Your thoughts on this ( Archived) (57)

To answer a few of your questions, as a lay person, not to say this is Gospel (!) In California, alimony must keep the payee "securely in the lifestyle said payee was accustomed to while married". In Oregon, spousal support is based on reasonable cost of living for the average middle class (but rulings are all over the place-- depending on where the couple lived). I don't know about other states. In some instances, even after a "settlement", the paid party can keep revisiting the case, getting more than previously agreed on, etc... which I think is extremely unfair. JMO

Certainly If I were to remarry, it would have to be the right thing for both of us. I could be just as happy being in a relationship where we both lived in our separate homes. Friendship is a wonderful thing and it should be valued on all levels.I think that the respect that comes with it is what makes it worth so much. Normal does have different connotations for different people but one must go by what is normal for him. With a bit of luck we can all find someone special to share our feelings and thoughts with.

I still say visit the humane society and get a dog.

I have bi-polar disorder. Yes, it exists.

I rarely mention that I have it because I've had it perfectly under control for several years.

The thing about bi-polar disorder (and schizophrenia for that matter) is that there is the disorder, and then there is the person. What the person is made of is about a third of the equation, how the disorder impairs the person is another third, and the final third is the disorder itself.

Before the onset of the disorder in my early teens, I was a naturally tough-minded individual who both resisted and didn't buy into the disorder as it took hold and progressed. This allowed me to hold out for many years, until something close to a cure was found- serotonin reuptake inhibitors in my case. I could say that I'm cured, except that that would change the moment I stopped taking my pills. However, if a procedure was ever developed that caused my body to properly produce serotonin again, I would actually be cured.

Speaking as a person who has bi-polar disorder, there are a number of things I can tell you about the disorder that you will not find in any textbook. The first thing you have to understand is that the talk of "highs" and "lows" is utter nonsense. This is how the disorder appears to an observer. What is actually taking place, where the "highs" are concerned, is a process in the brain called "feedback". Think of the squealing sound of a microphone when you place it too close to a speaker. This is what the brain is experiencing during a "high". It's not actually a "high"- it's a feedback loop. The so-called "low" is the crash that follows. If your brain were an amplifier, it would be fried after experiencing feedback. The low is the brain being "crapped out", a process where it needs quiet and to be left alone, in order to allow it time to recover. What the layman "sees" is a person who "doesn't want to get out of bed and do something".

When a "low" is prolonged, it's because the brain is experiencing a different type of feedback loop. It's literally stuck in "crapout mode", and for a time has lost the ability to spontaneously recover.

Take a different person and you end up with a different situation. If you're dealing with a person who is easily overwhelmed, emotionally and mentally, that person ends up having psychotic breaks. In those cases the disorder is a hundred times worse, because not only is the feedback process compounded many times, but the person's wherewithall, their ability to withstand the effects of the disorder, gets eroded over time until the person has few or no resources left with which to withstand or fight back. This is the peril especially of paranoid schizophrenics. Not only is the disorder devastating in and of itself, but the effect of the disorder on the sufferer is an horrific trial, not only every waking moment of each and every day, but during sleep as well. Even the subconscious mind is invaded, so that there is no escape, no relief, ever.

Any- sorry to run on like this; I just felt it was important for people reading this thread to know a bit of what bi-polar disorder is about.

Now that I've outed myself as a crazy person, you'll all no doubt be watching my posts for signs of my coming unhinged . . .

Good post,gsmonks. I have a brother with this disorder so I can relate to everything you have said. It is sad though how much negative feedback that we, as a family, recieve from people that know absolutley nothing about this disorder.