What do your manic episodes FEEL like?

[cowgirlnerd]

I have a few different experiences during mania and was wondering, I suppose, what's "Normal" for us bipolar's to experience, feel during mania.  

For example:  I have out of body experiences (detachment); rapid speech; anger and aggression; uncontrollable laughter; uncontrollable verbal vomit; paranoia; increased heart rate, ...etc.

What's your experience?  The detachment thing drives me batty - I wanted to see how others feel during mania.  

Will you share with me?

[hellsbells21]

I get flashes of light and my head feels weird and i shake but my bodies still i talk d fast and rambling and want tobe o  move. Ithink im gods give to others a d that everyone wa tz me but i get depressed and vedy vefy  low phyc say i ok but i know its now quite right but i like hypa but not after effets

[InMyNextLife]

All of the things that you experience plus I tend to try to sell my stuff, want to move away ( I think this is me trying to get away from the mania. Unfortunately it goes where I go). Also I rage. It's awful for everyone around me.

[bbm1188]

An enormous amount of energy, cant stop cleaning, researching, I have to stay busy like Ive taken an upper. I will not shut up either, think very rapidly, sometimes ill get angry or irritated easily. Ill get this high sense of self like I am so awesome,  I get really into myself lol I think what I say do and think is the ****. Like I can do no wrong. My husbands manic episodes he gets very obsessive with whatever hes doing such as video games, a Project, he will stay up for days obsessing. Sometimes he gets delusional thinks to much about god and thinks he can make sense of things he cant.  Starts talking and your like what? Your just not on his level. He will talk alot become very stubborn and short tempered, if its real bad he will get aggressive with specifically any stranger that rubs him wrong, but only with strangers and just guys.  He also gets violently ill throws up multiple times a day. As soon as his mania is under control hes fine, drinks and eats normally. Otherwise he will starve. And when I get really manic I plain old forget to eat.

[Robbi50n63]

That so sounds like the behaviors I have suffered, however being independent, the stress of my job (caregiving) has took its toll nearly, I am considering starting a disability claim, though that sounds like a death to me, I couldn't stand just staying at home yet the structures and responsibilities have become over whelming to say the least to go to work daily, though I keep on because I have no one else to depend on financially.

[Tsunade3]

My manic episode find me being very aggressive and feeling indestructible.  I get paranoid easily, then go to feeling indestructible, like i could take on an entire gang by myself.  I also start spending a lot, and more then once in the past I have gotten into trouble gambling.  The worst is my hyper sexuality.  I recently went off my medication several months ago and spiraled into a manic phase and took out all this sexual energy and frustration on others.  Surprisingly I did not have sex with anyone, but I met up with other guys and texted people asking for sex and then ditched them all.  I sent pictures, I teased, I said graphic things, one guy even rejected me and I got so angry I pursued him.   I did this all for my own satisfaction and for the rush of it.  I started taking meds about 2 weeks ago and talked to my doctor and was planning ways to tell my boyfriend about this, but he found out before I could tell him and now our relationship is ending.  I have never gone off my medication before or done anything like this and now I have let something I had control over ruin the best thing in my life.  All so I could feel that extra high.  Its not worth it to me.

[Midijane]

My mania is more irratabilty, anger rages, spending sprees, and enough energy to let me get something productive done. I usually feel awful with guilt when this happens bc my anger is ridiculous. I look for reasons to be upset. And the feeling of not being able to stop moving like I HAVE to get everything done today that is on one of my many to-do lists. But as soon as I cross a few things off my lists, i add more things to-do. Its exhausting. I will forget to eat, have many genius ideas, run around and get a lot of things half done, but not many things completed, and call everyone I know just to have a chat.

My depression is much more dominant and more easy for me to recognize the stages I slide through as Im on my way down. I can honestly say the predictability of my depression is somewhat comforting by this point in life because I dont fight it anymore. I just accept quiet days in bed, never leaving the house, avoiding the phone, mail, people in general, lots of sleep, and guilt-free living bc I have just surrendered for a bit.

