I’ve had my Wellbutrin upped! I think it’s going well. I’m still emotional, but I mean, it’s not going to GET RID of my emotions. They kind of have to stay there doing things so I can function as a human being. If I wanted to get rid of my emotions I know several heavy tranquilizers I could request but since I’m not actually in a state where those are required, it’s fine. Ha ha sounds so serious. Really I was just thinking about Zyprexa which I still hate and am glad I don’t take anymore.

So I feel a little cheerier. God, regulating moods is so weird. I wonder how regular people do it? It’s really gonna take a month to see the full effect of this change.

I miss my old psychiatrist tho. She was awesome. She kept paper notes, and had an actual lie down couch in her office although I always just sat in a chair. She always went through the standard questions every session.

Actually so did my GP who changed my meds.

What are they? They ask about your energy levels, your sleep, your appetite, if you are displaying manic symptoms (I forget which ones they ask but my old psychiatrist would always ask if I was sending a bunch of emails because that’s what I did when I was manic in 2007. So long ago!), if you are irritable, and then they ask if you are depressed (but I think they word it differently) and if you have suicidal or self harm thoughts/behaviours. My psychotherapist goes through the same list. I guess it’s the standard Bipolar check in or something. It would get annoying if everyone checked in with me that way. Like friends. The pharmacist. The cashier at No Frills.

It’s been 13 years since I’ve been diagnosed. And 9 years since my last manic episode. I think I am doing pretty good, except for this depression. I think a lot of people accept being depressed because it feels like we’ll never find the perfect balance and the other option is to be manic and that’s just awful and is a really good way to alienate friends and lovers. But surely there must be a decent middle ground.

Today I loaded my pups into their crates and we flew halfway across the country to Saskatoon. They did good. I was worried, but it gets easier every time we do a flight together. Posey didn’t even get carsick and barf on the way to the airport, and she almost ALWAYS barfs. Actually I think her carsickness is starting to go away, because we got a ride home from a lesbian soccer match and she didn’t barf in the car then either. She didn’t even drool.

It’s very weird being here because of course, now Grandpa isn’t here to visit. And I used to visit him all the time, so it feels very out of sorts for him to be just gone. Mom and I are going to drive up to the reserve and visit him and Grandma’s grave. I want to think of something to leave for them. Maybe candies or chocolates. A lot of people there leave cigarettes on the graves, but Grandpa didn’t smoke. He did like chocolate though.

I feel like my life is evolving into a different phase right now. I guess that makes sense. I’m turning 39 next year. That’s almost 40! It’s a nice evolution. I’m starting to not care so much about what other people think.

I saw Dolly Parton this past Friday. She was awesome. I was really impressed to see how casually she incorporated her own accommodations into her performance as an older woman. Like she had different props to sit on, like a pedestal and a pretend porch and a pew and sometimes she sat at a piano and sometimes she just sat on a stool. Like yah! Of course! Don’t make yourself stand all the time and burn out! Also she had a really good system of telling stories around all her songs so that she wasn’t singing ALL the time. It gave her voice a bit of a break. But it was still SUCH an amazing show! She did my three favourite songs and a whole bunch I didn’t even know were hers. Ha ha of course I wanted to go mostly because I loved her in Steel Magnolias. Ha ha ha. We were pretty far from her, she looked like a glowing apparition. But she was awesome. I heard a rumour that she has full tattooed sleeves on her arms, and that’s why she always wears long sleeved shirts. And the crowd was funny because there were so many Christians and so many Queers!

I think I am ready to love someone. I think I’ve been ready for a while. But it’s feeling like I finally have more to give to a relationship than in the past. For one thing, I’ve been sober for four years, and I am mostly out of some old addiction habits I used to have, like behaviours. Just weird things addicts tend to do.

I think my main problem with forming relationships is that I get really impatient and want things to happen really fast, when maybe going slower is a wiser decision. Like I know in the past I’ve been really fast to sleep with women, because I wasn’t sure how else to convince them to stick around. Which is kind of sad. And also it meant that intimacy developed differently than if there had been some more flirting and getting to know each other. And I think, unfortunately, a lot of my exes maybe never would have even been my sweethearts if I had taken the time to get to know them and see how they treat people, me in particular.

Lately my problem is picking people so goddamned unavailable! Actually that’s been an ongoing problem. And it’s not that they are bad people, it’s just that they are not queer or not single or not close by. I don’t know why I get so crushed out so hardcore. I’ve always been that way.

But it’s funny, AND it goes back to the earlier thing in this post. My cousin told me that because we’re bipolar, it’s just the way we are. We feel things a lot more deeply than other people. Which to some people might seem sweet, and to other people might seem creepy. Like that emotional resonance is just dialed way up when you have a mood disorder.

The last woman I had sex with was also bipolar. I thought we could be good together based on that, but obviously it didn’t happen. I mean, there were other reasons I was interested. I don’t go trolling lesbian bipolar support groups. There is a tendency for bipolar people to date each other though, which was really the point I wanted to make.

Once one of my friends told me she had never been in love, and I was kind of flummoxed. Like, never? God, I was in love when I was 14. And it went on from there. I’ve never had a problem falling for someone, it’s just actually making something work out that never happened. I don’t want to come across as a loveslut though, cause really I am SO particular about who I fall for.

I have been awake for SO LONG! OMG I woke up at 6am EST and now it’s almost midnight in Saskatchewan (which changes time zones so I can never keep up but it’s 2 hours behind).

Yikes!