Completely Random Post #978: Bipolar and Botulism

This post is coming from so far out in left field, you shouldn’t even try to find any spiritual connotations in it. Back in the day when Bipolar Girl used to blog every ten minutes, stuff like this would have been a given. Now it’s an exception, so please bear with me:

 

Ever the teacher, I can turn just about anything into a learning experience. So today  when I was teaching a lesson on drawing conclusions I used the totally true story about last night’s dinner. Having skipped lunch because I didn’t like what I’d packed, I was starving by the time I got home. I made my famous Chicken Marsala… or should I say infamous. I hadn’t gone shopping on the weekend so my ingredients were a bit on the “suspect” side. I gave the longer version of the story to my students…. and they  found it positively hysterical. Short version? I ended up throwing up. Unfortunately, I’d made enough for lunch today and froze some to eat post-op, but even that was part of my teachable moment.

 

I’m telling the story to my students and they are laughing their heads off. Then we make this really detailed chart on the board that looked like this:

 

Stated Facts + Implied Facts + Personal Experience/Knowledge = CONCLUSION

 

We filled in all the stated and implied facts… etc using bright colored Expo pens all the while laughing at my expense. As one of the Implied Facts, one cheeky student wrote, “Old ingredients = a Recipe for Diarrhea.” She couldn’t understand why I’d gotten off with just throwing up. As if “just throwing up” wasn’t enough. Go figure. Once they were done, I had them draw some conclusions. The conclusions that most of them drew were the following:

1. I should have eaten my lunch.
2. I should throw out the rest of the food.
3. The chicken (which had been defrosting in the fridge for about a week) was probably what made me sick.

They all thought that I was crazy when I said that I was going to actually try some of the leftovers to see if maybe I was wrong. Maybe I hadn’t given myself food poisoning and the Marsala was still edible. Remember… I haven’t gone grocery shopping. It’s slim pickins in my house right now. Just to make sure I hadn’t botulised myself I googled “botulism.” It’s safe to say that I am not a victim of botulism since that actually has to do with canned food gone wrong.

When I go to school tomorrow I’m going to ask my students to draw conclusions about what I ate for dinner tonight… I can bet that when they find out the answer, some of them are going to conclude that I’m crazy. Not crazy… just hungry. I guess the spiritual slant to this post could be: PRAISE GOD I don’t have food poisoning OR don’t forget to pray for your food especially if you’re using old ingredients.

Just Call Me “Flipper”

Ok… so it appears that the behavior of my second period class the other day was just a fluke. Paint me gray and call me “Flipper.” Sadly, they reverted back to type yesterday… but the cool thing was that I didn’t hold it against them. I might have felt a deeper connection the day before, but I didn’t like them any less as they all did the Electric Slide on my buttons. Why?? I had the memories of the day before to look back on and hope.  If they could do it once, they could do it again. I’m content to wait for it. That’s where stockpiling good memories can come in handy. Bipolar Girl has enough bad memories to last a life time, but it’s amazing how the new good memories that I’m accumulating are kicking the old bad stuff to the proverbial mental curb. And since I’m spending a lot less time wallowing in the bad place, there seems to be a lot more room in my head to entertain new and more interesting thoughts.

Like this one. I read this the other morning before going to work:

One of the things that patience works in us is that it gets rid of pride. Impatience is caused by pride. And patience burns it out of us…. When we become prideful, our hearts are full of ourselves and not God.

My middle name is Ann-Marie… but I should really change it to Impatience. And I’m only half joking. Now that I’ve got a longer commute to get to work I’m really starting to worry about my lead foot and road rager tendencies. When you work 8 minutes from work it’s rather hard to get a real picture of just how ugly you look when you strap on that seat belt, but now that I’ve got a longer way to go I’m seeing some seriously disproportionate levels of anger. And generally I’m angry because people are in my way! How dare they drive the speed limit when I’ve got places to be??!! It doesn’t seem to dawn on me while I’m driving that by driving 25-30 miles over the posted speed limit that I’m actually the one doing something wrong. It also never dawned on me that my impatience with slow drivers… my impatience with my students… my impatience in general is all rooted in pride. I want things done my way according to my plans. RIGHT NOW!