[crabapple27]

i'm having a manic episode right now, but perhaps if i'm able to write this message you'd say i couldn't actually be manic because i am so self-aware but i'll explain exactly what it feels like. it happens to me about once every 3months. it is when things have gone really well. it builds up and reaches a point where I no longer feel attached to the ground. I feel like i'm floating right now. I can reason and evaluate but only to a certain extent. I'm usually an extremely grounded teacher. Right now, it feels like nine out of the ten switches in my brain have been switched off. Usually when one thinks (or types) you are doing that, but the cogs are whirring in the background too. right now the only active part of my brain, is spilling out onto this page. everything else has shut down. It is like usually I have ten ropes tieing me to the ground, but now nine of them have been cut. A definite floating detached feeling. I don't like it, I'm certainly not hyper in the conventional sense. i just feel very awake but like my brain has fused. can anyone relate to this? Am I not manic? Am I just making more out of this than there is?

[lea1010]

Hi! I've had one very intense and very long manic episode (lasted about a year). My personality changed 180 degrees. I had been married for 25 years, and I just bluntly  told my husband I wanted a divorce. I took up with a man before I was even out of my family home. Minor drugs, alcohol, promiscuity, excessive spending, flunking out of school twice, and losing 40 lbs in TWO months. Sooo, yeah, I guess my mania was sort of textbook. Depression set in a little at a time. I almost tried suicide in December of 2009. Wanted to try again (many times) in 2011/early 2012. I didn't know I HAD bipolar. Thought it was depression only. When I finally got on a mood stabilizer, I'm getting better and better. Not "normal" though. I guess it's my "new normal."  Crap.
I wish you all health and happiness

[MommyBug0901]

Mania (for me) usually includes serious amounts of angry outbursts, detachment from people, obsessive-repetative negative thoughts, alcohol binges, flipping out on someone only I don't remember the fight at all. Sweating, lack of sleep, uncontrollable and sometimes inappropriate laughter.

Mania is realizing that your life is a rollercoaster.
with its ups and downs. only there's no way off!!!!
My stomach is getting upset, I'm yelling to stop the ride, and when I feel I can't hold on any longer......it just gets faster

[discomposed]

I've had one recognized episode of hypomania and one recognized episode of mania. Both have some similarities, but are also very different in other ways.

Hypomania:
I felt extremely excited and confident, couldn't sit still, thought I was awesome, hadn't a care in the world. I don't think I was talking fast, but I was definitely talking more. I wanted to do all the things I typically can't do, and felt a lot of resentment toward my mother and the world for not letting me run free. When angry I couldn't actually properly express it, I had to say the word because my silly face was stuck with a permanent smile. I'd tug on my hair and flit all over the place, and was slightly inappropriate at times. Slept about 3hrs per night, woke up feeling fantastic. I'm completely unproductive, all I want to do is have fun. However, I was still cognizant enough to make decisions that needed to be made, and to clue myself in to the world around me and figure out what I needed to do to keep family and doctors at bay.

