PeteBandel

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I am just like you, well you with a condition that causes me to have extremes in my moods and personalities. I am bipolar, something few understand, many suffer from silently, and many others are wrongly diagnosed. I am classified as mentally ill, but that does in no way diminish the capacity of my understanding, complexity of my thoughts, nor faculties of intelligence. I am more prone to suffer from a mood disorder than an infringement of my mental well-being. I think critically, I ponder expansively, I search existentially, and I learn pragmatically. However, I feel emotions irradically. I love chaotically, I grow tired and bored too easily, I fly towards flights of fancy too readily. I am as grounded as one man can be. Externally, I look polished, processed, non-conflicted, readied for the tasks that come my way. Internally, I am frenzied, reticent, scattered, emotional, lovelorn, unapologetic, stoic, worse-for-wear, calm-in-the-face of danger, full of neuroses, able to stand still with ice-water flowing through my veins, full of kinetic energy, longing for rest, up, down, sideways and so much more.

I am a graduate student, writer, friend, brother, son, lover, uncle, cousin, and all too often "crazy" or "insane" follows all of those statements. That is not the truth though. I simply have a condition that causes me to beat a little off, a little faster or a little slower than you. Like a pace-maker for an irregular heart, there is hope. There are supports, educations, medications and coming-to-terms practices that I have done that have made a stigmatic disease something that is a blessing and an absolute strength. Those that truly care have been those that have saved my life and given it purpose. All of this is for them.