I'm different and that's Okay!

Irritability is an excessive response to stimuli.

Stimuli are events in the environment that influence behavior.

Stimuli....what an ugly word to call my family.....bahahahahaha! Just kidding guys, there is much more that irritates me than my family. I stay very irritated and angry. I'm not sure if it's easier for me to show anger than other emotions or if that's just the emotion I am most familiar with. I think it's the one I am most familiar with and so it's easier to express. Now that I am thinking about it, it happens to be the only one I express.

I rarely show happiness, the sadness may show but I don't intend for it to, I never cry and if I do I do it alone and love I rarely show. I feel these things on occasion of course, I am human after all. When I sit and I think about these feelings the one's I feel most frequently is anger. But when I'm not angry what do I feel? What do normal people feel? If you are happy do you feel happiness all the time? I know if I am depressed I feel depressed all the time. I feel angry all the time. I rarely feel happy, I mean I feel okay, but as far as happy I really don't know.

I find that to be another thing, not knowing how you are feeling. Don't ask me how I'm feeling cause most of the time I don't know. I really don't know. How can that be? That someone doesn't know how they feel? Is that normal or is that how people with Bipolar Disorder feel? I don't know. All I know is most of the time I don't feel anything. Gosh that sounds pathetic huh? If I am not angry or irritated then I feel nothing. I say I'm okay and maybe that is MY okay. I guess when you don't know what normal is for yourself yet (because I don't) it's okay to not know. I remember when I was young and in counseling Missy would ask me how I was feeling and I couldn't tell her. I didn't know. Shew, I need therapy.

Love is the hardest emotion for me to show. It means I need to be vulnerable and that's not something I am good at. I think somewhere along the way I have tied love and weakness together. I've always had to be strong. To not be strong is to BE weak. I've always refused to be weak. I was "weak" a couple of times and they made a fool out of me and I refuse to look that way again or feel that way again and so with love I can't be vulnerable. Well, to be honest I don't know that I can love. To love would mean to let someone hurt me again. So I keep people close enough but not too close. I've been let down by every single person in my life and it has broken my heart so badly that the pieces won't fit together anymore. And yes, I have certainly let people down and yes I think they should still love me and that's great if they can but I can't love all the way again. Is that confusing? I can love them, just not the way I used to love them. I will never love the way I used to love and that's sad. It used to be when I loved, I LOVED. Never again.

Speaking of weakness, I never cry and if I do I do it alone like I said. I'll never forget, I was telling one of my friends a story about something that happened and I mentioned that I was crying like a baby. Well the facial expression I made as I said that must have been one of those "roll your eyes, get over yourself faces". She said, "you talk about being emotional as if it's a bad thing". One thing about being bipolar (at least for me) is when someone says something that you like, don't like or makes you uncomfortable you never forget. I will obsess over what they said for days on end sometimes. When I say obsess I really mean that it will be all I can think about constantly, non-stop, in a drive you crazy kind of way. This is one of those moments I will never forget because for me it is a bad thing to be emotional. I don't like to be emotional.

There are so many things I wish I could forget. When people say hurtful things to me they NEVER go away. Every time I see that person I will remember what they said to me and feel that emotion over and over again. That's why I hate when people point out my flaws. I will obsess over it, feeling insecure until I forget then something triggers that memory and I start obsessing again. I can't just move on like normal people because my obsessive brain won't let me. I'm not holding a grudge intentionally, the pain is too much that it consumes me and no I can't get over the pain. If I could I would, I don't want to hold onto it but looks like I have no choice.

From the forums I have been on and all the Facebook support pages I am active in I have come to know that this is normal for people like me. We are sensitive people, we sometimes don't know how we feel, we are passionate, artistic and deep. I am sure the list could go on. We are on a different spectrum and it's hard for me to remember that not everyone FEELS the same way that I feel, hurts the way I hurt or thinks the way I think and that's okay. They may call me a drama queen or over reactive but they expect me to feel the way they feel, hurt the way they hurt and think the way they think and I don't. Most of the time that's not okay with them. But who cares? I am different and that's okay.