BLESSED with BIPOLAR

by Richard Jarzynka
CHAPTER 17 of BLESSED WITH BIPOLAR

Two days ago I  spent 45 minutes in quiet contemplation and brief intercession in the prayer
chapel at Allison Park Church. I closed by praying in the Spirit (tongues) for a couple of minutes. The woman
scheduled after me to continue the church’s attempt at 24 hour / 7 day a week
prayer showed up seconds before I finished. I told her that she
nearly caught me praying in tongues. If she had been a new believer, I would
have looked like a raving madman who had little orientation to any kind of
reality. And she would have cut out, thinking, “What in the name of nonsense
have I gotten myself into now?” She understood and we had a good laugh. I asked
God to anoint her prayer time and said good-bye.

I really should have left the building. But between the prayer chapel and my car was a makeshift gym that the
church has thrown together for its teenagers and young people. That’s where the trouble started.

For me, teen-age is a 26 year-old
memory to which my bipolar brain sometimes says, “So what?” The heavy punching
bag was verily crying out my name. “C’mon, Ya’Zhynka, I dare ya.” I was not
going to put up with that crap out of some lousy bag. So, I wound-up, leaped
forward onto my left leg, and swung my right foot soccer-style and “take
that!”smack into the mid-section of that yapping, arrogant, pansy bag.

Nineteen hours later I was looking
at two cracks on an x-ray of my ankle. Football, street hockey, roller-blading,
and a 26-mile marathon never caused me to break a bone. It took a nit-witted
bipolar kick at a punching bag to get that done.

I am thrilled that I was only
messing around when I kicked that bag. I would have felt like an idiot if I had
broken my ankle in a fit of bipolar rage. It’s much better to do it in a fit of
bipolar goofball impulsivity.

My faith-informed experience of
bipolar disorder, somehow, empowered me to understand this whole childlike
scene in terms of blessing. Could it be that the Holy Spirit is using the
writing of this book to train me to look for blessing in everything, not only
bipolar disorder?

Things have changed. Two years ago
my bipolar response to breaking my ankle would have been a cursing rampage. I
would have been angry at myself, angry at the bag, angry at whoever put the bag
there to tempt me in the first place, and, ultimately, angry at God (all anger
is ultimately anger at God). But the Holy Spirit used the loss of my lawsuit
against St. Thomas University in December 2006 to change me. “Change” may actually be too mild a word.The Holy Spirit
transformed me in the loss of that lawsuit.

During the lawsuit, I had imagined that the loss of it would be the loss of my last chance to have a life. I was
suing because St. Thomas had expelled me from law school without a hearing and without any chance to be
heard in my own defense. I owed $18,500 in school loans, had no job, and no
chance to get accepted at another law school. As I think about it now, I
realize that when I lost the lawsuit, I did lose my last chance to have the life
I had hoped for. But I gained something so much greater – the lived
understanding that I did not need to win the lawsuit and I did not need to have
the life I had hoped for. In my loss, God proved that He really does, and
always will, provide for all of my needs. And I realized that He always has.
Always.

I lost the life I had hoped for, but I gained more of Christ. Didn’t He say, “He who loses his life in this
world shall find it?” Don’t let that deal go down without you.  You will never find one better. Having my
emotions and outlook on life so magnificently transformed in the loss of the lawsuit – something
that I could not have previously imagined surviving – led to my discovering the
many blessings of bipolar disorder.

So, yes, I do see breaking my ankle
as a blessing. I do not doubt that you will think that I am making this up.
That I am stretching this thing a bit too far. “Right, breaking your bones is a
good thing. Everything’s a blessing. Get off it, man.” I can hear you.

Well, I admit it. I do now want to search for blessing in everything because I have seen God turn what seemed
catastrophic into enlightenment, wonder, peace, and a changed man. I have seen
God be at work for good in the greatly feared things in the life of one who
loves Him, one who is called according to His purposes. I have seen God take
what man intended for evil and turn it for good and the saving of lives. It has
happened in me, in the loss of my lawsuit against the school that had
wrongfully expelled me, and in bipolar disorder so extreme that it required
seven emergency hospitalizations. So, yes, as odd as it may seem, I do now look
for blessings in broken bones.

