Manic: A Memoir

by Terri Cheney

The memory of sustenance is a terrible thing. Far worse, I think, than actual starving. Starving just kills you. Longing can gnaw away at you forever.

But suicide requires movement, and depression weighs a thousand tons.

But depression, like any virulent poison, doesn’t just exit your system all at once. It lingers in pockets and traces, long after you think you’ve recovered.

Apparently there’s a strange place on the bipolar spectrum called a “mixed state,” in which mania and depression meet and collide. In a mixed state, you have all the relentless, agitated drive of mania, but none of the euphoria. Instead, you feel depression’s misery and self-loathing. It’s the most dangerous condition possible, the one in which the most suicides occur. No longer protected by depression’s inertia, you now have the ability to act upon your despair.

All I knew was that as long as I was engaged in the process of chewing and swallowing, I didn’t think about anything else. Sensation completely replaced emotion. I didn’t feel anything more complex than salty or sweet, smooth or crunchy. And I didn’t give a damn about anything beyond the next bite.