BIPOLAR health Care- Fight for the Right to have control over YOUR LIFE!

In my quest for more Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham info, I randomly stumbled upon  this blog:

IT'S JUST A RIDE. It's the touching, candid and oddly informative blog of a bipolar gentleman from the UK. His latest post was about the upcoming election and how the government wants to increase the number of "Talk therapists" for people with depression by cutting the Mental Health budget 5%. So.. let me get this straight.. The UK wants to CUT around 5% of the MH budget so they can pay for therapists to occupy/run/facillitate all the new depression intensive talk therapy centers they are planning to build...

Hmm... I guess the UK is just as fucked up as we are.

Gotta love politicial agendas, elections and doublespeaking candidates... Its like a three ring circus! We should cut the budget for helping the people suffering from mental disorders- BUT that makes room for us to build places to PUT THEM! and pay for people to staff them. There we go, problem swept under the rug... er, aham, problem solved, right?...
Needless to say, I felt the need to comment. My comment has become its own blog post:

More people need to know about how devestating, unpredictable, frustrating, confusing and exhausting it is to be Bipolar. If I don’t have the right meds, I am a ticking time bomb. I’m just not aware of it until I’m about to explode and blow everything up all around me. It has cost me relationships with people I really care about, jobs I may have had a future with (if i could just show up for work on time like everyone else- or everyday like everyone else), college courses, acting/modeling opportunities..etc. I’ve failed because of irratic moods, depression, overwhelming emotions, mood dictating behavior, impulsive and often STUPID decisions, unable to figure out priorities because EVERYTHING is a priority, so nothing gets done and I feel even worse. Guilty, exhausted, discouraged, out of control… without my meds, when I am in a depressive state, I reach a point where I just don’t want to BE… and I question why I AM. What’s the point?


Yet, when I’m stabilized, when I feel clear headed, when I know what its like to be “normal”, life is beautiful and its crazy to question why you wouldn’t want to live in the presence of such wonder and beauty. Meds help me find a balance and without them, with my insurance company only covering GENERIC drugs(UM HELLO- different fillers can spell disaster for me! I’m talking to YOU generic adderall, you are the devil!), half of the cost of my therapy and psych appts and costing me WAY more than it should for one, single, undergraduate female. So, what happens to us when the world lacks empathy for the bipolar?

 We go undiagnosed,remain untreated, feel unhappy and act unruly. If other people, the big wigs, the moneybags, the monoploy guys, the frickin’ shareholders of the world,( I dunno, whoevers in charge- could be the damn CEO of Walmart by know, who the heck knows? , could walk around in our frantic shoes, listen to the overlapping voices in our heads, cry our tears (for no reason- of course), and wreck THEIR lives/relationships/family because of their inability to make sense of their emotions, actions and thoughts… I’m pretty sure all our meds would be covered, free of charge.


I’m lucky to live in Vermont where we have the state sponsered health care program VHAP. VHAP covers my meds, my therapy and doctor appts. I had to fight tooth and nail to get it or, you know, just spiral completely out of control TRYING to get help on an employer assisted CRAP health insurance plan that covers nothing. Basically, I couldn’t afford the help I needed and I didn’t qualify to get any extra help for diagnosis/treatments because I was working… I didn’t qualify until I finally did lose it and took off for canada with a big bottle of coconut rum and a full bottle of valluum. After a suicide attempt/cry for help, the state was finally helping me find out what the hell was wrong with me and figure out my ongoing treatment plans.


The public needs to understand how important it is for Bipolar people to have the proper health care coverage. It takes time and perseverance to collect checks from Disability and Social Security. I don’t even WANT to. I bet most of us don’t. I want to go to work and earn my paycheck. I want to set financial goals for myself and not live off the tiny little allowance the government says is enough for me to survive on based on their skewed views of “universal” liveable income. It costs more for everyone when I can’t get that help because now, I’m collecting unemployment. If I wasn’t trying to go to school, I would qualify for food stamps. If the state finds out I’m going to school (even if its part time) AND i’m unemployed, they stop my health care coverage… Does this make sense to you? I can get alot of help from the government if I don’t work and don’t go to school. They will give me free health care AND food stamps. Apparently, all I have to do is do nothing and not try.


I realize in other states, people aren’t so lucky. They can’t get the help they need whether they’re employed or jobless and living on a park bench. If I had my breakdown, night of hypo-manic, accidental suicidal maddness in a different state, I might have ended up dead on the canadian border. Just another victim of the system. Jane Doe from Vermont. So senseless… why did she do it? Thats the thing.. I wouldn’t know. I wasn’t thinking anything that made sense. Call it crazy autopilot. I hope.. maybe things will change, awareness will be raised, and health care will improve for everyone. Everyone should have a right to live their life! Bipolar takes control of you and you are your irratic mood’s slave. I’m lucky (for now) that I can get that help. Is it up to us, the ones affected with mental, mood and personality disorders, to demand that change? It sure would be nice to have more people in our corner… Well.. there’s always the NAMI walk:)

I'm pretty exhausted after writing all that. Perhaps my mind is finally calm/empty enough to fall asleep....