Mania:
I was euphoric, but zen. I felt like I was one with everything, like my mind and body melded with the whole universe. I paced in large circles, tugging on my hair. I could not sit still. Sleep was waaaaay down, sometimes nil. I talked fast, I was overly-descriptive, yet also managing never to actually finish telling a story all the way through. I had no sense of time. Again, completely unproductive, all I could focus on was doing things that were actually of interest to me, things that were fast and fun. I couldn't be held back even if and despite when my mother tried. While feeling wonderful, I was also easy to irritate and frustrate, suddenly coming to anger over the stupidest of things while still feeling happy at the same time. I was constantly laughing. Constantly. I was obsessive in my interests. Then I was suicidal, the sound of everything around me unbearable, sat at the hospital for half a day only returning home when I thought I was tired and could sleep, only to discover I wasn't actually tired I was just extremely bored. The next day I was once again experiencing zen-euphoria. I talked to myself a lot. I needed to be constantly stimulated, and sought out anything to fulfill that need. I gorged myself on caffeine, knowing full well that it was tipping the mania higher. Despite all the wonderful awesomeness, I also felt incredibly hopeless in this weird contrast, where I "realized" I was never going to have a good life and the depression would return and the thought of suicide was never far from my mind, but I wasn't and couldn't be saddened by this. I was deceptive, trying to hide my mania from the doctor (it took a lot of questions and one wrong answer, followed by a call to my mother, for him to figure out I was very not-right). I was so mind-dumb that I walked myself to psych emerg at my family doctor's request thinking I was just getting a med-change, when really I was being admitted. When the intern said they were holding me, I said and I quote, "you can go now, shoo shoo!" and to the psychiatrist after telling me he was holding me, a completely light-hearted, "I disagree!" as though these things would actually change the outcome.

[gal101]

I have the exact same as you!!! ESPECIALLY THE detachment thing out of body depersonalisation derealisation any info on it ? Thankyou!!!!  and the weird laughter i do it kinda scares me..... im like 'huuughhhhhhhh' sounds werird...

[Unpredictable1]

When Manic like now :I I feel afraid because I can feel myself internally wild. I fear loss of control and I'm anxious. My senses are accute and My hearing is sharp. This may not be true but I believe it is so it is. I become paranoid. I'm concerned about each noice, tick, sound, possibility. I become protective and find ways to protect my daughter and try to do it without being obvious because on some level I understand that I am being irrational but can't stop it Just In Case...you never know. And isn't that the thing about paranoia? You never really do know except hard core paranoia you are CERTAIN. I'm not there but whooo I teeter on the edge. I know I need to be safe and on guard at all time and it IS exhausting. Mania used to be fun-not anymore-now I hate it. It's scary. Hypo mania on the otherhadn feels great. It just doesn't know how to leave without trading off with mania. If I could only solve that problem and maintain stability and hypo mani I would be So thankful! Peopel like the hypo mania me. I like the hyp mania me. Who wouldn't? But Manic I feel Awful.

[hell1971]

im still learning as all my major episodes have been mixed states and am rapid cycling at the moment, thats not so flash, i have mind games like i see something for a split second and its horrid, something like a dead animal or body, or bug then I look again and its a plastic bag, i feel like im shaking inside but if i look at myself im not shaking at all, my minds busy so i cant stand noise it makes me really irritable, i cry alot, my emotional responses are not appropriate, something that i should be happy about i have no response, something I should be sad about and i laugh. happy one minute and ready to go go go and then sad the next unmotivated etc..

but when hypomanic thats fabulous, lots of energy, have no worries in the world, highly productive on whatever i decide to do, life and sole of the party, flirt with all the good looking guys (im married not so flash) and of course spend too much money that i cant afford.

obviously a lot more than that but it would take too long to put to paper.

[Alex_X_18]

it depends for me really....
I noticed diffrent things happen at diffrent times so I asked my phyc doctor if there
are diffrent stages of mania and she said yes....
in my lower stages I have better memory and im more social but I also become nostalgic
as it gets higher im less tired and feel bursts of enegry where I want to run and do more activities
when it gets real high I'll start having heavy anxiety
and occasionally I just sit there quietly but it feels like my brain is going a thousand miles an hour with racing thoughts

[cowgirlnerd]

I have cycles that I have recognized after becoming "self-aware" (I hate that expression),  I start with euphoria and then end it with b*tch mode....then the lovely depression and going back and forth without warning....

[paranoid_cataclysm]

My mania always involved me being irritable and erratic and hyper.  Only really felt some type of emotional high or euphoria before for six months of my life but the reason for it was natural and not mania.

[jimgreg]

everyone is difft when there in a manic state..some get high euphoria feelings..i never did mine were all mixed states of anger anxtys and feelings of kinda scared feelings..but they do stable ..unless you rapid then its much more to deal with..

