September 29, 2025 • 30 mins
Understanding the true source of bipolar symptoms requires becoming a detective in your own life rather than accepting diagnosis as the final answer. Approaching symptoms with curiosity instead of judgment allows us to identify what's really happening beneath the surface and find effective paths to healing.
• Diagnoses are observations of symptom clusters, not explanations for why you have symptoms
• Breaking symptoms into specific experiences rather than broad categories reveals important clues
• Looking at circumstances surrounding symptom onset helps identify potential triggers and causes
• Coping mechanisms like binge-watching or substance use are clues about underlying distress, not character flaws
• Tracking patterns in symptoms can reveal connections that aren't obvious when living with them daily
• Approaching trauma responses with curiosity helps identify what needs healing
• Medication side effects or withdrawal can create symptoms that complicate the picture
• Writing your detailed story in a dedicated notebook helps uncover the true sources of symptoms
Grab a composition notebook and start writing your story, beginning with your earliest memories of symptoms. Become a detective in your own life so you can uncover the true sources of your symptoms, treat them with integrated research-based approaches, and heal.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
It's possible for somebody to develop these
addictions based on, you know,curiosity as a teenager.
You know, you're you're at aparty, other people are
drinking, you want to see whatit's like, and that could lead
to an addiction.
But it's also very common forpeople to do these things to
numb themselves.
I've heard it calledself-medication.
And you're trying to escapefeelings that feel uncomfortable
(00:23):
to you, or emotions or you know,other symptoms.
And so those, instead of lookingat these things with judgment,
look at them with curiosity.
Write it down in your story andstart to look at circumstances
that would trigger a desire todo these things.
And those things can be cluesthat can help you then work
through and identify underlyingissues that need to be treated.
(00:49):
Welcome to the Upside ofBipolar, where we uncover the
true sources of bipolar symptomsand share proven tools for
recovery.
I'm your host, MichelleReitinger, number one
international best-sellingauthor of the Upside of Bipolar
Seven Steps to Heal YourDisorder.
In this podcast, I bring yousolo insights from my journey
and guest interviews withleading researchers and experts.
(01:10):
Join us to transform chaos intohope and reclaim your life.
Let's heal together.
(01:33):
Each of these episodes, the lastcouple episodes, have kind of
naturally progressed into thenext one.
And last week we talked abouthow the bipolar diagnosis is
actually kind of a problembecause it makes you think that
you have been given an answer towhy you have the symptoms, when
in fact, all you have been givenis an observation that you have
a certain cluster of symptoms.
(01:55):
And I want to talk a little bitmore about that process and then
how you can start identifyingsymptoms in a way that helps you
to become a detective in yourlife rather than a victim.
And that can lead to healing.
So when I was first diagnosed,the very first time, I went in
and filled pages and pages andpages out of questions that were
(02:17):
all related to symptoms.
Even the questions about familyhistory were related to
symptoms.
And the whole point of theexercise was to try to gain as
much information about thesymptoms that I was having so
that they could identify thebucket to put me in.
What's the cluster of symptomsthat I was experiencing so that
they could then give me adiagnosis?
(02:37):
And one of the things that thattaught me to do was to dump
symptoms into buckets, toidentify symptoms that I was
experiencing as categories,instead of looking at symptoms
with any kind of curiosity andwondering why the why I had
(02:58):
those symptoms.
You think you've been told whyyou have the symptoms, which is
not the case.
You've just been told that youhave these symptoms.
A diagnosis is just anobservation.
And what should have happened,and what I hope will happen in
the future, is that when you goin, it is useful to learn about
(03:21):
the symptoms within the contextof further curiosity.
So if you look at somebody'sstory and start identifying the
symptoms, you can then ask whatare the circumstances around
that?
And when you look at familyhistory, if there are, if there
is a history of it that mightindicate, you know, an
underlying source of symptomsthat is hereditary.
Not a chemical imbalance, that'sbeen completely debunked, but
(03:43):
things like micronutrientinsufficiency or generational
trauma is another thing thatgets passed down from generation
to generation.
And so what we need to do, ifyou want to start the path to
healing, one of the reallyimportant beginning steps of
that process is learning how totell your story.
And within that process,learning how to look for
(04:06):
specific things within yourstory so that you know what you
need to treat, so that you knowhow to identify things as these
are symptoms.
This is a symptom of the brainin distress, this is a symptom
of the body missing something.
And so I want to talk a littlebit today about what that looks
like, how you can start writingyour story down and telling your
story in a way that will lead tofurther curiosity, help you
(04:29):
become a detective in your ownlife, and look for clues about
why you're experiencing thesesymptoms that can then lead to
you to identifying the effectivetools and resources that can
treat the underlying source ofthe symptoms so that you can
heal and recover.
So the first thing that I wantto talk about is how important
it is not to lump symptoms intocategories.
(04:53):
We have been trained to look atthese symptom clusters as
categories.
We talk about depression and wetalk about mania and we talk
about anxiety as categories.
And one of the things that'sinteresting about that when we
talk about these in thesecategories is we think a lot of
times that when we hear somebodytalk about depression, that
they're experiencing the samething we do because we are not
(05:13):
breaking out the specificsymptoms.
We're just talking about thecategory of depression or the
category of mania or thecategory of anxiety.
I'll give you some examples frommy own story.
So let's do that.
That's probably the easiest way.
I'll give you some actualexamples.
So when I started my blog backin 2021, I didn't actually know
I was healing still at the time.
(05:34):
I thought I had just learned howto manage my bipolar really
well.
I still believed that bipolarwas incurable.
And so I was trying to tell mystory and talk about the things
that I had learned to managethese symptoms that I was
experiencing.
And the more that I would writemy story and the more that I
would do research and learnabout tools, I started
(05:55):
connecting dots.
I started recognizing, like whenI was the first time I
experienced suicidal ideationwas when I was in junior high.
And the, and I, as I thoughtthrough, you know, the
experiences that led to thatpoint, it became very clear that
the reason I was feelingdepressed was not because I had,
(06:16):
and and feeling the suicidalideation and the embarrassment
and the you know, the badfeelings that led to that were
not because I had some kind ofdisease.
It was because I had beenseverely bullied for four years
up to that point.
I had lived in four, you know,we had gone, I had gone to four
different schools.
Each school, I had started off,you know, starting to make some
(06:37):
friends.
And then within about a month ofstarting school, they would find
a very mean, very public way ofostracizing me, telling me they
didn't want to be my friendanymore.
And then I would just become asocial pariah from that point
forward for the next rest of theyear, and then I would move to a
new school and the whole processwould start over again.
So by the time I was in seventhgrade, I was desperate.
(06:58):
I I felt I felt like there wassomething fundamentally wrong
with me.
And I kept trying to changemyself and nothing was getting
better.
