MI-5 and other grand ideas

I've been pondering tonight the range of trouble I could get myself into if I was inclined to get drunk. MI-5 had lots of great situations, brought on during times of high stress, but directly precipitated by drunkenness. I already feel like I make a fool of myself plenty often as it is, so I could be quite a disaster in the making if I started drinking much. Actually, there is a second side to that idea, however, that I overanalyze too much, and that I don't actually act any more foolish than anyone else, whatever my perceptions. By this line of reasoning I might benefit from loosening up a bit and taking the chances I consciously prevent myself from considering now. Actually, even the friends most strongly opposed to alcohol, who vehemently reject the idea that I might drink the stuff, all have at some point suggested this 'loosening' effect as the one obvious benefit to my drinking. Why is this running through my head now? I'd have to be really sleep-deprived or drunk, or have nothing to lose, to be exact, but suffice it to say that the guy (It is always a guy, of course. Nothing else can have quite this sort of effect on people.) I would be/ ought to be talking to has no idea- won't have any idea the way things are going. I considered a few months back whether I was interested in dating during my MA, and came to no definite conclusions then. Now, of course, I have my committee pretty much formed, with a pretty solid start to my thesis development, and a growing sense of where I want to be in 5 years. Since the mystery guy is not an integral part of my life now, he is not included in those plans, and every semester that he remains the 'really nice, cute guy' I am not dating, he is less likely to fit into those plans. That is all nice and logical. Fine. I just have to make sure I don't wind up drinking too much, ever, in his company or with his friends, while I am in a mood like this one. I have few enough inhibitions against telling people awkward information while sober.

Pervasive power of moods

I've been pondering off and on all through the past two days, whether I had a bad day, or whether I simply am in an off mood, and I am certain it is the latter. No, yesterday was not one of my best ever, but while I didn't get my overview of the Republic of China constitution and government structure printed out in time for class, I remembered enough of it to present a more than adequate summary from memory for the class, and I picked out the comparisons that the professor seemed most interested in having introduced. I didn't finish reading the speech by Obama for my second class of the day before class started, but we never got to that after all, and I was at least as prepared for the discussion we did have as anyone else was. The only annoying or unpleasant detail of the entire day, really, was finding that the professor I work for as a TA has different ideas from me when it comes to grading student writing. This is hardly surprising, nor is it unusual, and any other week it would be like water off a duck's back, but in my present mood, this one detail made me grouchy enough to bite someone. Even finding out about a political party dedicated to applying Objectivist principles to real-life, something that makes my thesis very timely and potentially useful as something besides a paperweight, only barely made a dent in my overall constitution.

Actually, these past few days have been a successful test of cognitive intervention in controlling mood disorder transitioning. My mindset has been growing progressively more pessimistic all week. This translated over the weekend into passing thoughts about how none of the people I know at school are really 'friends,' since I don't see them except at school. This is a very common thought progression, a reinterpretation of social connections to distance oneself from everyone, creating a defensive, solitary bubble. But political science people, unlike some other academic groups I have known, are quite friendly and gregarious, and so are some of the revisionist and social historian history students down the hall. I suppose it would be possible to maintain an isolation bubble still within this community, but not without being noticed. Not only that, but I also have an advisor, who also happens to teach a class I am taking, so that I see her 3 days a week. Short of dropping out, it would be very hard to get away with classic depression-style distancing within such a community setting. And every positive social interaction chips away at the pseudo-logic supporting my 'social-pessimism'(Is there a term for this feeling? There has to be. It is a sort of revulsion, a compulsion to avoid people for my own safety, emotional or otherwise. It also is closely linked to a 'felt' belief that those people who act nice to me are faking friendship, maybe laughing behind my back or something. This last part is also a feeling, not a logical or reality enforced idea.) Maybe some of my fellow grad students ARE feigning friendship, but if so they are natural politicians who could sell anything to anyone, and I am glad to be blissfully ignorant. Even better for me, there are a few people in the department around whom I really can't maintain a depressive state, and I encountered three of them today. I'd bet that the presence of such people in communities where depressed people go when in recovery make a huge difference in recovery rates just in general. Two of the three people I was around today are the perpetually cheery type, and I know I have read a few studies that have at least mentioned them as potential antidotes to depressive spirals, but the third is just someone whose presence I particularly enjoy. I doubt such interactions are measurable for any sort of study short of self-reporting questionnaires.

