Ron's Bipolar Blog

• The Financial advice and plan are are underway and although the news on the markets is not encouraging I feel we are still better than I thought so we will look at more closely once we have all the facts sometime early January.

• Eating fast and not chewing my food has been hard to change but at least I catch myself and am able to slow down, I think the key here is don’t be in a rush to get somewhere or do something, sit down and concentrate on enjoying the meal. Work is still needed here but I am not beating myself up about it and am confident of success. I am purposely eating smaller meals and having my biggest meal at Breakfast and smallest at Dinner time

• I am definitely exercising more and have greater energy, I put this down to four main things 1. Going off Lithium due to side effects and just being on Epilim which does only have limited side effects on me 2. Less bread 3. Better diet all round more juices, try to do one day a week juice fast or four meals only juice per week, definitely detoxes. 4. I had seven mercury fillings replaced while in Brazil, three to go, it might be just my mind but I definitely feel better for it.
• I am wasting much less time Judging, Criticising, Blaming (especially myself) and Shaming, I try to see the best in every being in this wonderful Universe.

Hello world I am sitting here in Brazil, which is a bloody long way from Australia where I live (my wife and I have come here to give my son Daniel and his wife a hand with their new born twins).

It is nearly time to go back home ,we have had a wonderful time helping Dan and Rosarmy, living with the locals.  While my wife was busy with the twins (I have helped)  I have had some valuable time to think, read and talk to my son Daniel, the editor of  http://www.pathstobliss.com.  I have read his free E Book which you can download if you wish from www.pathstobliss.com. It makes great sense to me so I thought why don’t I put it to the test and see what I can achieve for my betterment.

This blog site has come about through my discussions with Dan and I know I will achieve the mental wellness *Bliss* I desire if I follow the simple philosophy *more GAINS* less drains.

Firstly I thought I should identify what Bliss is for me because we all see it in our own way.

When I was a kid I thought everything was blissful.  I seemed to have a greatchildhood and probably did. The first time as an adult that I felt Bliss was when still single I had driven with friends to the Royal National Park in Sydney and a thunder storm hit, here we were running through a rain forest in torrential rain, lightning, thunder and wind in bare feet a truely wild feeling. I felt so alive.

Falling in love, getting married holding my new born children and grandchildren for the first time are blisses that are always alive in me.
So to me reaching my *Bliss* is to feel internally the positiveness of people, things or events that make me feel alive, blessed or full of gratitude.

So what are the easily identifiable drains that come to mind that I can change now or over the next month or so;

- Fear of the future,enough money to survive retirement (This has been a
major drain for years)
- Rushing my eating not chewing fully, fermentation and gas in the stomach causing major belching and other smelly noises
- Mercury fillings in my teeth, I have 11 mercury(amalgam) fillings that research tells me are poisoning my whole system
- Holding grudges against people from years ago
- Guilt (I have many guilt drains so for now I will work on the easier ones)
- Too much processed food
- Self  Love, they say you must love yourself before you can love others(similar to guilt)

That’s a good start now what do I intend to do, lets see what easily
identifiable *GAINS* I can find to negate the drains and have few extra *GAINS
* to keep the account in the positive.

- I have been retired now for nearly six months and I am already so much more relaxed, retirement is not as difficult as I feared (nothing is,nothing I ever worried about ever happened the way I thought it would). When I get back to Sydney I am going to sit down and look at what we have in assets, determine what we need on a yearly basis, talk too our accountant and financial advisor and structure a plan that tells us exactly what the position is. With all the information we can make an informed decision rather
than a guess,  based on little fact and full of fear.

- When I was getting married my mother said to my future wife ’stop him from eating so fast he doesn’t chew his food’, 40 years later nothing has changed but I know now it has too and I am determined to make the change.  Back when I was 20 I used the excuse that I was the baby of the family and if I didn’t eat fast my brothers would steal it. It sounded good at the time. I intend to have a juice fast one day per week Mondays if possible; eat more grated raw food; consciously chew my food ; eat smaller portions
of meat and other  foods which tend to bloat and ferment in the gut; cease drinking with meals except the odd glass of red wine to be
sociable when out with friends.

-Love myself and the Universe more each day , Unconditionally Love all things and be Gratefull for what I have in life not wasting energy on guilt,fear or what I dont have.

- Exercise more in nature and swim in the ocean as much as I can

Well there we go this is my simple starting point I will update this blog at least once a fortnight and add more GAINS as I eliminate more drains.

Hi My name is Ron Coates, I turned 60 this year.  I have kept fit all my life and was first diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder in 1995.

What a journey  it has been over the last 14 years but I know I created it and I am the one who must cure it.

The intention of this Blog is to:

1. Describe my journey up until now.
2. Diarize my journey to recovery, setting out proposed changes in my direction/lifestyle.
3. Allow the whole world to comment on what I am doing and also share any good advice or experiences which can help others benefit over time.

Most people reading this blog will know what bipolar is.  My simple definition is that some life event minor or major creates a mood swing either Up (Manic) or Down (Unable to cope). The swing can be minor or major depending how your mind interprets it.

In my case I would swing so far down I couldn’t talk or socialise even with my family/friends. Then within months, weeks, days or even hours I could swing upwards to a massive manic mood (high) where I believed I could do anything, nothing was impossible, I would talk quickly and have a 100 projects in my head at once (manic was very dangerous for me and my family).  Then a stress would hit me mentally(generally due to something I had done while manic and I would be back into a deep  depression again.

Manic is a great  feeling(you feel fantastic) but by far the most dangerous mood you can have in my opinion.  For me a manic state develops after a period of deep depression (down), I think I am OK, balanced when suddenly up I go, becoming so engrossed in so many projects and solving the worlds problems that I have no time for caring about myself or others.  I commit to projects and waste money on things I cant afford, which then spins me back to depression ( one big spiral to nowhere up and down).

My experience of deep depression is that I  lose all love of self  (worth, esteem, confidence, control)

Tags: bipolar, depression, manic