And I got to the point where Iwas severely depressed and I
didn't want to live anymore.
And so if if I if I looked atthat experience, if I had gone
to a psychiatrist, I'm verygrateful actually back in those
(07:20):
days that that wasn't somethingthat was very common.
Because if I had gone to apsychiatrist at that point, I
probably would have been put onpsychotropic medications as a
teenager.
That wasn't what I needed.
What I needed was somebody tolisten to me and to help me
because I was so lonely.
I was so, I felt like there wassomething fundamentally wrong
(07:41):
with me because nobody wanted tobe my friend.
When if if you go forward, oneof the things that came out of
that, I had I developed copingmechanisms that progressed
through teenage years and intoyoung adult years that made me
vulnerable to an unhealthymarriage.
And I ended up in a marriagethat was abusive.
And I didn't talk to anybodyabout what I was going through
(08:04):
in my marriage.
And when I finally got thecourage to leave, I didn't ever
want to talk to anybody aboutit.
I was so filled withembarrassment and shame for the
things that I had been throughin my marriage that I just
wanted to hide it.
I didn't want to talk to anybodyabout it.
I wanted to move on with my lifeand pretend like it never
happened.
And I moved to another state.
I, you know, got back intocollege.
(08:25):
And over time, that suppressedtrauma started manifesting with
depression symptoms.
I would go for long periods oftime when I would not want to be
around people.
I would develop copingmechanisms like binge watching
television shows and movies.
Um, and and then I would startto get an elevated mood.
(08:48):
My mind would start to workreally rapidly, and I would get
big new ideas and think that Ihad a new plan for my life and
tell everybody about it.
And this pattern developed uhout of this unprocessed trauma
that I was had experienced.
And as I started to tell thisstory more and more over time, I
(09:10):
started to understand betterthese underlying sources of
symptoms.
I could, I could start toconnect the dots about when
these symptoms started occurringand connect it back to the
experience that I had.
So that's why it is soimportant.
Number one, as you tell yourstory, is you start to write
your story out, and you canstart with an outline.
(09:32):
You can kind of outline, um, andit's it is useful to start when
symptoms occur and then kind ofwork backwards sometimes.
But um, it is important to makesure that you don't generalize
categories because you need tolook at the specific symptoms
you're experiencing.
So, for example, um, anxiety isa very broad category that can
(09:53):
lump a whole bunch of differentkinds of symptoms into one
category that starts to becomemeaningless because that
category is so broad.
For me, anxiety started to looklike a really intense tightness
in my chest.
My I felt like there was a vicearound my chest.
And I I felt like I was, I wasconstantly yawning and I
(10:14):
couldn't get enough air in mychest.
I didn't, I even went a fewtimes and got tested for asthma
because I had such a hard timegetting a full breath of air
that I thought maybe I had alung problem.
And it was important to makesure that I recognized those
symptoms for what they were.
I don't want to talk about itgenerally as anxiety.
Those are those are symptomsthat could be called anxiety,
(10:35):
but they occurred when my bodyfelt unsafe, when I felt unsafe.
And so it was something thatover time, as I started to
understand, I started to breakdown those symptoms and started
to understand that thosesymptoms were an indication that
my body felt unsafe, that mybrain felt unsafe.
Then I could look around me atwhat had what was going on when
(10:55):
I started to feel those symptomsand start to look for clues
about what led to the symptoms.
The next thing that's reallyimportant to do as you're as
you're doing this.
So the first thing that I'm Iwanted to mention is as you tell
this story, don't lump thesethings into categories.
Don't say I felt depressed or Ifelt uh I still struggle with
(11:16):
that.
But I if you say I felt and ifyou do, you say I started to
feel depressed, I want you tothen break that down.
What did that look like?
I struggled to get out of bed inthe morning.
I had a hard time wanting to bearound people.
I everything felt like work.
You know, I felt really hard to,you know, to just get up and I
didn't want to take a shower.
I want you to talk about thespecific breakdown what that
(11:38):
looked like because there areclues within those categories.
The next thing that's importantas you're doing this is, and I
talked about this a little bit,is I want you to look for
circumstances.
Um, and that can be umcircumstances of abuse, neglect,
it can be circumstances of majorlife events, major changes in
(11:59):
your life.
One of the problems we createdby by categorizing these, you
know, taking these symptoms andjust lumping them into buckets
and then giving them a name isit gives us an idea that we have
a disease when there can bereally, you know, this could be
in uh at the way that your mindand your body are responding to
traumatic events in your life.
(12:21):
Um, were there changes in yourenvironment?
Were there changes in uh in youreating habits?
One of the things that's reallyinteresting is the onset of
symptoms for a lot of peopleoccur in the young adult years
when there is a lot of change.
There's there is physical changewithin our bodies, there is
environmental change.
You know, people are moving awayfrom home.
(12:41):
There's there are, you know,you're all of a sudden you've
been going to school.
Most people are, you know, ifyou're in public school, you've
been going to school for 12years and then all of a sudden
it ends.
And now you're supposed tofigure out what you're doing for
the rest of your life, andthere's a lot of pressure.
Um, you may be moving away fromhome for the first time, and
you're in charge of yournutrition, and all of a sudden
your nutrition goes in thetoilet because all you know how
(13:02):
to do is bake potatoes and cookramen.
So it's important to look atwhen some you know symptoms
start to occur and what thecircumstances are that are
surrounding the onset of yoursymptoms.
The next thing that's importantto look at is to look at coping
mechanisms.
And coping mechanisms don'talways, it's not always easy to
(13:26):
understand that that's what theyare.
I've talked a lot about indifferent episodes, I've talked
about my one of my copingmechanisms was binge watching.
I mentioned a little bitearlier.
When I was growing up, we weweren't allowed to watch TV a
lot.
And so television, there was athere was a stigma around TV.
My mom didn't like television,she didn't like a lot of the
(13:47):
programming on TVs.
And so we didn't watch TV verymuch when I was growing up.
So there were some ideas that Ihad in my head about television
that made me feel like if Iwatched a lot of TV, that I was
doing something wrong.
And so that became a copingmechanism for me because it was
(14:08):
a way for my brain to escapethat was um it was for whatever
reason that's what I gravitatedtowards.
So it was, I had a very vividimagination when I was growing
up.
And so when I would watch TV ormovies, my brain would like
escape into that alternatereality.
And for whatever reason, thatwas what my brain sought out.
So as I got into my young adultyears and I was really
(14:29):
struggling, I would binge watchtelevision or binge watch
movies.
And it was a coping mechanism,but as but I didn't recognize
that that's what it was becauseI thought I just didn't have any
self-control.
And so for years, I spent a lotof time trying to stop myself
from this bad habit in my mindthat I had.
(14:51):
I even went to addictionrecovery programs.
