Erica Loberg is a writer, author of several books of poetry and columnist in PsychCentral Furthermore, when she was almost 30 years old, she was diagnosed with hypomania.
Hypomania is found in the DSM V, within bipolar disorder and related disorders. Briefly, its diagnostic criteria are:
Period of abnormally elevated mood and increased energy most of the day almost every day. Along with 3 or more of the following indicators:
- Increased self-esteem.
- Disminution of necesity of sleep.
- More talkative than usual.
- Flight of ideas.
- Easy distraction.
- Psychomotor agitation.
- Recurrent participation in activities that have many potential consequences
painful
The symptoms must represent a change compared to the individual’s previous behavior. Other people should be able to observe them, however the severity is not enough to cause problems in work, social life, etc. Finally, the episode is not substance-induced.
Below is the translation of his story about that experience:
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With a clinical diagnosis of hypomania, also known as bipolar II, I spent most of my life in a chronic manic state that can often be confused with ADD or ADHD or other conditions. It was not until I was almost thirty that I was properly diagnosed and treated and able to begin a life free of hypomania. Only now can I look back and see the symptoms I endured that reflected my hypomanic state and the people who, along the way, tried to help me.
People always told me to walk slower, and my response was that I come from a fast-walking family, so the idea that the quickness of my steps was a sign of hypomania never crossed my mind. People always told me to speak more slowly and I said that I think very quickly and I have to keep up with my mind. People always told me that I was very sensitive and I said that I was a human being who was in touch with his emotions.
There are many things that people said, not necessarily to bring me down, but to try to control me, stop me or make me some kind of freak that needed to acclimate to the world. When you’re hypomanic that’s just not going to happen, so I found myself living alone in my mind, knowing that something made me different but not having the knowledge or education to know what was causing these distinctions. I began to feel alone and navigate through these symptoms on my own. I didn’t expect my parents to understand because they came from a generation that didn’t talk about mental health, which only made things worse, especially when I was a child. My mom said that when she was a baby she never slept. When I started school she would stay up at night and watch my sister (with whom I shared the room) sleep soundly. I remember she once mentioned to my parents: “Erica doesn’t sleep.” And it’s not that they ignored the comment, they were simply not witnesses to my nightly struggles with insomnia in which my sister was constantly complicit.
When I entered university I was studying full load and playing college volleyball. Our team traveled up and down the East Coast, and when I was put to sleep with a roommate along the way, they always mentioned that I wasn’t sleeping well. I don’t know how a person can play Division I volleyball without sleeping, but somehow I managed to do it.
But things didn’t get really bad until after college. The academic and athletic structure were helpful in managing my hypomania at the time so, when I entered the real world, the reality of my insomnia took center stage. I remember that one summer I was working in Mergers and Acquisitions and I had a friend that I was going to go out with, she lived in Brooklyn and I in Manhattan, sometimes she slept at my house. We would go out late and then go back to my house and with few hours of sleep I would get up to run in the Hudson River. When I returned, she had just gotten up after being tired the night before and looked at me as if to say, what the hell! Are you back from running? Yes, but exercise was always instrumental to my health so I didn’t think it was a sign of something else.
So by the time I got help I had no idea I had suffered years of sleep deprivation, and I remember the first time I took a mood stabilizer. I remember waking up feeling fresh; as if he had slept like the rest of the world. I was so excited and relieved, but also disappointed and remorseful. Why did I spend almost three decades living with chronic hypomania? It’s no one’s fault, really, not even mine, but, for someone who always knew deep down that something was wrong, and who had loved people along the way, like the worried voice of my friends, my teammates, and my Sister, they were helpful insights that I simply ignored. They were gifts I wish I had paid more attention to.
I hope that if you experience any of these symptoms, or know someone who does, that you find a way to talk about it. And if you find people in your life who leave clues along the way, take note and listen.
Fountain: