I Am Giving Up….. I Admit Defeat, I Have Failed

English: Angelina Jolie at the Cannes Film festival (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

His last girlfriend was a bipolar as well, but he met her when she was manic and at her most charming. I was neither manic nor depressed when he met me. I was surfing a gentle sine wave. I was riding my bike every day, swimming in the pool for the rest of the afternoon, I had a life that I had carved out for myself with a lot of hard work and introspection. I had friends. Good friends that I now do not have. I do not know if this is the illness biting me in the ass, or if her has me so isolated from every one that people just stopped coming around.

He judges me on a daily basis. Because he is arrogant enough to point out that women/girls in big cities take the time to fix their hair just so, and make their lips look like Angelina Jolie after a collagen injection. I do not want to look like that. I want to look like me, just enhanced. I do not want to look like Mick Jagger. But, he says that is what turns him on (thank you Internet porn for warping my husband.) It didn’t used to be an issue. But, I still continue to be held to standards of female beauty that I just do not agree with. I have achieved a compromise with the all important lip liner. I just have to say that if he expects me to try to turn him on, he needs to bathe more than once a month. Why should I bother trying to be a porno slut if he can’t even keep his hygiene under control? That turns me off, completely.

I have hit the point where I really do not care if I turn him on or not. I am comfortable with the way I look. At the risk  of sounding vain, I am not an unattractive woman. I know for a fact that I am beautiful. Both inside and out. Besides, having sex with him after nearly three months is going to feel like a one night stand. He’ll get up and go sleep on the couch, and I will fall asleep in the bed. It has been this way for months. He just refuses to sleep in the same bed with me. Oh well, benefit for me. I have less back pain than I did before  🙂 I can just feel my self losing faith in what is supposed to be a partnership, and a loving marriage. Granted, I can understand his position. He has inherited my anger and volatile temper along with a whole lot of hurt from life, in general. And, yes, I do lash out at him even though he has nothing to do with past issues, but the Internet Porn is all his doing. That is something he has done all on his own, and it has changed him from the man I used to know. He continues to view it for hours on end even though he knows that it hurts me and that I do not like it.

What happened to quid pro qou? He gives up some of the time he spends with the porn sluts, and keeps his hygiene up, and he might see a change in my attitude. but, as it stands now, nothing is going to change. i cannot change him, I can only change myself. And, he may not like that new self.  I am half inclined to go with my mom today to file divorce papers today. I have rarely admitted defeat before I try to succeed, but this marriage seems hopeless. I am the only one who has to change, I am the only one causing problems between us (ummm, hello, hours on the Internet looking at other naked women, and watching them do anything; that one’s on him.) It just isn’t going to work between us. He is a big city guy stuck in a Southwestern “town” (never mind that there are 750,000 people living here.) I am never going to be able to be what he has decided he likes women to look like. I am who I am, and I am what I am. I have no apologies for that, I do not regret anything that I have done or has transpired to make me who I am. What I think is sad is that none of this had to happen. He could have stopped the porn stuff, and he could have been less adamant that I look like a big city girl. I am not from a big city, and therefore, I do take care with my makeup, but I have never had anyone with such an adamant and unwavering attitude that I must look like the big city women. I am fine with the way I look. Other men seem appreciative. He’s the only one who is dissatisfied with the way I look. And that argument is part of a larger whole of dysfunction in this relationship. it really isn’t about lipliner, it is about appreciation, and he might get what he wants if he would just bathe more often. This whole argument is about two people not wanting to do what it takes to make this work.

I am not the only one who has to change, he has his own issues that he should be working on, not focusing on my mental health issues. He says that I spend all my time thinking about my “illness,” I can guarantee you that he spends far more time on it than I do. Having Bipolar Disorder has just become part of my life; he’s the one who is hung up on it, and mentions nearly every day. And using lip liner is not going to help. As I said before, why should I bother when his basic hygiene is so bad? Why should I turn myself into one of his “fantasy” women if he won’t keep himself clean? I am giving up. I admit defeat. I admit that this failed because I was too defensive, too abrasive, and not enough of a whole lot of other things. I just cannot do this anymore. This argument is about respect, and compassion/appreciation for the other party. I have tried. I have failed.

More Morrie ~ I Find Him Very Inspirational

On Maintaining an Active Involvement in Life:  “Resist the temptation to think of yourself as useless.  it will only lead to depression. Find your own ways of being and feeling useful.”

