Ever since I was little, I saw God as a lion. I mean, I guess you can thank the Chronicles of Narnia, because C.S. Lewis created a tangible image of Aslan for 8 year old Lauren. From the moment I finished reading the books, I imagined a lion was prancing behind me as I walked and when fear consumed me he enveloped me in a scratchy, but warm, embrace. It was a lion who never conjured fear in your spirit as he approached you, yet instead a presence of peace. Everytime I was afraid I could feel this warm breath brushing past my face creating warmth from my lips to the depths of my belly. My own personal bodyguard; I could conquer anything even when afraid.
When I was 8, there was a lot of fear I shouldn’t of had.
I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
The medical definition states bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, is a mental illness that brings severe high and low moods and changes in sleep, energy, thinking, and behavior. People who have bipolar disorder can have periods in which they feel overly happy and energized and other periods of feeling very sad, hopeless, and sluggish. Bipolar usually starts due to a hormonal imbalance. You can be diagnosed with bipolar at any age, but most people are diagnosed in their teens or twenties, and you’re at a higher risk if you have a family history of bipolar. I want you to fully grasp, this isn’t just depression or anxiety. I want to give you an image to hold onto:
Imagine you wake up one day, and every single one of your senses is heightened. The birds sounds cheerier, your sheets feel softer. Everything you sense feels elated. Your interactions with family and friends turns into a number in a musical. You want them to feel every ounce of joy you are experiencing, trying to pull them into your magnetic field of bliss. You go about your day as if everything is seamless, every stitch is perfectly placed in this thing you call life. Then, out of nowhere, it hits. You can’t distinguish what triggers it or where it comes from, you especially can’t stop it. The birds you hear turn to scratches on a chalk board, the presence of each family member and friend become annoyances, each breath causing you to cringe. Your body begins to feel every organ sinking to the floor. Each foot is a concrete block, as you drag one after the other gravity pulls you deeper into its abyss. The only place, the only thing protecting you from whatever is hunting you down is the place you wake up and fall asleep each night. Once you sink into the sheets, it’s hard to move. Your job is no longer a concern, your relationships are non-existent, and your life feels absolute. This feelings lasts for days or weeks at a time.
I want you to understand this, because bipolar is something everyone is aware of. However, unless you have it, you cannot understand it. I also want to emphasize, bipolar disorder is something, once you are diagnosed with, you will never get rid of.
These high highs I explain were the worst part. Once I started dropping from my highs, I was like an atomic bomb waiting to go off and there was nothing to diffuse me. I was violent towards my sister, aggressive towards my mom, and used my words against my dad. Kids in school never liked me and quite frankly when I looked in the mirror, I couldn’t help but feel the same way. I was 8 years old with no understanding of why my brain couldn’t function normally. From the age of 6 I was already in and out of therapy appointments and doctors. Each one giving me new medication, each one giving me a new doubts. Constantly being told the chemical imbalance in my brain was permanent, something only medication could solve. I was trying so hard to grasp onto a firm foundation, when in reality your feet are standing on sinking sand and everything you grab onto sinks you deeper. This is what being bipolar felt like; sinking sand. And whoever tried to grab ahold of you went down with you.
Bipolar is a funny thing. Your brain has manic episodes, which are harder to deal with after the fact than during. You can’t control what you say resulting in hurting those closest to you; resulting in hurting yourself. I was 6 when I started hurting people around me, and I became pretty good at it. When I came off of a high, I kicked my sister, punched my mom, yelled at my dad, threw things at the wall; I hurt myself. I want you to fully grasp how bad it got, to envision where I was. By the age of 15 I was institutionalized into a mental hospital twice. Medication after medication was blended, smashed, or swallowed whole to fix the imbalance I was born with. Each medication made you feel worse off, it made you feel numb. I even have people close to me who had electroshock therapy done (a procedure where small electric currents are passed through the brain, intentionally triggering a brief seizure) because there was no other option. Bipolar has a tendency to make you believe your life isn’t worth it and the pain becomes so overbearing the only way out is death.
Researchers estimate that between 25% and 60% of individuals with bipolar disorder will attempt suicide at least once in their lives and between 4% and 19% will complete suicide. Again, take a step back after reading this. Fully comprehend what it means to have bipolar disorder and it affects someone. Can you imagine 3/4 of the populations wanting to commit suicide? That’s a constant for bipolar patients.