As soon as I wrote that last
paragraph I got up from my table in the food court at Ross Park Mall to meet my
father who had driven me there and was picking me up at 3:45. (sort of like the father of a teenager who
had broken his ankle kicking a punching bag). Before I reached the door I saw a
boy of 10 or 11 sitting beside two metal crutches with a sky blue cast on his
leg. He looked up and we both smiled. Bipolar extrovert Ya’Zhynka was engaged.
Richard the Introverted took a seat and waited to write about whatever was
about to happen. (I’ve got the two of them a little more under my discipline
now. But I do allow them some freedom.)

I asked the boy what had happened
to his leg and he quickly responded, “I cut my Achilles tendon.” Whoa! I
thought of athletes who had their professional careers ended by Achilles tendon
injuries.

“How’d it happen?” I asked.

“I was riding my friend’s electric
scooter up a hill and it stopped. So, I put my foot down, ya know,” He smiled,
“like you would with a regular bike? But it had a kick-stand and it wasn’t —
It was down and it cut into my leg,” He still smiled, all bright, blue-eyed
like sunshine.

My eyes went wide as my jaw fell open, “Oh, man, that’s bad. Was it severed, cut all the way through? (He knew
what severed meant.)

“There was just a thread left.” His eyes sparkled.

Every dream a 10 year-old boy has
for his summer – swimming, baseball, bike-riding, a day or two at Kennywood Park riding the Thunderbolt, the
Pittsburgh Plunge, and Raging Rapids – had been trashed in an instant. And his
eyes still sparkled and his face still smiled through the whole conversation.
The summer he dreamed about every winter afternoon while his teacher droned on
about pronouns, participles, polar ice caps, and global warming had been blown
away, but there was not one scintilla of a trace of bitterness or self-pity
about him. I liked this kid.

“So, you had surgery?” (I was a
little sensitive to that issue. My doctor had firmly warned me earlier that
morning to keep the Darth Vader boot-cast on my broken ankle by saying, “You’re
going to live in that boot . . . If the bone doesn’t move, you won’t need
surgery.” I guess he assumed that if a 46 year-old man is screwy enough to kick
an anchored heavy-bag, he might just be screwy enough to take off the boot-cast
and run. I will behave . . . but my five-year-old nephew is coming to town from
Nashville and with him arrives temptation to the screwy.)

The young boy gave the obvious answer to my needless question and added a stunner. He told me that he did have
surgery and added, “They said if it had gone that much further (he held his
index finger and thumb together), they would have had to amputate my foot.”
My ankle didn’t feel so broken anymore.

“You almost lost your foot?” I said in awe.

He nodded and grinned.

“How long will you have the cast on?”

“Six weeks.”

I did not have the heart to say,
“Just in time to go back to school,” as if he had not considered that a
thousand times.

I do not know what else is going on
in that kid’s life, but he is blessed with a beautiful outlook on life that
some people go to their grave without attaining. Somehow, God is blessing him
with that cut Achilles and if he puts it all in the hands of the Lord, God will
turn this nearly tragic summer into a blessing for the rest of his life. He may
even be inspired to author a piece of Christian non-fiction about it.

I asked the boy if I could pray for
him and he shifted quizically at the out-of-place mid-mall request, then sat up
straight, and grinned, “Sure.” He might not have expected that I would break
out in intercession right on the spot. “Jesus, heal this boy’s Achilles tendon.
Thank you for the healing you have already worked in him. And thank you that he
didn’t lose that foot.”

The boy was a blessing to me. One I
would have missed had it not been for the breaking of my ankle.

God also used the broken ankle to
force me to take the rest I have needed – but would not have taken – from
working-out. I have been pushing too far, too often. My body kept groaning,
“I’m not 26.” And I kept mindlessly pushing. I took a couple of days off, felt
a little better, and went back to pushing and hurting several times. I was
about to do it again when the ankle cracked. God’s way of saying, “Your body
needs a break, but you’re not going to take it unless I break you.” My
shoulders, knees, and quadriceps feel better than they have in weeks. They
thank my ankle.