My job? I was beginning to get a little impatient the other day with the process. I interviewed in July for a job I didn’t want only to meet the woman they just hired yesterday. A month and a half. It took a month and a half for them to hire somebody else. I’m now applying for a job that I’ve been doing since July. I’m going to have to interview again even though I interviewed last year (for the job that I didn’t get) only to be offered my current job which I did get…during which time I interviewed for that last job (which I didn’t get) as I wait to interview for my current job (which I don’t know if I’m going to get). If you missed all my sarcasm… read that last paragraph again. If I wasn’t already mental, this process would do it to me. And yet, all I’ve been hearing from God is “Be patient. Bloom where you are.” God knows I’m waiting. God wants me to wait. God is like the slow moving driver ahead of me yesterday. He’s going to move according to his plan, not mine. My desire to move faster is not going to impact his purpose or plan. And getting mad will accomplish nothing.

My pride would have me think that I’ve been working there long enough not to have to put up with the delays in the process. They know me. They like me. They should just break all of their rules and procedures and hire me before I… do what?? Quit and go somewhere else?? As if. I like my job. Grandstanding will get me nowhere. Listening to pride will have me doing on the job what I do on the road: get angry and act badly. My job is not about me. Pride, however, will tell me that it is. God sent me there for a reason. He’s enabling me to work with a student population that would have scared me silly two years ago. If he wants to slow things down or even move me on… who am I to say otherwise??

Other thoughts have been dancing around my mind this week,  but this is the thought du jour. Both on the road and in my classroom I need to stop thinking that I’m the one in the driver’s seat. I’m not. Jesus is. I’m just the co-pilot. I’ve been complaining for years that I want to know Jesus more. That I want a deeper relationship with him… but maybe as he tried to go deeper with me I was moving too quickly through my days to see him. It’s time to slow things down. Does that mean that I’m going to get in my car today and drive the posted 35 mph?? Not likely… and…I’m not sure just how this realization is going to work its way out in my life just yet, but it’s enough this morning that I’m aware of it.

They call him Flipper, Flipper, faster than lightning,

The Best Day Ever

I used to have a student in my class years ago who would walk into class and say, “This is the worst day EVER.” Looking into his second grader face I always wondered how he could possibly have so many “worst days EVER“ and what he would do if the rest of his life was filled with such days. Praise God this kid’s life has turned around (or he finally got some much needed perspective), because I’ve got it on good intel (from his mom) that things are going just great in his life and has been for the last seven years. With age came the realization that the bad days didn’t all have to fall into the “worst day EVER” category. I think he also came to realize that it was because of those bad days that he could appreciate the good days even more when they finally came.

As a survivor of my own unfair share of “worst days EVER, ” I can tell you now that I’m milking my good days for all the enjoyment value that I can squeeze out of them, so that my good days are starting to stockpile memories that outnumber the bad. And as far as memories go, today was my BEST DAY EVER!!! Ok. Perspective says that I’ve had better days — like when I went to Disney World and got my first glimpse of the park. That was pretty darned special as far as good days go. Graduation from UC Berkeley was pretty great too. Of course, that cannot top the day I became a Christian. That day wasn’t just the “best day EVER, ” it was the  GREATEST DAY.

