Final Project

I am sharing with you a part of myself that I don't typically let others see, it's hard to talk about. This subject matter is something I didn't want to share, but the idea persisted. It wouldn't leave my thoughts. To me that's a sign saying I need to share this.

Bipolar Type II:

A form of bipolar disorder. It's symptoms include depression symptoms and episodes of hypomania. It differs from Bipolar Type I due to its severe depression and hypomania (instead of full blown manic episodes). With all versions of Bipolar disorder hallucinations and delusions of grandeur may occur.

Rapid Cycling:
An variation on traditional bipolar disorder where your moods can cycle as fast a daily. Traditional bipolar disorder usually cycles in one to three month periods, and can stretch out to once or twice per year.

Anxiety (Panic Attacks):
Panic attacks are sudden episodes of intense fear that triggers severe physical reactions when there is no real danger or apparent cause. When panic attacks occur, you may think you're loosing control, having a heart attack, or dying.

Early Warning Signs

My earliest moment that I remember showing symptoms was when I was 15, and it was a panic attack. It was my freshman year of high school and, and time for freshman basketball tryouts. I had walked up to Sunnyside Park by the University of Utah with a friend of mine. There were around 50 guys there who all had hopes to make the team. We started with warming up, I made it 15 minutes before I started to crash, my lungs felt like they were closing off, I couldn't think straight, and was scared. I didn't know what to do, so I left. I walked about a mile down the hill, looking at the valley below, got on the bus, and went home.

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Your first kiss should be something memorable, sweet, awkward, and full of stress with someone who you love to the degree you can at the time. My experience is different than most. My friends and I just got done with a cast party for "You Can't Take it With You." I was around 17 at the time. We were coming home in my friends van, I was experiencing a depressive low. I didn't know what was going on, my mind was foggy and in a dark place. I was in the seat behind shotgun, Miriam was next to me. She didn't know what to do with how I was acting, and took it as pouting. We pulled up in the driveway of her house and she leaned across the van and started kissing me. It should have been a wonderful experience.

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The Dark Figure, Delusions, & Hallucinations

Throughout my life I have often seen a dark figure, standing over my when I was in bed, woke me up at night by getting close to me, or walking the halls of where I live. Because of this I am not able to walk around my house with the lights off in the middle of the night, or sleep with my bedroom door being open. I know rationally that this all in my head, that it's a hallucination. I know it's a hallucination because since I have been medicated I see it less.

I was living on my own when I was 23. Working full time and going to school 4 days a week. The condo I lived in didn't have any young children, so there were never kids outside playing. People owned there own condos, so the smokers didn't come outside, let alone spend time outside the gated entrance. It was an overcast day and I was on my way home to get ready for school, eat dinner, and relax a little. I was driving up the road, not really registering anything I saw outside of cars around me. I was about 50' feet away when I saw him, a man wearing a dark blue suit, next to the tree to the right of the entrance of the complex. He was eyeing me down as I got closer. Fear overtook me. I was feeling malice, anger and disdain being projected towards me. I started to panic, looked around me, then back to the where he was standing. He was no longer there. I slowed down looking around me, no one was there, I was shaken by what had just happened.

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Age 25, I have been married for less than a year at this point. My wife and I are living in out first apartment, 2310 W Orion Way Apt X (third floor). We were still trying to reestablish ourselves since we have moved back from Colorado. I was restless, tossing and turning in bed, anxious. I was entering a stage of hypomania, boarder line manic. I was restless because I was having insight to the people who lived in our apartment before us. It all made sense that they had done something evil, wrong, or dark. I ended up on our balcony asking for a piece of paper so I could draw the person I was seeing in my head, I was convinced that this person had lived here and was causing these troubles. My wife and I went and stayed hotel that night because I wasn't able to sleep where I believed these horrible things had happened.

2310 W Orion Way

In March 2013 my wife and I were in bed. I was not able to sleep again. It felt like my wife had woken up and gotten out of bed. I sat up and looked at the figure in the door frame. It was a female figure. I called to her and asked her what she was doing. She then turned over in the bed and asked me what I was saying. The figure looked at me with a glowing green eye, then walked out of the room. I was frightened, shaking in bed, and remembering all the times where the dark figure appeared around me.

