A couple of observations regarding the last piece that I wrote...
So, here's what I've noticed about blogging. Folks really seem to dig the down and dirty, real stuff rather than the mundane every day stuff. Wonder why that is? What fuels our desire to know the ugly truth about the world around us? Are we perhaps looking for truths uglier than our own, or do we just need to know that we're not alone in hiding our ugly realities from the rest of mankind? Yeah, show me yours and I'll show you mine....
I think I'd really like some feedback for those questions.
Now, for questions you were probably asking as you read it....
Why did I write it in the third person? Honestly, I hadn't really intended for it to be taken as truth. I was still trying to hide what used to be my reality. But, I don't think you can write that the way I wrote it without having experienced it. If you ain't been there you ain't ever really gonna get it. The best I can do is give you a glimpse. The reality is much more gut wrenching than the words I wrote. Besides, written in the third person it allowed me to detach myself from it, get past the emotional aspect and actually make it to the computer screen.
Does the kiddo know that I wrote it, and how does he feel about me putting it out there? Yeah, he knows. I'd never expose his truths without knowing that it's ok with him. I read it to him the other night as, again, he laid stretched out across the end of my bed sharing his day. His reply? "Mama, I love you so much I ever saw." I think I broke a little in that moment.
Aren't you concerned about the stigma that comes with throwing bipolar out there? Not really. The way I figure it any stigma attached after you read it is attached by you and therefore your problem. Now, I'm not trying to be offensive. But, the stigma comes with just not knowing any better. Bipolar isn't the end of the world. Bipolar people can lead normal productive lives and leave the rest of the world never having a clue that it's part of the equation. Negative judgments are completely unfounded and given to lack of information. Bipolar doesn't always mean Lindsay Lohan Lifestyle.
The kid is gonna be OK. The kid I have now is the kid I haven't seen since the pre-teen years. Sometimes, I wonder if he's actually bipolar and if it wasn't just "angry kid with a single mom syndrome". He's un-medicated and seems perfectly normal to me.
Any other questions you'd like answered? Post a comment and I'll add your question to this post along with an answer to your question.
This is me. Sometimes I say what I mean. I always mean what I say. Read at your own risk. All text, thoughts, musings, works of fiction, etc. are solely mine and not to be reproduced, copied or pasted without the express consent of Sapphire Dragonflies/Erica Tomlin.
I didn't even notice you wrote it in third person. I guess because I do that. Like you said it's much easier to detach yourself from it and it still be in its brutal raw honest form than in first person but if you hadn't told me it was in third person I wouldn't have ever realized.
ReplyDeleteThe stigma exists because people don't talk about it. Because it's foreign, alien, and misunderstood. People fear what they don't understand. The more people who actually have bipolar and live with it everyday talk about it the less of a stigma there will be. Except for those asswipes that have nothing better to do but belittle others to make themselves feel better. I don't have time for people like that anyways.
I wish you had a platform where you could write freely, where your every word wasn't judged and examined under a microscope. Hugs