Today was another work day. I’m surprised today was so good… because last night was approaching the worst night (ever) stage. My internet connection was out and I was not handling it well. You’d swear I’d been placed in a room with green kryptonite or something. I also had a big stack of papers to grade and people hadn’t followed directions. I was pretty mad when I went to sleep. I did have a pretty amazing dream which deserves its own post… but the bottom line is that last night was not good. Then when I got up I saw something online that I couldn’t resist: the listing for my job. I was actually going to be late to work because I stopped to fill out the online job application for the job that I’m currently doing. Applying for the job that I’m doing but don’t yet have. Ah… the intricacies of being a substitute instructor. Part of me still wants to know why they just can’t give me the job and be done with it… but I squashed that part and filled out the application. The application pushed me behind schedule. I was going to have to do that “bat out of hell” thing that I do when I get behind the wheel of my car… only in turbo time. I hate being late. Makes my moods start swinging all over the place. Oddly enough, I didn’t morph into the ugly road rager that lurks just below my surface. I rationalized my way to work. It wasn’t the other drivers’ faults that I stopped to fill in an application — so they were not obligated to drive faster or to get out of my way. I had made a choice. I had to deal with the consequences. This actually helped calm me down for some reason. It didn’t ease my foot off the gas pedal though, so I was pleasantly surprised that I was not late to work.

And the pleasant surprises kept on coming. My first class was great. I was engaging them more as people. They are beginning to lighten up with me. One guy even offered me gum. But it was my second class that took my breath away. That’s the class that pushed my buttons a few posts back. The one that had me thinking about respect and how to go about getting some. I’ve been working to explicitly teach them what is and isn’t acceptable behavior in a classroom. They aren’t native to this country. What is acceptable back home is not acceptable here. For much of the past week I wondered if I was banging my head against a wall or if I was getting through to them. Today they were the dream class. Out of nowhere. I don’t know how. I don’t even really know why… but it was totally gratifying. I felt really connected to them today. This of course had to be the BEST TEACHING day (ever) that I’ve had at my current job. Will they be like that tomorrow?? Y’know, I don’t know that it even matters. I’m just so thankful for today.

Home Alone

“It’s just another Manic Monday…”

That has to be one of the best songs from the 80′s. It was by the Go-Go’s and I used to LOVE to sing it when I was younger. When I found out that I had Bipolar Disorder and really understood what “manic” meant… the song lost a few brownie points with me. Almost all of my Mondays were manic — complete with anxiety, stress, and rapid cycling moods. I got so bad that I used to hate Mondays when I taught elementary school because the kids would come back from the weekend wired for sound and I was somehow supposed to corral all of that energy. I’d end up edgy, emotionally disturbed, and almost non-functional.

The only way I could handle Mondays was to not handle them. I stopped going to class on Mondays. I mean I went to work… but I got a parent volunteer to agree to come in to my class for the first 10-15 minutes while the kids were unpacking their bags and getting settled in because the chaos was enough to make me mental and I needed to avoid all of that so I could teach. I couldn’t just could not handle it mentally or emotionally, so after years of trying I found a better solution . When I returned to the classroom my students would be in their seats ready to go and I’d take over from there… knowing that how I started the first part of the day would set the tone for the entire day.

So when I say that today was good… it’s a sign that my Manic Mondays really are a thing of the past. Last week was a hard week… the disrespect and the overall slacker attitude got on my nerves. Not knowing how to express my emotions has always resulted in them being bottled up until I was ready to explode. Generally, that meant imploding. I never let people know I was upset. I’d just turn it inwards. The cycle was always the same: anger and frustration repressed long enough to produce bitterness, resentment, and rage when shaken just right would result in a mentally disturbed cocktail of depression and suicidal ideation.

All weekend long I wondered how I’d change things. No more repressing. No more imploding. But working with young adults is nothing like working with children. Dealing with the language barrier and the cultural differences would also be an added challenge. As I meditated on this problem and prayed about it this weekend, I was even more convinced that I couldn’t continue to be morally indecisive. I got that from studying the life of a biblical figure. I was reading the book of 1 Samuel and looked at the life of King David. If ever there was a cautionary tale, that was it. One of his sons rapes one of his daughters (they were half siblings, so I guess the guy thought it was ok). David didn’t do anything about it, so the girl was ruined for life because back then you didn’t marry a woman in her situation. It goes unaddressed for two years until her other brother kills the first brother and then tries to take over the kingdom while sleeping with his father’s concubines in the process. Can we say “daytime soap opera” right after we say, “Ew.”