Um, I bought a lockbox to put onthe power cord to prevent myself
from being able to watchtelevision.
I was doing all these things totry and stop the behavior, not
understanding that that behaviorwas actually a clue.
It wasn't until I met with atherapist, I was in a time
period when I was feeling a lotof depression and stress and
(15:13):
worry, probably partly because Iwas processing trauma.
And I was binge watching showsagain.
And I went to my therapist veryfrustrated one day, you know,
upset that I'm like, I don'tknow, I have no self-control.
You know, I just can't, I can'tstop myself.
You know, I'm watching TV again.
And and she asked me, what needare you trying to meet?
(15:34):
And I remember her when sheasked me the question, I'm like,
what?
And she she repeated thequestion, what need are you
trying to fill for your brain oryour body or your or your
emotions?
What what need are you trying tomeet?
And I said, I'm not trying tomeet a need.
I, you know, I have noself-control.
And she repeated the questionagain, just very calmly, but she
said, What need are you tryingto meet?
(15:55):
And and after the third time herasking me, I stopped to think
about it and I thought, I don'tknow.
And so that was a clue thathelped us to start recognizing
that that behavior that Iengaged in was an indication
that I was feeling distress.
Just like I talked aboutearlier, like the physical
(16:16):
symptoms of anxiety for me, thethe test chite, the chest
tightening, the you know,difficulty breathing was was an
indication that I was feelingdistressed.
So was the binge watching.
This coping mechanism was anindication that I was feeling
internal turmoil or distress.
And that would give me pause,and then we could take a look
around and see what was going onin my life at the time that was
(16:39):
making me feel this stress, feeldistraught, feel like I needed
to escape.
And then we could work through,you know, working through what's
going on that needs to behealed.
What is what is my body askingfor?
What is my mind asking for thatneeds to be healed?
And some people will have thiswill manifest some people in
addictions to you know harmfulsubstances.
(17:00):
So alcoholism, um, drugs.
And this is a very common thingwhen people go through addiction
recovery programs, they have tofigure out what the triggers are
for them, what's causing them tofeel like they need to cope or
escape.
And I do believe that it'spossible for somebody to develop
these addictions based oncuriosity as a teenager.
(17:21):
You know, you're you're at aparty, other people are
drinking, you want to see whatit's like, and that could lead
to an addiction.
But it's also very common forpeople to do these things to
numb themselves.
I've heard it calledself-medication.
And you're trying to escapefeelings that feel uncomfortable
to you or emotions or you know,other symptoms.
(17:43):
And so those instead of lookingat these things with judgment,
look at them with curiosity.
Write it down in your story andstart to look at circumstances
that would trigger a desire todo these things.
And those things can be cluesthat can help you then work
through and identify underlying,you know, underlying issues that
need to be treated.
The next thing to look for is umpatterns in in your symptoms.
(18:09):
So one of the things we do in myprogram is we start tracking.
We use a mood tracking appcalled Bearable.
I've talked about that in mybook and I talk about it on my
blog.
Um, and it's actually one of thetools that we use as part of
developing the mood cyclesurvival guide.
But it's really important tostart seeing patterns.
When you live with thesesymptoms for your whole life or
(18:30):
long periods of time in yourlife, um, these patterns feel
normal and so you don'trecognize them.
And so as you start trackingyour symptoms in a mood tracking
app, you can start to seepatterns.
You can start to seeconnections, and that can reveal
information to you that can beuseful in the healing process.
(18:51):
Um, one of the other things thatthat is really helpful when
you're going uh when you'relearning about how to how to
tell your story for yourself oryou know, write things down and
start to become a detective inyour story is to start to
understand what the symptoms aremeaning.
So I am a huge proponent thateverybody should be taking
(19:11):
micronutrients.
One of the main reasons, basedon the research that I've done,
is so many people are beingdiagnosed with with mental
health issues now, is because ofthe serious issues with the
nutrition in our foods and inour diets, and people's brains
aren't getting what they need tofunction in a healthy way.
And this peels back one of thelayers of symptoms for people,
(19:35):
but then you have to startlooking for clues within the
other symptoms that youexperience.
We have to stop thinking thatthere is a single answer to all
of our problems.
Um, even when people talk aboutlike the ketogenic diet or, you
know, even micronutrients,they'll say, Well, I tried
micronutrients, but I stillexperience symptoms.
And I always, you know, a lot oftimes this is in forums where I
(19:58):
don't have an opportunity torespond, um, like on social
media, but or where it doesn'tfeel kind to respond because I
don't want them to feel like I'mattacking them or just
discounting what they've done.
But the problem is that it itdismisses all of the other
factors that can lead tosymptoms.
And and it it's this idea thatwe have developed that there is
(20:19):
a magic pill that's going tosolve all the problems.
So once you start gettingmicronutrients into your body
and your brain starts tofunction in a healthier way,
then you can start to go to workon the other sources of symptoms
that you experience.
And the more that you begin tolook at your story with
curiosity instead of judgment,then you can start to uncover
(20:45):
what's actually happening foryou.
So, what I mean by that is umcoping mechanisms.
We have a tendency to judgeourselves because usually coping
mechanisms that are, you know,if we develop unhealthy coping
mechanisms, they're notbehaviors that we want to keep
doing because they're nothealthy for us.
And in which is why we call, youknow, I refer to them as
unhealthy coping mechanisms.
But what's happened is yourbrain is trying to protect you,
(21:07):
it's trying to help you.
And so it has developed copingmechanisms in that effort.
And so instead of judgingourselves and saying I'm a bad
person because I do this thing,ask with curiosity, like my
therapist did, what need are youtrying to fill?
Why, why do I have thiscompulsion to do this thing?
Why am I struggling with thisbehavior?
And what is underneath it?
(21:28):
Um, the same thing with thesymptoms that we experience.
You know, I the symptoms ofanxiety, uh like, you know,
difficulty breathing ortightness in your chest or
numbness, tingling that youexperience, um, a desire to hide
from people, not wanting to bearound other people, those kinds
of things.
Those are clues.
(21:48):
And instead of instead oflooking at myself at yourself
with judgment and judging,judging yourself for feeling
these ways, ask why do why do Ifeel that way?
What makes me feel unsafe inthis situation?
What is the trigger that'shappening?
Um, I it was really helpful whenI finally started to start to
recognize these as traumaresponses.
I had an experience, um, I can'tremember how many years ago.
(22:11):
This was, it was after I startedmy blog.
Um, and I was had been, I wasstarting to understand, you
know, how to how to look at mysymptoms with curiosity and how
to look for clues in mysymptoms.
And I had somebody attack meonline uh and say some really
awful things to me about what Iwas doing, telling me that I was
dangerous and that I, you know,I was gonna hurt people, and
(22:34):
which is the opposite of whatI'm trained to do.