Last week, prior to breaking my
ankle, I said to my mother, “Y’know, I have had such great peace and joy for
the past year-and-a-half . . . I’d like to get to the point where I know I
would have that peace even if I had physical limitations that kept me from ever
working-out again and I couldn’t stay in shape. Could I still have this same
peace?”

God has allowed me the chance to
practice. I am on the 15 day disabled list and unsure of when I will be
reinstated. So, God and I have a chance to prove our faithfulness to each
other. Will I believe that He is working in and through this fractured ankle
for my absolute best? Will I believe that in this He is providing everything I
need? That He is all I need? That He is my peace and His joy is my strength –
even if I cannot walk? Even if I – Oh no! – get fat?

So far, so good.

I will praise Him and He will come
through and the whole experience will strengthen my faith for its next
challenge. And I will have peace. And I will have joy. I trust the Lord to love
me beyond anything I can imagine – even when He calls me into a time of
suffering that He will use to win souls and give Him glory and bless me. When I
am weak, then I am strong, for the Lord’s strength is made perfect in my weakness.

Because I have recognized the
blessings of bipolar disorder in and through its anguish, I can believe more
fully that God will bless me richly in any adversity that I must face. And that
is a blessing that I can transfer into every situation. A blessing that has
transformed me and, I pray, will continue to be used by God to transform me
until I truly take on the image of His Son.

How can I repay the Lord for all his goodness to me?

I will lift up the cup of salvation

and call on the name of the Lord.

I will fulfill my vows to the Lord

in the presence of all his people.

Precious in the sight of the Lord

is the death of his saints.

O Lord, truly I am your servant;

I am your servant, the son
of your maidservant;

you have freed me from my chains.

I will sacrifice a thank offering to you

and call upon the name of the Lord.

I will fulfill my vows to the Lord

in the presence of all his people,

in the courts of the house of
the Lord –

in your midst, O Jerusalem.

Praise the Lord.

- Psalm 116:12-19

CHAPTER 22 of BLESSED WITH BIPOLAR

Some would describe me as a
free-loader, dead-beat, bum leach. A drain on society. Why? Because I receive
social security disability income (SSDI) as a result of having bipolar
disorder.

Allow me to ask the above-mentioned
skeptics whether they would hire me after learning during their search process
that I was hospitalized seven times for bipolar disorder, lost numerous jobs
because of agitated manic-depressive episodes, and was expelled from law school
on the very day that the Dean learned that I have bipolar disorder. To those
who say that I should get off my dead behind, get a job, and go to work, I say,
“Hire me. I dare ya!”

I had bipolar disorder prior to the
day in 1976 when I started a summer job at the paint manufacturing company
where my father worked in Pittsburgh’s
Strip District. I was 14.

I struggled with major depression
and mania during the semesters when I worked two jobs (part-time lifeguard and
full-time child care worker in a residential treatment facility for
court-adjudicated kids) while taking three undergraduate courses at Duquesne University.

I lived with bipolar disorder,
untreated, while I worked in a school and partial-hospital classroom with
violent, inner-city teenagers.

I had bipolar disorder when I was
spit on, cursed, kicked, and punched – all in the course of doing my job.

I lost social service jobs due to
bipolar disorder when I got too depressed to continue or finally blew my stack
– after willingly going into chaotic, disturbed, and abusive home situations
that one would do anything to avoid in one’s own family. And I kept on applying
for new jobs and going back to work, never giving the slightest consideration
to applying for Social Security Disability Income (SSDI).I was first hospitalized for my
bipolar disorder in 1988 – for two months. Upon my discharge, I gave no
consideration to applying for SSDI.

Over the next 18 years I held at
least 14 different jobs with 14 different organizations. I was hospitalized six
more times.