David’s problems occurred because he was morally indecisive. He let stuff slide that he should have addressed and then tried to go all bad cop on stuff that should have been ignored. The study notes in my bible raised this point and it made perfect sense to me because I can be a lot like David. In ignoring past bad acts, I put out a message that future bad acts would not be addressed either. This made students think that I was ok with the behavior, while in my mind I wanted to just start screaming. Is it their fault that I’m wishy washy?? Rather than come in today acting like there was a new sheriff in town waving negative incidents reporting forms in people’s faces, I just wrote a few gentle “REMINDERS” on the board. When everybody came in and was quiet, I orally gave them the reminders. Number one being No Cellphones in Class. The campus rule is that they should be confiscated if they are used in class. Would you believe that everybody who had one took it out, turned it off, and put it away???

I gave the reminder about the rest of the issues on the board. I stressed the last one:

Following directions = Respect

And told them that I wasn’t putting up with anymore slacking off, disrespect, or failure to follow my directions. Any such behavior from this point forward would be written up. The fact that all four of my classes ran really smoothly today shows that they took me seriously. It also showed me that failing to confront issues because I’m timid only creates more issues. Will this be the first time I have to give such”reminders?” Not hardly, but I need to do it in a timely manner to avoid weeks like last week.

Now I’m home alone reflecting back on how I handled my day. I respect how I conducted myself today. No anger. No stress. No slow simmer. It’s been clear to me for a very long time that I’m never going to be the world’s best teacher, but if I take myself seriously my students will too. I seriously had to confront my moral indecisiveness while respecting my basic personality. I needed to be clear and consistent. Today was a first step of many steps. And I took that step on a Monday. Gone are the weeks when I’d come home on a Monday stressed out, upset, and crying. Gone are the days when I’d come home from work and throw myself into porn to drown out my feelings of failure, insecurity, and hopelessness. And I know that I’ve seen the last Monday when I come home from work depressed and contemplating  suicide. Manic Monday was just plain “Monday” and the respect that I wanted to get at work  in my classroom today actually started this weekend when I was home alone.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T Begins at Home

Respect.

That was the buzzword at work the past two weeks. All the students kept talking about how respect is important in their cultures. As I looked at how they acted in class and towards each other I thought that they had a funny way of showing it but, out of respect, I didn’t come out and actually say that.  And when I looked at how some of them treated me in the past two weeks I failed to see anything funny about it at all.

For the most part, I am liked and they generally show me respect, but there were some issues that cropped up in the past two weeks that I cannot ignore. Notably? The student who made me cry needed to be dealt with decisively. At 6’2″ and solidly built, it’s not like I could put this guy in a time-out until his surly attitude changed. I am still annoyed that I let him move me to tears. My tears weren’t because I was sad or scared. I was pissed and didn’t know what to do with my anger. I’m still upset that my anger went through the roof like that. Where was all that love and forgiveness that us Christians are supposed to believe in??

Christians are supposed to love our enemies and show them respect. I wanted to punch him in the face until he bled. I gave in to dwelling on my angry thoughts WAY more than I would have liked to in the past two weeks. Ranting blog posts like that don’t really help me or anybody else so I didn’t say much. Then there was the whole bible study issue. As I’ve said before, it’s easier to blog when you’re anonymous. You can say whatever you want and not worry about being held accountable for it. In some ways I miss that, but in other ways I know I need to be held accountable if I ever want to grow. If I can’t say something to the person or people in question, should I really be saying it at all?? The study continued to push my anger button, and the angrier I got, the less I wanted to blog about it, so the silence continued.

During my silence, I struggled with God about said issues.  I learned that I cannot make assumptions about God. I assumed that because God sent me to the bible study that I was supposed to stay in it until the end. The study is something like 16 weeks. That’s a long time for me to nurse anger. I also couldn’t see how it was going to draw me closer to the body of Christ if I was ticked off every week. I will concede that God did adjust my attitude on a few points (important ones), but on some deal breaking issues my thoughts and feelings remained the same.

