Our new dog is manic. Never having had a small dog who is literally in your face all day I am finding my space rather invaded. He has now been resident for one week and two days and is really starting to test the limits. He races everywhere. Everything is a game and the lounge, as far as he is concerned, is his race track, always just out of reach of the one who chases behind him.
© irene waters 2014
I have a new admiration for my husband. He has been saying for years that I am manic in my actions. “Can’t you sit still for a minute”. As soon as I’m awake I have to get up. I can’t lie and do nothing. I have to be doing something whilst watching television or I drop off to sleep. It’s all or nothing with me. I take on more and more until I actually feel manic. One arm is being pulled in one direction, the other, along with my legs are going in other different directions. My stomach feels sick with a sinking butterfly type sensation and my thoughts are chaotic. I stop achieving. I do a lot with little tangible result. I am simply manic. Luckily I have learnt at this point to put things in the chest of drawers. The top drawer for really important things, the second drawer for important but lesser priority items and the third drawer down for things to be done when I have more time. The housework often goes here along with things that simply should be discarded but being a hoarder I tend to keep them. I am lucky I know when and how to stop my manic phase although I wish I could prevent myself from getting there.
I remember as a new graduate doing agency work my twelve hour shift one night involved specialling a woman in a psychiatric clinic who was suffering from manic depression (now called bipolar). She was in the manic phase and could not get herself out of it without help. Unfortunately I did not know what to do to help her and the staff at the hospital would not assist me as “I was being paid to look after her.” She was all over the place with her thought processes – at one point thinking that I was her husband’s lover come to spy on her so she had to get rid of me and tried to push me out the window. It was a harrowing night for both of us. I walked home in the morning totally wrung out and on arrival home sat on the front steps unable to do another thing, crying uncontrollably.
How difficult it must be to live life with such extreme highs and lows. To have your mood levels go from extremely high levels of excitement and energy, to be frantically busy and then drop to the lowest of the lows and be in the deepest of depressions. It would be a very difficult way to live and luckily there are treatments. I may be manic at times but not to this extreme level and rarely am I depressed, yet my husband at times feels that my pace is utterly manic and it is he that goes into the depression.
The new dog – time will tell. Will he become more manic? I know I decided last night that crate training is about to take place – a definite must.
Reflections and Nightmares- Irene A Waters (writer and memoirist) 
Lovely post and you sound a lot like me. But I love the new puppy and would not mind having him he would keep my son in line.
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Glad to meet you. Thanks for your comment. He’d certainly keep your son occupied. Cheers Irene
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Crate training IS a must! But as an owner of a manic dog, the secret is to take them out and run them. Sort of like my ADHD son – wear ’em out, they crash, and all is peaceful!
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We are taking them for longish walks but until we can let him off lead it’s probably a bit limiting. Zack our GSD is off lead and being old gets tired much easier. I’m afraid my running days are over – well to be honest they never started. Cheers Irene
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True, Irene ? If it is, you need to talk to someone about it – a clinic psychologist or the like. It would be quite easy to get your ‘manic’ behaviour pattern altered …
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I’m just hyper M-R. I love being active and doing things and I’m always good for a committee spot.Then I add my study and time with Mum and husband and friends and book club and dancing and writing my book and publishing my other book, and doing photo books and the list goes on. But it doesn’t worry me except occasionally I do take on too much and then I have to stop, until I am on top of it again. I don’t think I’d be too happy sitting around watching television. I’m sure that as the body gives out I will come around to that so at the moment I think I’ll give the psychologist a miss. Thanks for caring though. Cheers Irene
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You’re the boss of your own life; but your writing was a bit scary …
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It is really difficult I have discovered to do an emotion for every letter of the alphabet and writing about just that emotion makes me seem a really unbalanced person which I’m not…reeeeeally. It is interesting that there are so few positive emotions or if there are the same number as negative they all start with the same letter so I’m stymied. Cheers Irene
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I didn’t think you were. But all I can say is that next time you have to write about your own emotions, remember that there are some of us out here who care, and who can be rendered anxious !!! [grin]
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And I appreciate that muchley. Look at it as the snapshot of you that catches you with that really peculiar look on your face. You know it is not you but at the same time it obviously is for just that split second. 🙂
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Quite true: an excellent analogy ! You should take up writing. [grin]
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LOL
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Your little dog is so cute Irene! And yes, crate training is essential, it always works, at least in my experience. I go from one extreme to another, super busy, here there and everywhere and then I crash, so I relate. Having a dog to walk is great therapy 🙂
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Fantastic therapy. And it keeps you fit also. cheers Irene
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What can be better than that 🙂
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