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Twenty Years Later-Looking Back, Looking Ahead

© Colleen Sullivan

Twenty Years Later ~ Looking Back, Looking Ahead

It was Brian Kiley who wrote:

I went to a bookstore today,
I asked the woman behind the counter
Where the self-help section was
She said, "If I told you,
That would defeat the whole purpose"

My experience with Bipolar Affective Disorder has been much like that for the past twenty years, as I have struggled to learn and understand the illness. The lady in the book store represents the many brick walls I have run up against in my search, not only for knowledge but for understanding, empathy and compassion.

My doctor gave me a bare bones description of the disorder, and a vague prognosis all those years ago. He did say that I was lucky that it was 1980~that even twenty years earlier, before the advent of effective medications I would have been institutionalized, probably for the rest of my adult life. He did not, could not, answer my questions about what the future would bring. Fortunately for me there was no crystal ball to predict the events that would follow. If there had been I would have given up in defeat, never attempting to fight the fight or win the battle.

Reading was a consummate passion from the time I was able to put "Dick, Jane and Spot" together at the age of four. I looked to books for everything and well remember the visits to the local library every Saturday morning to choose five (the limit) books to read during the following week. By Wednesday or Thursday I normally had nothing left to read and was climbing the walls in anticipation. Quite naturally I turned to books for more education about Bipolar Illness. From medical encyclopedias, personal accounts, scientific journals, PDR's, and anything I could find I gradually learned more about it. Remember though, it was 1980. Bipolar Disorder was still a shameful and hidden Mental Illness...it had not had its "coming out" and literature was scanty.

Today, books are readily available from the easiest to read to the most scientific reports. With the advent of the Internet, up to date information has become accessible almost instantly. The internet offers not only information about the disorder, but support in the way of bulletin boards, chat rooms and even on-line psychiatrists! Oh, how I wish it had been available to me all those years ago!

In 1997 I got my first computer. Several months later, barely accustomed to the computer itself, I decided I had a message about Bipolar Illness I wanted to share. I had no knowledge of HTML language at that time (what was that?) but step by step I learned, and am proud of Bipolar World and my contribution to the Bipolar Community online.