Postponement, procrastination and processing

I am still of the opinion that prolonging a hypomanic phase is a bad idea, but I think that is what I have been doing over the past week or so. I thought yesterday that maybe I was actually getting properly sick, finally, a condition that would 'legally' permit me to take a few days off and actually recover, but while I was suddenly and inexplicably tired starting about noon on Wednesday, and had the full body ache that usually accompanies the flu for me, I was only nauseous for about half an hour, Friday evening at about 7, and have not yet had a fever. Does this mean I will not be taking legitimate sick days this term? I was joking around earlier about taking sick days anyway, but realistically I can't quite afford it. It would make reading political science textbooks easier, but as several folks have pointed out, some of the important discourses in this field are not in book form, and thus I am not yet up to determining my own reading list. Not only that, I am not sure absolutely which areas I will choose as my emphases. After talking with Susan, I am dropping environmental policy as redundant, and an area in which I am less likely to need particular instruction, and theory is a definite. But I am torn between policy and American politics now. Looking at the range of topics within each, I can see at least half of each as necessary to my chosen topic, but not the whole range of either. So I am reading parts of Susan's New Handbook of Political Science, a remarkably readable and pleasant book considering its title, and hoping that I can sort out which direction I will go, before this coming Wednesday morning. Since I am taking an economics course, and a course on environmental policy theory, I only have space in my schedule for one of the two disputed areas.

I am also grading, finally, this weekend. Thankfully, all the 50+ papers in my stack are readable, but to grade the middle-range papers I have to go back and review all the material they were given from which to develop their papers. The "clearly A" papers and "clearly D" papers were easy, but the differences between the ones in the middle are muddier to assess. Thus procrastination- they don't need to be graded till at least Tuesday anyway, and maybe, probably, later.

On top of this, I am also reviewing for an exam on program assessment/ policy analysis which I will be taking Monday morning, and writing a take-home essay-exam on green jobs and sustainability, which I finished 2 hours ago. And, if I still have time and energy tomorrow, I plan to go for a walk, weather permitting, and write a draft of the ecosystems science portion of my white paper. So, while I can feel my mood slipping decidedly towards depression, I am still being quite productive. It takes longer to get myself started, part of why I didn't write my take-home exam earlier, and my brain has been feeling muddy and slow, but once I get started, I can draw myself into a more productive mode again, possibly by sheer stubbornness. Nighttime has an effect too. I have always written better after 1am, so it isn't surprising that my brain feels better now (~3am). I am decidedly pessimistic about my would-be romantic interest, and am only barely emotionally engaged in that outcome, to the extent that I am not motivated to do anything to effect a positive outcome, despite my continued interest in this person. I also am pessimistic about my chosen thesis, despite the positive reception it received from both faculty I have recruited into my committee thus far. That has something to do with my reaction to the Ayn Rand Institute website, and to my literature search on Friday that yielded very little useful information. I have yet to look up Alan Greenspan's contributions to this range of conversations, and I know that he wrote several things that may be useful, and I know Objectivism well enough to be able to find papers relating to my topic regardless of whether they use the term "Objectivism" or mention Rand at all. Realistically, I may not refer to Rand much either, as I go further into my topic. Her work is a map for my research, but my goal is not to prove her right or wrong. I do not like the cultish atmosphere of the Ayn Rand Institute, and do not wish to write papers that serve to bolster their cause.

Exercise seratonin and grand plans

I am going to miss playing soccer this winter. I doubt my body is up to much still, but soccer requires only brief spurts of running, not enough to make my heart beat funny, but enough to set back my mood cycling. I may get to prolong this hypomanic state another week after all. I was starting to transition out of this one this weekend, and this morning was in an odd state in which I had the mental restlessness and fidgity manner of hypomania, but with an underlying exhaustion growing that would allow the mania to burn itself out. Now, after another game with just enough running, I am back to the phase I was in last week.

