We talked today about my mood and its trends these past few months. I wanted to take a look at the mood charts and try and get a sense of what is going on, but in looking it is hard to get a handle on anything

here’s the year broken down into a paragraph- January and February even mood, right down the middle till mid March, then anger/ irritability first sign of elevating mood. 33 days of elevated mood (it is very hard for me to bring myself to rate my regular plain jane mood higher than a 5, so if I was rating at 6 and above it tells me something though I remember nothing from last winter. A few polo tournaments, but nothing else stands out), more irritability and then a short period of overwhelmed/ stressed. In early may mood started to trend lower. June mood continues lower and steadies into depressed/overwhelmed/ stressed, coming up on 2 months in steady depression when I saw psychopharm consult dr. and started provigil. 6/23/12 started med- mood elevated within couple days stayed up for month, despite increasing stress and pressure from farm. 2 days mood was very off and dark. mood rebounded with increased provigil dose and remained level for week bobbled hard for a day, and leveled again for week before a 30 day slide into dark and suicidal at end of August. another almost 30 days of depression and very dark low mood before Tough Mudder- rode that high for almost a month and into start of polo season, early November mood starts to shift, one week stretch where mood started to slide. but levels again for week before starting steroids for back. elevated mood for two three days and then very low mood for two three days, then epidural. mood very elevated for three days before crashing into suicidal depression/ gun episode. 10 days of extremely disconnected jumbled and disoriented mood state before hospital for 1 week. mood improved after 3- 4 days in hospital and became slightly above baseline at release, but dropped off right away upon return home. lost our old dog, and stress. angry, suicidal and disconnected. 12 days of low mood/ and flu. rebounded to midline last days of 2012. First week of 2013 solid, then mood declined rapidly into dark and disconnected for 10 days. then 12 solid days despite stress and pressure continuing from farm and personal horse being sold to create funds for debt. 23 days of very depressed dark mood just now lifting into a slightly better, closer to the middle mood.

I guess looking at one year of moods is interesting. Not that there is a distinct pattern, but more there is a lack thereof, especially since the steroids. The switch seems to flip faster and harder than it has in the past. When it gets dark it does so in a hurry. It isn’t just a little off mood. It is I want a way out NOW, not in an hour, or a day. It has to be now. This isn’t my normal. Not since I was young and impulsive at 20. It is a scary trend. One that Beatrice and I talked about. What is so terrifying is it doesn’t matter what they say, or that they are there. It is like my brain just makes it all disappear. There is only one option. It is a dark and horrifying place that seems to stretch to the horizon. Never varying, never seeming like a shift might happen. It is oppressive in its infiniteness. Smothering my good sense and any rationality that might still exist up there in my grey matter. So I am left wondering is this the new me? post steroids? a new chapter in my shifting landscape of moods and periods of dismal darkness and wishes of death. I know this sounds strange, but I preferred the way it was. Sure it was months and months of sliding before hitting the depths which fired up the impulses and desires to eradicate myself, but it was understood and I knew what was happening. There was time to hit the panic button. Time to change the meds, and ramp up the number of sessions. There was time to intervene. This is very different. This is not happy at breakfast and seriously contemplating methods over lunch. It is a space of hours, not weeks or months. There is zero margin for error. There is so much of a risk, too much of a chance things will go very wrong. Especially given I just can’t see out. I KNOW these shifts are happening fast, and not lasting long. I KNOW. but I don’t see it when I’m in the midst of it. The blackness if no less deep and starless as the one that dogears a two or three month slide. It is as painful, and as raw. If anything it seems worse somehow. It is a racier, fast more impulsive place. It isn’t “im feeling suicidal”, it is I am suicidal right now. It isn’t I want to die, it is I want to end this life this minute. There is a big difference. I know we often place importance on whether or not there is a plan. I have always put quite a bit of weight in that. It is like a line in the sand. the one that you cross into a riptide current and sure drowning. I’m not even sure I’d stop to think of a plan in this racier, angrier mood state. I think I would act, not think. There is no thinking going on. That is the problem. There isn’t anything but raw, teeming emotion. Swirling ankle deep one minute and neck deep the next. I can’t help but think of a tsunami wave. Those black roiling waters engulfing everything fast as the eye can track it. I want to go back to slow. I want the lazy soft trickle of Zambizi in the midst of a deep drought on the plains of Africa. No need to worry about crossing, or being swept away. That is my fear. I am terrified one of these shifts in mood will carry me away, long before I realize I have stepped into a river far too deep and too fast to survive. As I look into the future I only see this fear. I only sense the dread as the days click off and I wonder when it will shift again. I know it is coming. It is a matter of when and how hard the shift will be.