Being Medicated, Mood Swings, and Panic Attacks

Two years later I was just finishing my first year of college, and doing finals. I discovered if I dropped down to 3 hours of sleep a night and live on nothing but sugar and caffeine, I become super effective... then crash, and go deeper and deeper into depression. I ended up sleeping for almost 2 weeks before my wife bribed me to go to the doctor. I was diagnosed as bipolar, and referred to a psychiatrist to further evaluation. That's when I started my medication roller coaster. I began to feel numb to the world  here as I changed medications. 

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Being medicated is not a complete fix. I will never be fixed, and there is no cure for what I have. The process of treatment is to get everything that goes on inside your head with a manageable routine, combining medication, scheduling, exercise of the body and mind, and finding out how to handle the swings that will still happen (but will happen in a less severe manor). Just imagine going to a doctor and finding out there is no cure for a disease you have. For me it is hard to handle, especially on the occasion where my moods become a roller coaster, or I can't figure why the environment I am in is one I have to escape from.

On a typical Saturday I do grocery shopping. It's a structured morning. I go shopping, first to Costco (before the rush of people), the supermarket, then lunch, and finally back home. If I am too late to Costco on a Saturday the place is overrun with people. It's much harder for me to be there when this is going on. I was following my regular schedule, but got out the door later than usual. So the hordes of people were at Costco already. I walked in, knowing I needed to get some medication, and breakfast for the coming week. I started to sweat, not like I was working out and start to sweat, but I started to look like I had just taken a shower. My hair was wet. My prerifial vision started to blur, and effect my vision. I saw what was in front of me. It started to feel like I was drowning in a sea of people. I had to escape, but I knew I needed to get these two simple tasks done. My step increased and finally made it out the door. It was all a blur. I got to my car, and wasn't able to do anything until I calmed down (I'm unsure how long it was). I rushed through the other shopping I needed to do, and a couple of days later had to go back to the places I needed to go, and purchased the things I forgot. After I got home, I was useless the rest of the day, and sat in my chair, knees to my chest and disappeared in to my own world. By the time my wife got home (4 or 5 hours later) I had started to calm down.

The transitions of moods when going from mid-line to depressed or to hypo manic is almost as bad as the actual episodes. When I am experiencing mania or depression, it doesn't seem I will ever escape them. So paying attention to the triggers that cause it to happen, and the changes in myself are very important. With going into a hypomanic episode I begin to experience the world around with heightened senses. If I am in a room where there are a lot of people, I can distinguish just about every conversation. It gets unbearable. My other senses become overwhelmed also. I am able to seem more of what's going on around. I am aware of where people are in relation to me. The world feels different to me, more intense and I'm barely able to handle it.

Normality

I have been told I will never be off medication because of how many I have gone through. I call my morning medications breakfast due to the quantity I take. I have gone through over 14 types of medications with a large variety of combinations from 1-10 different pills, gels, or injections. With each come an array of side effects. Most side effects of the mood stabilizers and antidepressants is weight gain in various degrees. When the last change came to my medications I gained 50 lbs. Blurred vision, coppery taste in the mouth, increased depression, slowed reflexes, and fatigue are some of the more common side effects. The worst side effect is death. Yes one of the medications is able to kill you if not taken correctly. You break out in a life threatening rash, which has an increase of happening when you combine it with another medication. But in spite of all of that I take them. They make it so I can consistently function day to day.

When everything seems to be going to hell for me, I put in my headphones, play my music loud enough to shut the outside world up. My focus increases on what I am doing at the time. My preferred way to check out is with my watercolors and The Foo Fighters.

Assignment #7 Panorama's

Assignment #6 - Black and White Portraits

Alicia
Mother of two, full time Illustration student, she is coming down with a cold or the flu, and her three year old isn't going to sleep at night.

Marino
He's one of the biggest 11 year old kids I have met. We had been swimming for boy scouts. He tends to stick out because he is bigger than the rest of the boys.