Mourning the Past

The older I get, the more I mourn my youth, which I know is normal but being dually diagnosed I grieve for the carefree person I once was.
I happen to be listening to a song right now that came out when I was 15. I wasn't exactly carefree then but I was naive and I thought that love was everything, that it was enough; etc. I had no idea that I had been diagnosed bipolar the year before because my mom hadn't told me. I wasn't diagnosed bipolar on my own till I was 27 and didn't find out that I was originally diagnosed at 14 till I was in my 40s. My mom told me that back then there was no treatment for teenagers.
I pray my daughter doesn't wind up bipolar. I've always said I'd rather her wind up alcoholic than bipolar.
Last night I was watching the season finale of one of my favorite shows and was watching someone dance so  effortlessly and carefree - prescription-drug-free and I almost started crying because I was wishing that I could be that way.
I was remembering what that felt like. To be free.
But without my medications I am not functional.
I hate being paralyzed by my emotions, by what was done to me in the past.
I have an illness that the older I get, the worse it gets. Its just the nature of it. I have to accept it and work with it every day.
The only time I'm "normal" is when I'm with my daughter and when I'm working. That's a "God deal" as they say in the program. It's through no power of my own. It just happens. I'm just automatically different and thank God I can be.
Then, once I get home I'm me again.
I dream that in another life I will be all I always wanted to be. I imagine coming back, if there is such a thing as reincarnation, whole and beautiful, inside and out, doing all the things I always wanted to do, achieving so much more. Accomplishing what this crippled spirit won't let me do.
Because I know now it's too late.
I just have to finish living out this life the best I can and appreciate what I have, hoping and praying that my daughter continues to have a great life.


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