[blakismom]

I actually love to be in the mania or hypomania end of things. I am very happy, confident, productive, loving, giving, and stuff like that. I would be very happy if I could be stabilized on the high side and not have to dip way down into the low side as if a price has to be paid for that high.
But from what my psych tells me, it is not normal to be that high, and then way low, so the name of the game is to be somewhere in the middle. How boring! Just kidding... I do so love the high side though. The lows are hell...zero energy, I don't get out of bed or shower or go anywhere or do anything, And I certainly don't care to do any of it at all. I am only on Abilify 10mg once daily after quitting risperdal due to weight gain. I guess my psych is trying to get me stable, but I am still not sure what Abilify is prescribed for exactly. I guess I will have to ask the forum that question.

[tweekie]

I think this paranoia thing is more like a filter or maybe more like a warped lens that we see through, sometimes things that people do or say can be interpreted differently according to the mood I'm in. When I'm anxious I become hyper self conscious and I think that everyone is watching my every move, but its really that I am watching my every move and placing my self all around me, if that makes sense. Its sort of narcissistic in a way, and juvenile. I think that mania can enhance narcissism, and egocentricism. We become self proclaimed suns, the center of our universe no matter how fabricated it is. Extreme mania oftens drives people away because its just too intense and almost scary. Sometimes its fun when you feel that high and everyone indulges in your madness. I become quite comical and zany. I think I've had mixed states more than the mania though. The mixed state is when I feel really anxious, my thoughts are racing and obsessing, I can't sleep but I want to die, and it just seems never ending, not like a depression when you mope, and feel slow and retarded. Its just a feeling like I'm stuck in a hamster wheel in the dark. That summer when I was going crazy, going to the ER every other day, I played guitar so much, I actually wrote a bunch of songs and started singing while playing. Atleast I got something out of it. Thats the cool thing about mental illness, look at all that artwork, music, books etc. that came out of insanity.

[ILADVOCATE]

There are many varieties of manic episodes. I learned that from reading the websites and from my psychopharmocologist. What you describe are mixed states which I've experienced as well but mine had psychotic breaks as part of them as I have schizoaffective of course. An agitated mixed state is very typical. I experienced them before recovery and truthfully when I signed up here I was (because they couldn't find anything not from lack of responsibility) off a mood stabilizer and was rapid cycling and one medication for my physical disability was making it worse. Right now I experience little euphoria which is those feelings of elation one gets but I often get dysphoria which is those feelings of depression but experienced in a manic way. Some of that may be neurological and dissociation is part of this but I did experience that before recovery (without dissociation). I posted a photo on my personal page I took before I started medication of an old graveyard done through a sepia filter taken at about age 17. I was obsessed with death then. I looked back and could see that at that time that's what it was and I discussed this with my psychopharmocologist and he agreed. My general experience has been mixed states of one variety or another.

[zzzmykids]

First, good to "see" you,  Mostly the same, no laughter during manic lots other times but has slimmed down from years ago.
Last night, I got ticked off fast and vomited on my husband and daughter, no real reason.
Sometimes I know it can't be me saying the stuff, but that is getting better.No paranoia, well yes.  I sometimes am convinces someones motives are less that what they really are and am not polite about it with them.  Like my friend, my daughters mother in law I sometimes think she  does things to tick me off...if you knew her, you'd know she is not.
I swear my daughter who is getting married in November's mother in law to be is haughty, self centered and ALWAYS picks the most expensive place for all of us to gahter.
It was worse w/o lithium. I would physically get out of the car and walk home after I said choice words to Hubby or whoever was driving.
I mainly have angry mania.  I used to write plays in minutes from dreams/rough sketch.
I can write a poem once and know it is just right.  I still am able to eat at a new restaurant and copy it verbattem the next week for others...even the expensive places.
And I write too much when manic...like um now.
zzzmykids