I have a confession to make. This isn't my first time blogging. It's not even my second. I am a serial blogger. Over the years I've started up numerous blogs, kept them going pretty well for a while, then I've 'mysteriously' disappeared, shortly before the blog has.
I've come to the conclusion that most of the time this has been down to my cyclothymia.
As many of you already know, I'm a diagnosed cyclothymic and have been since my mid-teens. It's the mildest form of bipolar disorder but people living with it still experience the hyper mega-productive highs and the opposing self-hating frozen lows. During my diagnosis I had to draw a time-line pin-pointing these extremes. When you look at the chart, it's not difficult to spot the times when I self-destructed within careers and moved on to something new. So far I've trained and/or worked as a secondary RE teacher, chartered accountant, PR officer, website developer, radio journalist, volunteer recruiter, adult educator, burlesque performer, run my own business, and a charity...and there are probably some others I've chosen to forget about along the way.
From what I know of fellow bipolars, the cycle of doing something really well for a time before destroying it to start anew, to reinvent, seems pretty common. I seen them try to recreate by changing their names, jobs, hair colour, friends, etc (been there and done that too).
And guess what trend watchers, deleting your social networking selves is the new black. Or at least it's the latest thing to do when your life is all black. I regret to say I've jumped on this bandwagon too, and part of me wishes I hadn't, on the good days I'd quite like to read what I had to say.
I started my latest blog on moving to the USA last November. It was meant to journal the day-to-day discoveries we made trying to live as the Americans do for friends and family back home in the UK. As per usual with one of my blogs, people praised me on my writing, my humour, my insight...so naturally I began to hate it (I did warn you I'm a bit screwed up).
But for a while, as with previous blogs, I did find great joy, increased clarity and a sense of accomplishment every time I hit the 'publish this post' button.
So here we are today - a new blog, but not a new invention of myself rather than a new invention of what I'm showing to the world - all of me. Hopefully when you get to meet all of me a lot more will begin to make sense, and more importantly, I can be true to myself.
Here's hoping.
ps. New Invention really exists. It's a tiny village in the depths of Shropshire, England. You should go there one day.
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