He continues: “One of the great dangers when you are seriously ill is you can begin to feel purposeless…..if you don’t have purpose, you become depressed and start to wonder why you should bother getting up in the morning….it is very important to set goals for yourself, even if they are very small…..Don’t think that just because you are sick, you can’t have goals. Select your own objectives and get to work on them, no matter how slight they may appear to be….”

From page 66 ~ “….I started writing these aphorisms for my own benefit.  It was a way for me to distance myself from my illness and remind myself of what I needed to do to maintain my composure throughout my illness.  I wanted to get a hold on what was happening to me, and I wrote down what I was going through because it helped me objectify my experiences and be a witness to my own process.”


Writing down your experiences as a person who has (not is) Bipolar Disorder is incredibly helpful. Not only can you go back a re-read what you just wrote, you can go back years (depending on how long you’ve been writing), and see your progress from a person who just got hit with a heavy diagnosis to someone who is coping with and managing that illness. It can be very empowering to go back and read how far you’ve come, the progress that you have made, the mistakes you have learned from (and some are hard won lessons). I really encourage people to keep journals. I have about 12 that I write in, and I have been keeping them for years. Periodically I will choose one, and see what I wrote in that one (they have no sequence), and see how far I have come from that point. Keeping a journal is also a wonderful way of letting feelings out in an appropriate manner, and thereby removing them from our selves so we can examine what caused the pain, the hurt or the joy from a more objective view rather than the objective we have while experiencing the feeling. It is what Morrie called being a witness to your own process. Everyone processes bad news differently, and it is important to your recovery that you identify how you process your life as a Bipolar (remember it is only part of who you are, and it is certainly not the core of who you are). 


Relating to Others: “Keep your heart open for as long as you can, as wide as you can, for others and especially for yourself. Be generous, decent and welcoming.”


From page 71: ” Wanting to be different is just the beginning. There is no single way to go about changing the way you relate to others…..Identify what behavior you’d like to change; try to be specific….. then you need to identify things you can do toward accomplishing your goal……When you act like a kind and generous person, you eventually become one.”


From page 77: “Talk openly about your illness with those who’ll listen. It will help them cope with their own vulnerabilities as well as your own.”


I have always been an advocate of discussing Bipolar Disorder with anyone and everyone who will listen. It educates them, and allows you to let your feelings about it out. You do not have to get personal, but a little bit of personal experience does not hurt. You can talk about it in a clinical manner if that makes you more comfortable. I have had both types of conversations, it just really depends on who your audience is. Don’t keep what you are going through bottled up inside you. Don’t shut out other people.  It is also handy if people know in case you need to go the hospital.


From page 80 (this one is important): “Maintain and continue a support system, individually and collectively, of people who care about you and vice versa. Do not make demands that others are not ready or willing to fulfill. You may drive them away. Accept their refusal graciously.”


This is very important. While you can manage bipolar on your own, what are you going to do in those times when your illness has crept up on you, and you really need to talk to someone. However, don’t wear them out because the possibility of them withdrawing from you is realistic. I had that happen with my own mother who refused to see me, talk to me, anything to do with me for almost a year. I had exhausted her with my neediness and clingyness. After about 6 months, i was no longer homicidally angry with her, and we began to very slowly rebuild our relationship. Now, I do not call family or friends unless I really need to. If it is a baby depression, I just ride it out. If I find that it is developing into a full-fledged depression, then I will talk with someone. But, it is important to grow and maintain those relationships. They can save your life, quite literally.




From page 109: “If possible, find and develop a spiritual connection and practice that comforts you.”


I think this is very important in keeping yourself stable. I have what I call the “trifecta” against my Bipolar Disorder, and it is having very good doctors, having good medications, and practicing Nichiren Buddhism. Nichiren Buddhism is a very compassionate, pacifistic, humanitarian life philosophy. If you are interested in knowing more, then follow this link: Nichiren Buddhist Practice.
I have found that having strong faith and practice keeps me calm and grounded in the moment and does not really allow for self-pity. It is about the present and the future, and your happiness is your responsibility. We view obstacles and life struggles as opportunities to grow as human beings. So, Bipolar Disorder becomes one big growth opportunity for me instead of a reason to feel sorry for myself (which I still do on occasion.)