I I am doing this because I careabout people that are struggling
with these things.
I offer the things that I wishsomebody had helped me with.
And so it really hurt me to havethis person saying these awful
things to me.
But more than that, I startedhaving a trauma response to it.
And I started recognizing atrauma response for me was this
(22:55):
anxiety response.
I was, I was feeling unsafe.
So my chest got really tight.
I felt kind of tingling all overmy body like I was, like I was
getting ready for a fight.
Um, I couldn't, I was having ahard time breathing.
And the logical part of my brainwas still active.
And it was like, why do I careabout what this person says
about me?
But I started looking, andbecause I had started training
(23:17):
myself to look at symptoms withcuriosity, I was thinking, okay,
why this is a trauma response.
Why am I feeling triggered?
Why am I feeling traumatized bywhat somebody, some random
person on the internet is sayingto me?
I I don't know that person and Idon't really care that they
don't like me or that they'resaying those things.
I know they're not true, but mybody is feeling unsafe.
(23:39):
So I wrote everything down.
This is what I'm talking about.
I got I have a journal that wasdedicated to this, to what I,
you know, telling my story.
And I wrote everything down.
I wrote all the circumstancesdown.
I wrote down all of thesymptoms, not the I didn't say I
felt anxious.
I said I my chest got tight.
My whole body was like tinglingwith this, like feeling like I
(23:59):
needed to fight somebody.
Um, my, my, I was having areally hard time breathing.
I kept yawning and feeling likeI couldn't get enough air,
oxygen in my lungs.
And I wrote everything down.
And then I took it to mytherapist and I said, All right,
I have something I need helpwith because I don't know why
this situation triggered thisresponse.
And because I had so manydetails about the situation and
(24:23):
I had written down all thisinformation about my symptoms,
my therapist and I were able todo some trauma work.
And with her, I was doing EMDR,and it helped me to go back and
figure out that what this wastriggering was unhealed trauma
for my hospitalization.
And so that was a clue that ledto the underlying source of the
(24:44):
symptoms that then was I wasable to resolve through doing
SIME and DR with her and someprocessing.
And now people attack me all thetime online, and it doesn't
trigger anything because I'veresolved the source of the
symptoms.
Um, one of the other things thatis really important to pay
attention to are symptoms thatoccurred with in connection with
(25:07):
medications.
We have a tendency to look atourselves as the broken person
and you know, that it's chemicalin our brain or that we have
somehow, you know, that wesomehow have something wrong
with us.
And often if if you have startedtreatment in for, you know, for
uh psychiatric, any kind ofpsychiatric treatment, that that
(25:31):
water gets muddied because thenyou start adding in the symptoms
that come from the use of thepsychotropic drugs that are
changing your brain chemistry.
So when you're writing yourstory, it's really important to
include in that story when you,if you did have psychiatric drug
treatment, what the treatmentswere, what what the you know,
medications, if you canremember.
(25:51):
I don't remember a lot of thenames of the medications that I
took.
Um, but I do remember I was onantidepressants, I was on mood
stabilizers, you know, I hadelectroconvulsive therapy.
So those are all part of thestory because there are clues in
there.
Um, and and when I was, when Ilooked back, I was able to start
seeing like the onset of sleepissues occurred after I started
(26:15):
taking psychotropic medications.
Um I did have, I did have some,they were different kinds of
sleep issues.
So I did have some sleep issuesprior to my diagnosis because I
would go through periods where Iwas very tired, you know, when I
was, when I was had low mood,and and then I would go through
times when I was elevated, and Idid have a few times when I
would stay up all night, youknow, because I just couldn't
(26:37):
sleep because my brain wouldn'tshut off.
But it was different than theexperiences that I had when I
was on medication.
And that's why it's so importantto call out specific symptoms
because they were differentsymptoms.
They some of them kind of feltthe same, but they were
different, and there werenuances about those symptoms
that I was able to identify thatwere actually related to the
(26:58):
medications I was taking.
So um, and the reason thatthat's important is because
that's another clue.
If some of the symptoms thatyou're experiencing have to do
with drug withdrawal or sideeffects from medications, there
are specific treatments that canbe utilized to help heal those
underlying sources of symptoms.
(27:19):
So, all of this to say it isreally important for you to
start writing your own story.
And I encourage people, I'mactually going to give you an
assignment.
I don't think I've ever donethat on this podcast, but I'm
gonna give my audience anassignment.
I want to invite you to get acheap composition notebook for
yourself.
(27:39):
And I want you to dedicate thisto your story.
And I don't, I don't mean youhave to publish a book, but it's
really important for you towrite down these things.
Don't keep them rolling aroundin your head.
Um, if you like to type insteadof write, you can do that.
Uh, I there is some researchthat shows that there is a
difference, a different part ofyour brain that is engaged when
(28:00):
you're actually physicallywriting than typing.
So do with that what you will.
But I would encourage you, ifyou can, to begin writing.
And you don't have to do it allin one setting.
In fact, this is probably goingto take time.
You know, it'll it'll happenover time because it at the
beginning, you may not know whatto what you're looking for.
And it may just be a broad, abroad story that you write for
(28:22):
yourself.
But I want you to have adedicated notebook that you
don't necessarily share withanybody because I don't want you
to edit what goes in thatnotebook.
But I want you to start writingyour story.
Begin with the earliest timethat you remember feeling any
kind of symptoms, and maybe goback even a little bit further
if there is or if you thinkthere might be clues earlier in
(28:43):
your life.
Um, I didn't have symptoms whenI was in fourth grade, but those
the clues as to what the sourceof the symptoms were started in
fourth grade.
The, you know, the pretty severebullying and ostraciz, you know,
social ostracis, ostracizationthat I experienced starting in
fourth grade was were the thingsthat led up to the suicidal
(29:07):
thoughts when I was in seventhgrade.
And so I want you to just startwriting your story and look for
clues.
Become a detective in your ownlife.
The more effective you become atthis, the more you're gonna be
able to uncover the underlyingsources of your symptoms.
And then as you uncover theunderlying sources of your
(29:29):
symptoms, if you have moreinformation to work with, it's
gonna make it easier to develop,you know, to identify which
tools are gonna be mosteffective in helping you to
address the underlying sourcesof your symptoms so that you can
heal and recover.
I hope that this has beenhelpful to you.
I would really love to hear fromyou.
If you would like to tell meyour story, send me a message.
(29:51):
I know that you can comment onthe pod on the blog or on this
podcast.
Um, you can send me an email.
If you go on my website, there'sa contact link on there.
You can send me An email that Iwould love to hear from you.
I'd love to hear about yourstory.
Let's begin the healing process.
Become a detective in your ownlife so that you can uncover the
true sources of your symptoms,treat them with an integrated
(30:12):
research-based treatment, andyou can heal.