And that’s when God began to talk to me about respect. He reminded me of the DESIGN workshop and all the posts I’d written here about it. He has designed me a certain way and I function at my best when I function within that design. There are aspects of my personality and character that are unique to me that help to make me uniquely me. Sure, there are some times when I will need to step out of my zone and adapt to new situations and people. And when God calls me to do that, he will equip me to do that. Two months ago I was scared spit less of any kind of crawling or flying insect. Now I could moonlight as Bipolar Girl,  the Critter Slayer. Haile Berry could play me in the made for tv movie. My fear hasn’t disappeared, but it has been mastered. And at work, I’m doing a job I couldn’t have done a year and a half ago. Growth is good and I cannot resist necessary change. But I am who I am.

I also have to respect how God made me. There are some changes that are not necessary and forcing myself to do things that I’m not designed to do creates strain on my mental health. I do not like attending small groups studies. They stress me out and always have. Yet year after year I’ve tried to attend these groups only to drop out midway. I end up berating myself and feeling like a failure. I have Asperger’s Syndrome. It impacts my social function. Does that mean I should go live in a cave in eat worms? Not hardly. But it does mean I need to respect that aspect of who I am and stop trying to force the proverbial square peg into an electrical outlet. Small group studies weird me out. When Asperger Girl starts to weird out she morphs into Bipolar Girl and the moods just keep on swingin’. I cannot blame the study for pushing my buttons. God was giving me yet another opportunity to see what he’s probably been trying to show me for years: this kind of group is not for me. I need to join a minuscule group — instead of a group of 10 to 15 people that fluctuates every week, I need to start a group of two or three people who will be consistent to the end.

I have to respect myself and how I’m made. Respect starts at home. Sitting in a room with 15 people trying to talk about weighty topics is not ever going to work for me. The teacher in me is going to want to start and end on time, stay on topic, and will want everybody to do the homework. Structure and routine and procedures are important to me and my mental health. This is neither bad nor wrong. Unfortunately, these things are generally not big priorities with the rest of the people who tend to do group studies. Their priority is generally on the fellowship and “ministry” times. That is neither bad nor wrong either. Just different. I can respect their design differences  while acknowledging that group studies are not right for me at this time. That could change as I continue to grow and stabilize. In the end, I quit the study, but I’ve asked a friend would she be willing to do it with me. She’s also a teacher who values the things I value in a study. She hasn’t given me her answer yet, but I’m hopeful that we can do this study together. It’s called Experiencing God and it’s a great study.

I thought God wanted me stay in the study when I clearly didn’t want to stay. I thought he was trying to stretch my character and my faith. I lasted four weeks. I think that’s a record for me. When I left I’d made a few new friends and I was able to verbalize to the leaders how I was feeling and I had the pleasure of experiencing God in the midst of their response. Having accomplished all of that… how can I possibly disrespect myself by calling myself a loser or a quitter or any of the other things I used to call myself when I would drop out of a study because it was stressing me out and disrupting my mental wellness? Maybe my gains might look small to somebody else, but the look huge to me.

As for the problems at work? Those issues are rooted in respect as well. Because I’ve always been so timid and fearful, I’ve always struggled with classroom management. My students would misbehave and but I’d be too afraid to say anything. They’d act out more and I’d get angry. Because I worked with children, it seemed like I  was always trying to keep my anger under wraps. My classroom boundaries were weak.  I saw their misbehavior as disrespect. Again, respect starts at home. If I cannot respect myself, the authority that has been given to me by my boss, and the work I’ve been commissioned to do enough to set clear guidelines and enforce them… then whose fault is it when the students act out? It doesn’t matter if they are nine years old or nineteen years old. If I’m not setting the tone and being consistent, it’s my fault. I let certain students act out because I was too afraid of them to say anything to them. It hit the fan in the last two weeks. If I don’t do something now I’m going to set a tone for my classes that I do not like. I need to man up. What that’s going to look like is still lost on me, but the basis will have to be respect. I have to respect me and the way God designed me before I can expect the students to respect me. I need to create a classroom environment that I can live with before I can expect my students to live with it.