Today

Started my day out with a doctor appointment. It was winter. It was depressing and it was long. The constant feeling of emptiness everytime I'm forced to face my mental illnesses. The doctor prescribed me with some new medication. Funny how things pan out. Get off one addictive drug and they hand you a new one. Is it bad to say that I don't trust doctors? I never have and probably never will. What makes them so qualified to educate me on myself? I don't care how many years of schooling they do. What class do they take that teaches them how to read someone's mind and judge their thoughts? Today is the dead of winter.

A Spoiler Alert

To whoever chooses to read this, if by now you have not figured out my seasons...

Winter is depression. Summer is mania. And Autumn, Autumn is me. Not the depressant or the manic. This blog is a story of seasons. My highs, my lows and everything in between.

A Manic Depressant

The doctor looked at me and said "my assesment is showing signs of bi-polarism." He stared at me. Stared me right in the eyes and said "what do you think about that?". At first I wasn't scared. With a long list of mental illnesses under my belt, I shrugged it off. As I walked out of the doctors office, the receptionist hugged me. She hugged me as if I had just been diagnosed with a fatal illness. She told me everything would be okay and I would get through this. At that moment my mind was racing. People around me acting as if I had been diagnosed with fucking cancer. I went home that day and told my mother what the doctor said. She denied the diagnosis and told me that I shouldn't worry because there's no way that I was bi-polar. It was winter. A couple days later the mania overcame me. Days on days without sleeping, speaking faster than I could keep up with. As painful as it sounds, mania was summer. It was happiness and it was a break from the long, cold winter that was always brewing inside me. I wonder if I would sound crazy if I said that i'm forever thankful that I have bi-polar disorder. Forever thankful that everything in the world can be going wrong, but my mood will convince me that my life is perfection. My diagnosis was everything except for Autumn. It was high, it was low, but never on the middle ground. It was never Autumn.

The Story of an Addict

At the age of 15, I tried smoking weed. That is where this story begins. A year or so later, I took up cocaine and was abusing it on weekends. The real addiction starts at the age of 17 when I tried opiates for the first time. If there is 1 single day I could take back in my life, it would be that day. Oxycontin, morphine, codeine, hydromorphs.. the list goes on and on. The problem with opiates is the problem with many things in life.. you don't miss them until they're gone. I was foolish, watching the people around me become victims of addiction. But something in my head kept telling me that I would never be one of those people. The first time I experienced opium withdrawals, I broke down into tears. Only 2 months into my hard drug use, I was addicted. But something inside of me felt driven. I had so many people to con, so many ways to fuel my addiction. The thing about fuel, is no matter how hard you try, at some point the fuel runs out. I began stealing from my loved ones, lying through my teeth and manipulating anyone that would give me the time of day. The typical story of an addict. I did some unspeakable things. Anything to prolong the withdrawals. My addiction was winter. It was freezing cold. The darkest, longest, coldest winter.

Autumn

Autumn is not summer nor winter. Autumn is a happy medium. Autumn is looking in the mirror and feeling satisfied, feeling content and feeling like everything will be okay. That middle ground in this mess of seasons. If only I could hold on to Autumn for more than a minute, my life would change completely. Autumn is honest and realistic, loving and lovable. Autumn is who I wish I could be more often. In this story of seasons, being Autumn was the ultimate goal.

Winter

Winter time brings out the worst in me. The depression in me, and the addict in me. Winter time is the feeling of looking at yourself in the mirror and hating everything you see. The long days where you have to self-motivate yourself just to sit up straight and try to get out of bed. Winter is the fear of not knowing when the season will change. Hoping, praying and wishing for a change of seasons. Winter time has put thoughts in my head, winter time has made me con the people I love and wrong everyone around me. The low point where you wish you could just end it all. I think that many of us go through winter. Many of us are trying to cope, trying to manage at the end of our ropes. If everyone living in the winter time came together, maybe winter wouldn't be so bad. But winter is a season. And soon it will pass.

Summer

Summer time. The good. The happiness inside of me. Despite my long list of illnesses, there is a bright light inside of me. I laugh a lot, love a lot and live my life to the fullest. Summer is the feeling of overcoming your weaknesses. The feeling that nothing can stop me and that i'm not the person that the doctors make me out to be. Summer time could almost be described as mania. The ups in my bi-polar mood swings, the days my addiction didn't get the best of me. This is the feeling of being loved and loving the people around you in return. The feeling of joy that was so hard to find. If it was up to me, my life would be summer time. My life would be sheer bliss. However, this is a story of seasons.