Until next time, Upsiders.
Thanks for joining me on theUpside of Bipolar.
Your journey to recoverymatters, and I'm grateful you're
here.
For more resources, visitwww.theupsideofbipolar.com.
(30:34):
If you're ready to dive deeper,grab my book, The Upside of
Bipolar (30:36):
Seven Steps to Heal Your Disorder.
If you're ready to heal yoursymptoms, join my monthly
membership, The Upsiders Tribe,to transform chaos into hope.
Until next time, Upsiders.
It's possible for somebody to develop these
addictions based on, you know,curiosity as a teenager.
You know, you're you're at aparty, other people are
drinking, you want to see whatit's like, and that could lead
to an addiction.
But it's also very common forpeople to do these things to
numb themselves.
I've heard it calledself-medication.
And you're trying to escapefeelings that feel uncomfortable
(00:23):
to you, or emotions or you know,other symptoms.
And so those, instead of lookingat these things with judgment,
look at them with curiosity.
Write it down in your story andstart to look at circumstances
that would trigger a desire todo these things.
And those things can be cluesthat can help you then work
through and identify underlyingissues that need to be treated.
(00:49):
Welcome to the Upside ofBipolar, where we uncover the
true sources of bipolar symptomsand share proven tools for
recovery.
I'm your host, MichelleReitinger, number one
international best-sellingauthor of the Upside of Bipolar
Seven Steps to Heal YourDisorder.
In this podcast, I bring yousolo insights from my journey
and guest interviews withleading researchers and experts.
(01:10):
Join us to transform chaos intohope and reclaim your life.
Let's heal together.
(01:33):
Each of these episodes, the lastcouple episodes, have kind of
naturally progressed into thenext one.
And last week we talked abouthow the bipolar diagnosis is
actually kind of a problembecause it makes you think that
you have been given an answer towhy you have the symptoms, when
in fact, all you have been givenis an observation that you have
a certain cluster of symptoms.
(01:55):
And I want to talk a little bitmore about that process and then
how you can start identifyingsymptoms in a way that helps you
to become a detective in yourlife rather than a victim.
And that can lead to healing.
So when I was first diagnosed,the very first time, I went in
and filled pages and pages andpages out of questions that were
(02:17):
all related to symptoms.
Even the questions about familyhistory were related to
symptoms.
And the whole point of theexercise was to try to gain as
much information about thesymptoms that I was having so
that they could identify thebucket to put me in.
What's the cluster of symptomsthat I was experiencing so that
they could then give me adiagnosis?
(02:37):
And one of the things that thattaught me to do was to dump
symptoms into buckets, toidentify symptoms that I was
experiencing as categories,instead of looking at symptoms
with any kind of curiosity andwondering why the why I had
(02:58):
those symptoms.
You think you've been told whyyou have the symptoms, which is
not the case.
You've just been told that youhave these symptoms.
A diagnosis is just anobservation.
And what should have happened,and what I hope will happen in
the future, is that when you goin, it is useful to learn about
(03:21):
the symptoms within the contextof further curiosity.
So if you look at somebody'sstory and start identifying the
symptoms, you can then ask whatare the circumstances around
that?
And when you look at familyhistory, if there are, if there
is a history of it that mightindicate, you know, an
underlying source of symptomsthat is hereditary.
Not a chemical imbalance, that'sbeen completely debunked, but
(03:43):
things like micronutrientinsufficiency or generational
trauma is another thing thatgets passed down from generation
to generation.
And so what we need to do, ifyou want to start the path to
healing, one of the reallyimportant beginning steps of
that process is learning how totell your story.
And within that process,learning how to look for
(04:06):
specific things within yourstory so that you know what you
need to treat, so that you knowhow to identify things as these
are symptoms.
This is a symptom of the brainin distress, this is a symptom
of the body missing something.
And so I want to talk a littlebit today about what that looks
like, how you can start writingyour story down and telling your
story in a way that will lead tofurther curiosity, help you
(04:29):
become a detective in your ownlife, and look for clues about
why you're experiencing thesesymptoms that can then lead to
you to identifying the effectivetools and resources that can
treat the underlying source ofthe symptoms so that you can
heal and recover.
So the first thing that I wantto talk about is how important
it is not to lump symptoms intocategories.
(04:53):
We have been trained to look atthese symptom clusters as
categories.
We talk about depression and wetalk about mania and we talk
about anxiety as categories.
And one of the things that'sinteresting about that when we
talk about these in thesecategories is we think a lot of
times that when we hear somebodytalk about depression, that
they're experiencing the samething we do because we are not
(05:13):
breaking out the specificsymptoms.
We're just talking about thecategory of depression or the
category of mania or thecategory of anxiety.
I'll give you some examples frommy own story.
So let's do that.
That's probably the easiest way.
I'll give you some actualexamples.
So when I started my blog backin 2021, I didn't actually know
I was healing still at the time.
(05:34):
I thought I had just learned howto manage my bipolar really
well.
I still believed that bipolarwas incurable.
And so I was trying to tell mystory and talk about the things
that I had learned to managethese symptoms that I was
experiencing.
And the more that I would writemy story and the more that I
would do research and learnabout tools, I started
(05:55):
connecting dots.
I started recognizing, like whenI was the first time I
experienced suicidal ideationwas when I was in junior high.
And the, and I, as I thoughtthrough, you know, the
experiences that led to thatpoint, it became very clear that
the reason I was feelingdepressed was not because I had,
(06:16):
and and feeling the suicidalideation and the embarrassment
and the you know, the badfeelings that led to that were
not because I had some kind ofdisease.
It was because I had beenseverely bullied for four years
up to that point.
I had lived in four, you know,we had gone, I had gone to four
different schools.
Each school, I had started off,you know, starting to make some
(06:37):
friends.
And then within about a month ofstarting school, they would find
a very mean, very public way ofostracizing me, telling me they
didn't want to be my friendanymore.
And then I would just become asocial pariah from that point
forward for the next rest of theyear, and then I would move to a
new school and the whole processwould start over again.
So by the time I was in seventhgrade, I was desperate.
(06:58):
I I felt I felt like there wassomething fundamentally wrong
with me.
And I kept trying to changemyself and nothing was getting
better.
And I got to the point where Iwas severely depressed and I
didn't want to live anymore.
And so if if I if I looked atthat experience, if I had gone
to a psychiatrist, I'm verygrateful actually back in those
(07:20):
days that that wasn't somethingthat was very common.
Because if I had gone to apsychiatrist at that point, I
probably would have been put onpsychotropic medications as a
teenager.
That wasn't what I needed.
What I needed was somebody tolisten to me and to help me
because I was so lonely.
I was so, I felt like there wassomething fundamentally wrong
(07:41):
with me because nobody wanted tobe my friend.