Why am I telling you all of this? First, I want you to understand vulnerability is freedom. We become so fearful of our stories we cringe at the thought of telling others about the darkest part of our pasts. Through this, you’re handing over the keys to the devil and giving him the ability to set up camp. He’s staked his territory and the last thing he wants to do is give it up.
Second, I want to say once more how bipolar is a lifelong illness. Don’t believe me? Do a little google search and learn more about the disorder. Each and every doctor told me you can’t “fix” it. I think in these moments God was looking down, giving a little smirk. Funny how God has a way of shaking himself outside of the boxes we have put him so tightly into.
I was healed from bipolar disorder at the age of 15.
Dang, even typing this I have to take a step back and bask in how good God is. I want to begin altering how you see mental illness. I want you to begin understanding how God sees mental illness. Did all my struggles with it go away? No, not immediately. God uses the pain we suffer for the goodness of his glory. He plants a seed for us to sow.
I no longer have extreme highs and lows, my mood is stabilized and I am able to function normally. There is no depression, no anger; only freedom. I am no longer taking any medication. Every symptom is gone and every drug to fix it is no longer needed. For a disorder every doctor says you will have for life, I think they are missing something incredibly important.
He healed the disorder and then gave me the room to choose him, to grow in him, to continue sowing the seeds he so purposefully planted. I am writing these truths to set both of us free from stigmas. Our personal stories have the power to heal, only if we set aside the stigmatizing messages that put us into silence.
After this moment, there was a tie. As if a rope where each piece of twine had broken from its other half had been forcefully grabbed and wrapped into a perfect knot. It was as though without God I became untethered. In this life, we cannot fully experience the perfect presence of God; well not in this life. Yet, we can experience God’s perfect absence: an absence that can send us—that sent me—down into an inert pit of desolation and then up to a dizzying height of grandiosity. This absence was bipolar disorder.
Being afflicted by God’s absence is an inverse image of God’s presence—a revelation of what the world could be, would be, without God.
Bipolar disorder for me is a world without God. A world filled to the brim with confusion and chaos, on the brink of spilling over into every single person around you. I have a feeling you can relate to this. Whether it’s school, family, relationships, or even a mental illness, sometimes it feels as if something is missing. Whether you believe in God or not, it feels as though without a higher entity (which you hope is helping you have a greater purpose), your spiraling into a pit of desolation. Illnesses, whether physical or mental have the ability to remove hope from the picture.
I also understand not everyone in this life gets healed of the afflictions they face. I wish I had a perfect answer as to why this was the case, but without a doubt God suffers with you. His emotion is raw, He weeps with you, as he wept with Lazarus’s family (John 11:35). He knew the resurrecting work he was about to do, but he sobbed with anger anyway. With this, he knows how he is going to work in and through your life, and he is with you in the midst of it. Whether you are in the midst of your depression or have deliverance from it, God is holding your hand using you in every season. God knows your purpose, He wants to let you free of the chains holding you down. However, how can he let us go from something when we continually speak it over ourselves?
As I hope you’ve been convinced of God’s presence through this, I understand if this is something you still can’t comprehend. Hope is hard, healing is hard. But, I want this to be a grand reminder of how it’s still possible. Don’t allow your thoughts of negativity to become overbearing to those of possibility.
When I was 8, God showed himself to me in the form of a lion. He gave me a glimpse of possibility. At 8, I had no clue the lion represented God, but I think that’s how clever God is. He knew I wasn’t ready, was able to comprehend who he was, but he wanted to give me something safe. He gave me something tangible, something I could hold onto because he knew hard times were coming. Has there been something, someone placed in your life? Something which played a role even to this very day? Grab onto it. Hold tight and think deep. For all you know, there was intention in why this theme has followed you through life. My Aslan turned into a much bigger God. Your possibility could be right there, you maybe weren’t ready to see how big it really was.
I no longer struggle with bipolar disorder. It’s gone. If you know someone who struggles with this or struggle with it yourself, you know how this isn’t something to take lightly. I want you to remember, however, even though bipolar was squelched I still have to fight everyday. I have to remind myself every thought through my mind ultimately effects who I am and how I see myself. Every single day, I speak over myself I am free. My self-talk has gone from being critical and negative to life-giving. The seeds God planted in my life when I was 15 are still being sowed. I am constantly reaping from the harvest, constantly growing. Just because someone is healed, doesn’t mean we can stop fighting against what we were healed from.
If you take anything away from this, please take away this: He’s not walking out on you.
To this day, that lion still appears to me.
Now, I know who it is.
When he appears, I know it’s time for battle.
