Monday, November 25, 2013

Trans Bi

Before you think I'm referring to Bi Sexual, I'm not. I'm referring to Bi Polar. 

Thank goodness, the bi-polar medical condition has come out of the closet too over recent years. It's a real deal that can be treated in most cases (like mine).  Don't quote me but I think there are many levels of being "Bi". I compare it to what we experience in the transgender community.  Some of us desire to explore the other gender by cross dressing, others desire major transsexual SRS.

If your memory is better than mine, you will remember I mentioned here in Cyrsti's Condo I was diagnosed in the 1980's as being Bi Polar.  The reason I'm bringing that up is, as I read some personal stories from different groups I'm in, I often wonder if an individual here or there may be "Bi" too.

Here's how my diagnosis happened. As a result of several episodes of cheating on my wife with myself  (See the "I'm no Angel" post) I agreed to gender counseling as an attempt to save our marriage.  Very early in the process, I told my therapist about my episodes of extreme "up's". For days on end, the skies were bluer, the music better and I could conquer the world. Conversely, the days that followed, I could barely pull myself out of bed and face the world. I felt as if I was running in sand and couldn't accomplish anything.

Without hesitation she said she doubted my "condition" was caused by gender dysphoria. More than likely I was Bi Polar. Back in those days, I thought my next stop would be heavy sedation or the "rubber room". But over the next year or so she prescribed several different medications to try and indeed found one that has worked wonders for me ever since. In fact, the medication helped stop most of the severe anger management issues I had at work which were coming close to getting me fired.

Having said all of that and again I'm speaking only for myself, when I began the process of being accepted to start HRT, my current "Bi meds" regime raised huge flags for my therapist and medical doctors.  Of course the HRT meds themselves can cause depression after the initial rush of changes to one's body. I had to sign an oath in blood I would notify them if I felt the "elevator" going down (depression) significantly and staying there.

I don't play with it and do monitor my "elevator" constantly.

My purpose of this post is information.  For the longest time I blamed any and all of my noggin issues on my gender issues and some of the blame was wrong.  Another one of my "favorites" was I was just crazy. Along the way I began to understand too a better term for me could be "eccentric".  Again I was blaming my inner boy/girl turmoil on being "crazy".  Indeed, I do encounter my share of true "crazies" on the web, I find many others who use the term more as a crutch. Being transgender does not make you crazy.

It's time to put my "shingle" back away and again my only purpose of this post was information.  If any of this happens to fit you though, maybe you should bring up your symptoms during your next visit to the therapist.

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