When if if you go forward, oneof the things that came out of
that, I had I developed copingmechanisms that progressed
through teenage years and intoyoung adult years that made me
vulnerable to an unhealthymarriage.
And I ended up in a marriagethat was abusive.
And I didn't talk to anybodyabout what I was going through
(08:04):
in my marriage.
And when I finally got thecourage to leave, I didn't ever
want to talk to anybody aboutit.
I was so filled withembarrassment and shame for the
things that I had been throughin my marriage that I just
wanted to hide it.
I didn't want to talk to anybodyabout it.
I wanted to move on with my lifeand pretend like it never
happened.
And I moved to another state.
I, you know, got back intocollege.
(08:25):
And over time, that suppressedtrauma started manifesting with
depression symptoms.
I would go for long periods oftime when I would not want to be
around people.
I would develop copingmechanisms like binge watching
television shows and movies.
Um, and and then I would startto get an elevated mood.
(08:48):
My mind would start to workreally rapidly, and I would get
big new ideas and think that Ihad a new plan for my life and
tell everybody about it.
And this pattern developed uhout of this unprocessed trauma
that I was had experienced.
And as I started to tell thisstory more and more over time, I
(09:10):
started to understand betterthese underlying sources of
symptoms.
I could, I could start toconnect the dots about when
these symptoms started occurringand connect it back to the
experience that I had.
So that's why it is soimportant.
Number one, as you tell yourstory, is you start to write
your story out, and you canstart with an outline.
(09:32):
You can kind of outline, um, andit's it is useful to start when
symptoms occur and then kind ofwork backwards sometimes.
But um, it is important to makesure that you don't generalize
categories because you need tolook at the specific symptoms
you're experiencing.
So, for example, um, anxiety isa very broad category that can
(09:53):
lump a whole bunch of differentkinds of symptoms into one
category that starts to becomemeaningless because that
category is so broad.
For me, anxiety started to looklike a really intense tightness
in my chest.
My I felt like there was a vicearound my chest.
And I I felt like I was, I wasconstantly yawning and I
(10:14):
couldn't get enough air in mychest.
I didn't, I even went a fewtimes and got tested for asthma
because I had such a hard timegetting a full breath of air
that I thought maybe I had alung problem.
And it was important to makesure that I recognized those
symptoms for what they were.
I don't want to talk about itgenerally as anxiety.
Those are those are symptomsthat could be called anxiety,
(10:35):
but they occurred when my bodyfelt unsafe, when I felt unsafe.
And so it was something thatover time, as I started to
understand, I started to breakdown those symptoms and started
to understand that thosesymptoms were an indication that
my body felt unsafe, that mybrain felt unsafe.
Then I could look around me atwhat had what was going on when
(10:55):
I started to feel those symptomsand start to look for clues
about what led to the symptoms.
The next thing that's reallyimportant to do as you're as
you're doing this.
So the first thing that I'm Iwanted to mention is as you tell
this story, don't lump thesethings into categories.
Don't say I felt depressed or Ifelt uh I still struggle with
(11:16):
that.
But I if you say I felt and ifyou do, you say I started to
feel depressed, I want you tothen break that down.
What did that look like?
I struggled to get out of bed inthe morning.
I had a hard time wanting to bearound people.
I everything felt like work.
You know, I felt really hard to,you know, to just get up and I
didn't want to take a shower.
I want you to talk about thespecific breakdown what that
(11:38):
looked like because there areclues within those categories.
The next thing that's importantas you're doing this is, and I
talked about this a little bit,is I want you to look for
circumstances.
Um, and that can be umcircumstances of abuse, neglect,
it can be circumstances of majorlife events, major changes in
(11:59):
your life.
One of the problems we createdby by categorizing these, you
know, taking these symptoms andjust lumping them into buckets
and then giving them a name isit gives us an idea that we have
a disease when there can bereally, you know, this could be
in uh at the way that your mindand your body are responding to
traumatic events in your life.
(12:21):
Um, were there changes in yourenvironment?
Were there changes in uh in youreating habits?
One of the things that's reallyinteresting is the onset of
symptoms for a lot of peopleoccur in the young adult years
when there is a lot of change.
There's there is physical changewithin our bodies, there is
environmental change.
You know, people are moving awayfrom home.
(12:41):
There's there are, you know,you're all of a sudden you've
been going to school.
Most people are, you know, ifyou're in public school, you've
been going to school for 12years and then all of a sudden
it ends.
And now you're supposed tofigure out what you're doing for
the rest of your life, andthere's a lot of pressure.
Um, you may be moving away fromhome for the first time, and
you're in charge of yournutrition, and all of a sudden
your nutrition goes in thetoilet because all you know how
(13:02):
to do is bake potatoes and cookramen.
So it's important to look atwhen some you know symptoms
start to occur and what thecircumstances are that are
surrounding the onset of yoursymptoms.
The next thing that's importantto look at is to look at coping
mechanisms.
And coping mechanisms don'talways, it's not always easy to
(13:26):
understand that that's what theyare.
I've talked a lot about indifferent episodes, I've talked
about my one of my copingmechanisms was binge watching.
I mentioned a little bitearlier.
When I was growing up, we weweren't allowed to watch TV a
lot.
And so television, there was athere was a stigma around TV.
My mom didn't like television,she didn't like a lot of the
(13:47):
programming on TVs.
And so we didn't watch TV verymuch when I was growing up.
So there were some ideas that Ihad in my head about television
that made me feel like if Iwatched a lot of TV, that I was
doing something wrong.
And so that became a copingmechanism for me because it was
(14:08):
a way for my brain to escapethat was um it was for whatever
reason that's what I gravitatedtowards.
So it was, I had a very vividimagination when I was growing
up.
And so when I would watch TV ormovies, my brain would like
escape into that alternatereality.
And for whatever reason, thatwas what my brain sought out.
So as I got into my young adultyears and I was really
(14:29):
struggling, I would binge watchtelevision or binge watch
movies.
And it was a coping mechanism,but as but I didn't recognize
that that's what it was becauseI thought I just didn't have any
self-control.
And so for years, I spent a lotof time trying to stop myself
from this bad habit in my mindthat I had.
(14:51):
I even went to addictionrecovery programs.
Um, I bought a lockbox to put onthe power cord to prevent myself
from being able to watchtelevision.
I was doing all these things totry and stop the behavior, not
understanding that that behaviorwas actually a clue.
It wasn't until I met with atherapist, I was in a time
period when I was feeling a lotof depression and stress and
(15:13):
worry, probably partly because Iwas processing trauma.
And I was binge watching showsagain.
And I went to my therapist veryfrustrated one day, you know,
upset that I'm like, I don'tknow, I have no self-control.
You know, I just can't, I can'tstop myself.