I may need this phase, since I am working out my plans for the next 3 years now. I don't think it really affects the papers I am working on this term, so if I am not exactly sure of my focus just yet I have some leeway, but registration for next term is coming up very soon. My department is structured around 5 emphases, and a MA student is expected to choose 2. I was originally thinking when I started this program that I wanted to have an international focus, but the problem of making sustainability and environmentalism reconciled in some fashion with Objectivism has become a major issue in my current sustainability studies. So, I am back to the issues I was stuck on in high school. I am going with environmental policy and political theory as my two emphases, I think.

It may take more than a soccer game though to keep my energy up. I can see how anxiety disorder is linked to depression disorders. It is hard to put into words, but the more my depression symptoms return, the harder it is to do certain sorts of new things, especially things like trying out the recreation center on campus. I am sure I will eventually, but right now the thought that I might benefit from exercising there is pitted against an unreasoned reluctance to be in that sort of new public place alone. I really didn't do much at the CU recreation center until I started hanging out with my first two boyfriends, and Joe wanted to work out there with me. My reluctance to enter gym facilities is the same feeling as my reluctance to enter new bars or restaurants without company. However, I have no anxiety about contacting or visiting the office hours of professors I have never met. Are there extrovert and introvert varieties of mood disorder presentations? I am naturally a decided introvert, and am most at ease in the company of one or two people. This trait seems to become amplified when my mood cycles.

Certainly autobiographical case studies are of very limited utility in devising effective treatment for anything, and I have no way of really assessing my own mental state to be sure I am not compromised as I am writing, but at the very least I can record questions and observations for later testing. I will probably go back on depo provera eventually, at which time my mood will stabilize again, so this is a fairly temporary project, but I hate the idea of getting too used to relying on a drug.

Our Days are Numbered?

I am rereading Atlas Shrugged, the whole thing, after all. I had intended simply to analyze John Galt's very long speech, Rand's directed summary of her philosophy, against the concepts of environmentalism and sustainability. I have never disproved any major tenets of Objectivism, and yet I am now taking a course in which we are discussing the concepts of globalization, sustainability and justice, in a classroom of students who would for the most part want to lynch me if I took a pure Objectivist stance on our discussion topics. At least my committee chair read Atlas Shrugged in high school too, and did, at least then, consider herself an Objectivist. As far as I know, though, the majority of the department here is aligned more towards Marxism and socialism. It was safe enough and comfortable enough to keep Objectivism in the back of my head when I was in the sciences, because whatever my colleagues held as their governing philosophy, their actions tended to agree with the values espoused by Objectivism. In science, even if the 'truth' is elusive, we could all agree on the importance of honest research practices and reliance on data in forming theories.

Now, of course, I am in a department at the very heart of the debates that built up Objectivism. Political science is all about the role of government in private lives and in business, economic and social systems, and the construction of value sets and goals that drive policy. Every time I read Atlas Shrugged before this, these issues were outside my primary range of inquiry in my classes, and constituted simply the basis for a hobby interest outside science. This time, I am reading this book knowing that I am involved in discussions every day that touch on these same issues. Rand was certainly a pessimist, and ignored important roles emotion and intuition play in our evaluation of our goals and values, but much of this book remains solid, most in fact, despite these flaws in her philosophy overall.

In high school I wrote a paper on Atlas Shrugged, in which I looked up the historical parallels to Rand's characters and events in this book, Andrew Carnegie, J.D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan and the Pullman Strike, among many others. I wrote then about whether her storyline was an impossibility for real life, and while I optimistically stated that our real world is more robust and not so far gone as her book world, I still find this book disturbing now. I had studied then the arguments against FDR's programs to fix the Great Depression, and wondered how much longer those fixes would hold, and while I am not exactly expecting the entire US system to crack and crumble tomorrow, I still wonder. Eddie Willers, in the start of this book, is pondering the phrase "Your days are numbered," with the vague feeling that it applies to something bigger than just the old typewriter to which it had been applied. This is the feeling I have had increasingly this semester, looking at the complex maze of fixes, and patches on fixes, that make up our global and national systems. We escaped the fate of Rand's fictional world, eradicating monopolies and enforcing socialist measures, so far without collapse. For how long?

