Thread by @sheer_awe

My mentally ill kin, if u could rename your illness, what would you name it?

I'm thinking about how Bipolar Disorder or Manic Depression both focus on a binary that doesn't always encompass the experience. Im thinking, if I broke out of that language, what would I name it?

Today my therapist genuinely asked me to describe my illness as if we didnt have a mutual name for it. It was really beautiful, really freeing, to be trusted to speak from such an interior place. The invitation to shake the chrysalis of language, to uncocoon. So intimate & rare.

I love "Bipolar" because it touches on the poles of mania & depression in a very real way. The earth itself also has two dominant magnetic poles. But as I struggled to exteriorize my most blurry interior spaces to my therapist, I realized how much "Bipolar" can leave out. Worlds.

What "Bipolar"––as a name––has left out of my experience:
• Delusions that last months
• Aural hallucinations
• Paranoia
• Torturous insomnia
• Psychosis
• Catatonia
• Mysterious physical pain/symptoms

Also, on a more 'positive' side, "Bipolar" doesn't quite capture:
• A deep sense of Oneness (often described by prophets) that can't be dismissed
• Unparalleled awe at nature
• A vibrational, felt resonance of Self-lessness (often described by prophets)

Im the last person in the known universe who would romanticize Bipolar. It's nearly killed me. But Im also the last person who would conclude that our language for mental illness is sufficient. It isn't. Our mental experiences illustrate the brain at its most fritzed, wild, vast.