You know, I'm watching TV again.
And and she asked me, what needare you trying to meet?
(15:34):
And I remember her when sheasked me the question, I'm like,
what?
And she she repeated thequestion, what need are you
trying to fill for your brain oryour body or your or your
emotions?
What what need are you trying tomeet?
And I said, I'm not trying tomeet a need.
I, you know, I have noself-control.
And she repeated the questionagain, just very calmly, but she
said, What need are you tryingto meet?
(15:55):
And and after the third time herasking me, I stopped to think
about it and I thought, I don'tknow.
And so that was a clue thathelped us to start recognizing
that that behavior that Iengaged in was an indication
that I was feeling distress.
Just like I talked aboutearlier, like the physical
(16:16):
symptoms of anxiety for me, thethe test chite, the chest
tightening, the you know,difficulty breathing was was an
indication that I was feelingdistressed.
So was the binge watching.
This coping mechanism was anindication that I was feeling
internal turmoil or distress.
And that would give me pause,and then we could take a look
around and see what was going onin my life at the time that was
(16:39):
making me feel this stress, feeldistraught, feel like I needed
to escape.
And then we could work through,you know, working through what's
going on that needs to behealed.
What is what is my body askingfor?
What is my mind asking for thatneeds to be healed?
And some people will have thiswill manifest some people in
addictions to you know harmfulsubstances.
(17:00):
So alcoholism, um, drugs.
And this is a very common thingwhen people go through addiction
recovery programs, they have tofigure out what the triggers are
for them, what's causing them tofeel like they need to cope or
escape.
And I do believe that it'spossible for somebody to develop
these addictions based oncuriosity as a teenager.
(17:21):
You know, you're you're at aparty, other people are
drinking, you want to see whatit's like, and that could lead
to an addiction.
But it's also very common forpeople to do these things to
numb themselves.
I've heard it calledself-medication.
And you're trying to escapefeelings that feel uncomfortable
to you or emotions or you know,other symptoms.
(17:43):
And so those instead of lookingat these things with judgment,
look at them with curiosity.
Write it down in your story andstart to look at circumstances
that would trigger a desire todo these things.
And those things can be cluesthat can help you then work
through and identify underlying,you know, underlying issues that
need to be treated.
The next thing to look for is umpatterns in in your symptoms.
(18:09):
So one of the things we do in myprogram is we start tracking.
We use a mood tracking appcalled Bearable.
I've talked about that in mybook and I talk about it on my
blog.
Um, and it's actually one of thetools that we use as part of
developing the mood cyclesurvival guide.
But it's really important tostart seeing patterns.
When you live with thesesymptoms for your whole life or
(18:30):
long periods of time in yourlife, um, these patterns feel
normal and so you don'trecognize them.
And so as you start trackingyour symptoms in a mood tracking
app, you can start to seepatterns.
You can start to seeconnections, and that can reveal
information to you that can beuseful in the healing process.
(18:51):
Um, one of the other things thatthat is really helpful when
you're going uh when you'relearning about how to how to
tell your story for yourself oryou know, write things down and
start to become a detective inyour story is to start to
understand what the symptoms aremeaning.
So I am a huge proponent thateverybody should be taking
(19:11):
micronutrients.
One of the main reasons, basedon the research that I've done,
is so many people are beingdiagnosed with with mental
health issues now, is because ofthe serious issues with the
nutrition in our foods and inour diets, and people's brains
aren't getting what they need tofunction in a healthy way.
And this peels back one of thelayers of symptoms for people,
(19:35):
but then you have to startlooking for clues within the
other symptoms that youexperience.
We have to stop thinking thatthere is a single answer to all
of our problems.
Um, even when people talk aboutlike the ketogenic diet or, you
know, even micronutrients,they'll say, Well, I tried
micronutrients, but I stillexperience symptoms.
And I always, you know, a lot oftimes this is in forums where I
(19:58):
don't have an opportunity torespond, um, like on social
media, but or where it doesn'tfeel kind to respond because I
don't want them to feel like I'mattacking them or just
discounting what they've done.
But the problem is that it itdismisses all of the other
factors that can lead tosymptoms.
And and it it's this idea thatwe have developed that there is
(20:19):
a magic pill that's going tosolve all the problems.
So once you start gettingmicronutrients into your body
and your brain starts tofunction in a healthier way,
then you can start to go to workon the other sources of symptoms
that you experience.
And the more that you begin tolook at your story with
curiosity instead of judgment,then you can start to uncover
(20:45):
what's actually happening foryou.
So, what I mean by that is umcoping mechanisms.
We have a tendency to judgeourselves because usually coping
mechanisms that are, you know,if we develop unhealthy coping
mechanisms, they're notbehaviors that we want to keep
doing because they're nothealthy for us.
And in which is why we call, youknow, I refer to them as
unhealthy coping mechanisms.
But what's happened is yourbrain is trying to protect you,
(21:07):
it's trying to help you.
And so it has developed copingmechanisms in that effort.
And so instead of judgingourselves and saying I'm a bad
person because I do this thing,ask with curiosity, like my
therapist did, what need are youtrying to fill?
Why, why do I have thiscompulsion to do this thing?
Why am I struggling with thisbehavior?
And what is underneath it?
(21:28):
Um, the same thing with thesymptoms that we experience.
You know, I the symptoms ofanxiety, uh like, you know,
difficulty breathing ortightness in your chest or
numbness, tingling that youexperience, um, a desire to hide
from people, not wanting to bearound other people, those kinds
of things.
Those are clues.
(21:48):
And instead of instead oflooking at myself at yourself
with judgment and judging,judging yourself for feeling
these ways, ask why do why do Ifeel that way?
What makes me feel unsafe inthis situation?
What is the trigger that'shappening?
Um, I it was really helpful whenI finally started to start to
recognize these as traumaresponses.
I had an experience, um, I can'tremember how many years ago.
(22:11):
This was, it was after I startedmy blog.
Um, and I was had been, I wasstarting to understand, you
know, how to how to look at mysymptoms with curiosity and how
to look for clues in mysymptoms.
And I had somebody attack meonline uh and say some really
awful things to me about what Iwas doing, telling me that I was
dangerous and that I, you know,I was gonna hurt people, and
(22:34):
which is the opposite of whatI'm trained to do.
I I am doing this because I careabout people that are struggling
with these things.
I offer the things that I wishsomebody had helped me with.
And so it really hurt me to havethis person saying these awful
things to me.
But more than that, I startedhaving a trauma response to it.
And I started recognizing atrauma response for me was this
(22:55):
anxiety response.
I was, I was feeling unsafe.
So my chest got really tight.
I felt kind of tingling all overmy body like I was, like I was
getting ready for a fight.
Um, I couldn't, I was having ahard time breathing.
And the logical part of my brainwas still active.