Concessions to reality

I finally had to give in and accept that I am not able to focus enough of my energy on printmaking this term. At least I have a burin, scraper, and some linoleum pieces to work with for the rest of the year, and a plan for my project. Actually the only thing in it that really requires studio access is the background imagery anyway, and if I do callograph I only need the school studio for the press for one afternoon. Everything else can be hand-pressed, and can be done using a small roller I can get from the art supply store. I had thought maybe after soccer is over next week, I would go back to being in the studio on Mondays and Wednesdays, but looking at all the reading I want to accomplish to really do a decent job on this prairie dogs paper, I am not sure I will have the energy, even once my one-month long English class is over. Oh well. I do think I might tackle the paper mache faces and wrapped wires this term, and work up a set of imagery for the prints, and maybe I can print in late December or early January, between semesters, all but the callography, which maybe I can run on a slow day in mid-January when the regular students aren't ready to print yet anyway. And next semester I think I am going to try for a choir instead, for my fun class. I would have gone with a choir this term, but they all conflicted with something else I had to take. Next term ought to be somewhat more open.

Needless to say, my bipolar phase has shifted again. I am actually teetering on the edge of a hypomanic phase, with lots of excess energy in short bursts. Mt typing speed is pretty high right now, and my spelling and typing errors, typing fast, are still low, even for me. I couldn't sleep till almost 4:30 on Sunday night, and if I hadn't been running around a lot during our game on Monday, I might have not slept much on Monday night either. My appetite is almost gone, too, oddly enough, so I am functioning on less than 1000 Calories a day, and have to remind myself to eat. I think if I could stay in this phase for a few weeks I could have all ~70 pages of papers for all my classes written and edited to a professional standard within about two weeks, including all the reading and typing. I still only type at about 40 words per minute at my fastest, unfortunately, even on my smaller, laptop keyboard. Unfortunate, too, that this phase is extremely draining. Amusingly, it is a great phase for awkward or potentially upsetting social situations, since my brain is running so fast now that if I am upset about something, my brain is already moving on within hours, or even minutes, even with situations that in my depressed phase could upset me for weeks. It is as if those episodes happened months or years ago, and are already old history. It would be interesting to find out how universal these features are in bipolar people, especially those with bipolar II. I am not sure if a fully manic individual could really be introspective enough while manic to really make any decent observations of their disorder.

Actually, to the extent that I could develop a better understanding of how my brain functions while in the various phases and transitions of bipolar II, it is debatable whether bipolar II is even a disorder in my case. It certainly will always affect the ways in which I interact with 'normals,' but the same can be said of any personality trait. It would perhaps take a particularly observant, tolerant and interested individual to really provide me with a stable long-term romance, ever, and I can see why a lot of bipolar cases turn to self-destructive sexual habits, resorting to strings of one-night stands and other unstable, unhealthy behaviors. If they can't maintain a normal relationship, they would almost certainly, in their manic or hypomanic phases, seek out whatever relationship they could get. I can't quite imagine myself into such a state, but I have the advantage of over a decade of reading and studying psychology (16 years, at least, now, since I started reading about affective disorders). I also test, at least during manic phases, in the 'genius' range of IQ tests, and am decidedly not suggestible for things like hypnotism, so I am not representative of standard bipolar cases.

I suppose the next question I am interested in is whether I could artificially extend my hypomanic state beyond its normal course, without making myself dangerously depressed. It is probably a very bad idea to experiment with this during grad school; the temptation to hold my brain in a manic phase to finish major papers, and especially in a few years to finish my thesis, might be too great if I allow the possibility of doing this one during a semester. I seriously doubt I could ever be truly suicidal- I am too stubborn for that- yet I suspect that at some point holding mania artificially might precipitate an unnaturally severe depression in its wake. It would be irresponsibly arrogant of me to assume I could manage such a state, especially alongside the normal, and severe stress of graduate school. Probably I can find enough information from case studies, once I am no longer researching prairie dog management, to construct at least a theoretical base from which to consider this aspect of manipulation of bipolar states.

In the meantime, I obviously am not functioning 'normally' yet, cause it is now one o'clock in the morning, and I am only beginning to feel the fatigue, and Tuesdays are my longest. So, more fascinating observations and contemplations of my affective disorder will have to wait, while I finish the dinner I forgot to eat a few hours ago, and head off to sleep (hopefully).