. Didn't get to bed until after 0130 this morning though. I was actually quite "wired" after my good day and thought it would be hard to go to bed but I slept well. It was a bit cute that as I went to get into my bed, I discovered our dear son, JD curled up under the blankets with the air conditioner set to the "Overnight Freeze" setting. I made him get up and go to his own bed :)

The decision was made as I got into my bed. My heart told me that the Darwin trip we'd planned wasn't going to happen... this time. I've subsequently postponed the journey to Easter next year. We are disappointed of course but it has proved to be the best decision for everyone in the final analysis.

Sunshine breaks through the seething storm clouds of dismay. I turn my face toward it and bask in the warmth of its golden glow; soaking up its healing light and being reassured that always after rain comes the rainbow of promise.