The Same Reasons, or Why I've Started this Blog

Yesterday in my chemistry class, a woman in my class shocked. She's a pharmacist, and I was telling her about my plans to write about lithium for our independent projects in class. She seemed impressed by the amount I already knew about lithium and displayed no emotion when I told her (it's important not to lie about these things, at least my "how to survive" rulebook) that I take it. She said, "it's inspirational that someone can be as successful as you are with this illness". We got to talking about mental health, and my reasons for wanting to be a psychiatrist. If it was so hard for me to make it through what I went through over the past few years, how hard must it be for those who do not have the safety network, the financial security, the physical health, the happy accidents of birth and family that I have? And so on. She listened intently. When I asked her why she wanted to be a doctor, she looked me dead in the eye and said, "The exact same reason as you." This is the second time in the past three months when, after disclosing my illness, I've found that a colleague or peer shares my diagnosis. Either I'm a magnet for bipolar people or there are more of us than it feels like as we hide our episodes from our bosses and watch our pharmacists struggle not to display any emotions (confusion, pity) when we fill our prescriptions (is this really for you?). As the woman in chemistry class pointed out, "it's because this illness isn't like cancer: you always have it and you don't get better or worse". So instead of better or worse, I'm writing this blog. I'll share some very brief short stories on the topic of mental illness, my own observations of mental diagnoses and our society, and hopefully links to other people who are writing and thinking about these things in much more thoughtful ways. Despite the somewhat upbeat tone I hope this blog will take, it's a risky effort for me. It's scary to speak so openly about these things, but that's the goal. Because for better or worse, my illness is here to stay. And so am I.