And it was like, why do I careabout what this person says
about me?
But I started looking, andbecause I had started training
(23:17):
myself to look at symptoms withcuriosity, I was thinking, okay,
why this is a trauma response.
Why am I feeling triggered?
Why am I feeling traumatized bywhat somebody, some random
person on the internet is sayingto me?
I I don't know that person and Idon't really care that they
don't like me or that they'resaying those things.
I know they're not true, but mybody is feeling unsafe.
(23:39):
So I wrote everything down.
This is what I'm talking about.
I got I have a journal that wasdedicated to this, to what I,
you know, telling my story.
And I wrote everything down.
I wrote all the circumstancesdown.
I wrote down all of thesymptoms, not the I didn't say I
felt anxious.
I said I my chest got tight.
My whole body was like tinglingwith this, like feeling like I
(23:59):
needed to fight somebody.
Um, my, my, I was having areally hard time breathing.
I kept yawning and feeling likeI couldn't get enough air,
oxygen in my lungs.
And I wrote everything down.
And then I took it to mytherapist and I said, All right,
I have something I need helpwith because I don't know why
this situation triggered thisresponse.
And because I had so manydetails about the situation and
(24:23):
I had written down all thisinformation about my symptoms,
my therapist and I were able todo some trauma work.
And with her, I was doing EMDR,and it helped me to go back and
figure out that what this wastriggering was unhealed trauma
for my hospitalization.
And so that was a clue that ledto the underlying source of the
(24:44):
symptoms that then was I wasable to resolve through doing
SIME and DR with her and someprocessing.
And now people attack me all thetime online, and it doesn't
trigger anything because I'veresolved the source of the
symptoms.
Um, one of the other things thatis really important to pay
attention to are symptoms thatoccurred with in connection with
(25:07):
medications.
We have a tendency to look atourselves as the broken person
and you know, that it's chemicalin our brain or that we have
somehow, you know, that wesomehow have something wrong
with us.
And often if if you have startedtreatment in for, you know, for
uh psychiatric, any kind ofpsychiatric treatment, that that
(25:31):
water gets muddied because thenyou start adding in the symptoms
that come from the use of thepsychotropic drugs that are
changing your brain chemistry.
So when you're writing yourstory, it's really important to
include in that story when you,if you did have psychiatric drug
treatment, what the treatmentswere, what what the you know,
medications, if you canremember.
(25:51):
I don't remember a lot of thenames of the medications that I
took.
Um, but I do remember I was onantidepressants, I was on mood
stabilizers, you know, I hadelectroconvulsive therapy.
So those are all part of thestory because there are clues in
there.
Um, and and when I was, when Ilooked back, I was able to start
seeing like the onset of sleepissues occurred after I started
(26:15):
taking psychotropic medications.
Um I did have, I did have some,they were different kinds of
sleep issues.
So I did have some sleep issuesprior to my diagnosis because I
would go through periods where Iwas very tired, you know, when I
was, when I was had low mood,and and then I would go through
times when I was elevated, and Idid have a few times when I
would stay up all night, youknow, because I just couldn't
(26:37):
sleep because my brain wouldn'tshut off.
But it was different than theexperiences that I had when I
was on medication.
And that's why it's so importantto call out specific symptoms
because they were differentsymptoms.
They some of them kind of feltthe same, but they were
different, and there werenuances about those symptoms
that I was able to identify thatwere actually related to the
(26:58):
medications I was taking.
So um, and the reason thatthat's important is because
that's another clue.
If some of the symptoms thatyou're experiencing have to do
with drug withdrawal or sideeffects from medications, there
are specific treatments that canbe utilized to help heal those
underlying sources of symptoms.
(27:19):
So, all of this to say it isreally important for you to
start writing your own story.
And I encourage people, I'mactually going to give you an
assignment.
I don't think I've ever donethat on this podcast, but I'm
gonna give my audience anassignment.
I want to invite you to get acheap composition notebook for
yourself.
(27:39):
And I want you to dedicate thisto your story.
And I don't, I don't mean youhave to publish a book, but it's
really important for you towrite down these things.
Don't keep them rolling aroundin your head.
Um, if you like to type insteadof write, you can do that.
Uh, I there is some researchthat shows that there is a
difference, a different part ofyour brain that is engaged when
(28:00):
you're actually physicallywriting than typing.
So do with that what you will.
But I would encourage you, ifyou can, to begin writing.
And you don't have to do it allin one setting.
In fact, this is probably goingto take time.
You know, it'll it'll happenover time because it at the
beginning, you may not know whatto what you're looking for.
And it may just be a broad, abroad story that you write for
(28:22):
yourself.
But I want you to have adedicated notebook that you
don't necessarily share withanybody because I don't want you
to edit what goes in thatnotebook.
But I want you to start writingyour story.
Begin with the earliest timethat you remember feeling any
kind of symptoms, and maybe goback even a little bit further
if there is or if you thinkthere might be clues earlier in
(28:43):
your life.
Um, I didn't have symptoms whenI was in fourth grade, but those
the clues as to what the sourceof the symptoms were started in
fourth grade.
The, you know, the pretty severebullying and ostraciz, you know,
social ostracis, ostracizationthat I experienced starting in
fourth grade was were the thingsthat led up to the suicidal
(29:07):
thoughts when I was in seventhgrade.
And so I want you to just startwriting your story and look for
clues.
Become a detective in your ownlife.
The more effective you become atthis, the more you're gonna be
able to uncover the underlyingsources of your symptoms.
And then as you uncover theunderlying sources of your
(29:29):
symptoms, if you have moreinformation to work with, it's
gonna make it easier to develop,you know, to identify which
tools are gonna be mosteffective in helping you to
address the underlying sourcesof your symptoms so that you can
heal and recover.
I hope that this has beenhelpful to you.
I would really love to hear fromyou.
If you would like to tell meyour story, send me a message.
(29:51):
I know that you can comment onthe pod on the blog or on this
podcast.
Um, you can send me an email.
If you go on my website, there'sa contact link on there.
You can send me An email that Iwould love to hear from you.
I'd love to hear about yourstory.
Let's begin the healing process.
Become a detective in your ownlife so that you can uncover the
true sources of your symptoms,treat them with an integrated
(30:12):
research-based treatment, andyou can heal.
Until next time, Upsiders.
Thanks for joining me on theUpside of Bipolar.
Your journey to recoverymatters, and I'm grateful you're
here.
For more resources, visitwww.theupsideofbipolar.com.
(30:34):
If you're ready to dive deeper,grab my book, The Upside of
Bipolar (30:36):
Seven Steps to Heal Your Disorder.
If you're ready to heal yoursymptoms, join my monthly
membership, The Upsiders Tribe,to transform chaos into hope.
Until next time, Upsiders.
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