In July 1999 I was fired from a job
as Director of a family counseling program. I had testified on behalf of a
family who was attempting to have their children returned from the custody of
the county’s Department of Children and Youth Services (CYS). CYS vehemently
opposed the family. The judge agreed with my recommendation – against the
wishes of CYS. The same CYS, that is, which funded our program. I was fired 11
days later.

After being fired as Program
Director, rather than considering SSDI, I attempted to change fields. I went to
law school at the age of 38. That‘s a drastic change of life for a man
approaching middle-age. But I did it in the hope of being productive,
supporting myself, and making a contribution rather than applying for disability.
I wanted to work and be financially responsible.

After I was expelled from law
school within one day of the Dean learning of my disorder, I went back to work
as a counselor.¹ I was fired from that job after confronting an
ex-con father regarding his mistreatment of his autistic son. I admit that I
also had trouble keeping up with the paper work. The job and the stress of
trying my lawsuit was causing bipolar to mess with me. But I still did not
consider SSDI.

My point in all of this is that I
did not leap at the chance to leave the workforce and collect a government
check. From the time I was first hospitalized in 1988, it took 18 years, 14
jobs, 6 more hospitalizations, a plethora of psychotropic medications, an
expulsion from law school, and the loss of my lawsuit before I finally applied
for SSDI.

If you think I should go back to
work, hire me. I dare ya!

SSDI is not welfare. I paid into it
nearly every hour that I worked (part-time, full-time, or summers) from 1976
until 2003. I could have applied the first time I cracked-up in 1988. But I
held onto the hope of being able to work and succeed until I finally lost my
lawsuit in December 2006. I could no longer beat my head against that wall.
When the federal court system failed me, I decided to take the safety net that
I had paid into. And I thank God that I live in a country that has the
compassion to provide such a program to people who are too handicapped to
remain in the workforce.

Some people will say that there
surely must be some work that I can do. “He’s written a book,” they will argue,
“Doesn’t that prove that he shouldn’t be on disability?”

I do not deny that there is work
that I can do – when I am not too manic or depressed and if I can do it when I
want to do it, the way I want to do it, and without a boss dragging over my
shoulder. I never know when I will or will not be able to function. (I write
because I can do it only when and if I feel like doing it. There is nobody
making demands about how and when it gets done. Therefore, if I do not feel
like writing, then it does not need to get done.)

Being forced to be at a specific
job, for a specific 40 hours per week, doing things according to somebody
else’s directions would, in short order, cause me to blow a fuse.  Or, as the vocational expert at my disability
hearing said, “He is incapable of interacting in a socially appropriate
manner.” Bipolar can do that. There is documentation. But that does not
mean that I am out of control 24 hours a day. Just that bipolar prevents me
from continuously interacting in a way necessary to maintaining regular
employment.

Do you know of any companies that
would allow me to have as many sick days as necessary, that I could take
whenever necessary, on the spur of the moment, and possibly for a month at a
time?

If being on SSDI helps to keep me
sane enough to stay out of the psych ward, then my benefits may actually be
saving the government some money. A thirty day hospital stay could amount to as
much money as I will receive on SSDI in three years – maybe more.

I am a political conservative. I
believe in small government, low taxes, cutting Washington’s wasteful spending, financial
responsibility, free market capitalism, the right to life,  a strong national defense, and the
sovereignty of the fifty individual states. But Social Security Disability is a
legitimate and necessary government program. There are citizens of this country
who truly cannot work due to a handicap. And once they have gone through the
thorough and rigorous governmental process of determining that they are no
longer medically capable of working, the government must provide a safety net.

We who receive SSDI have either
paid into the program or have been severely handicapped all of our lives. We
did not choose to be medically incapable of being a part of the workforce.

If bipolar disorder has caused you
to be unable to work for significant periods of time or repeatedly interrupted
your ability to work, I urge you to look into social security disability
income. Knowing that you have a financial safety net may relieve some of the
work-related stress that can sometimes exacerbate your symptoms. There is no
shame in receiving SSDI and receiving it does not mean that you can never work again. In fact, once a
person is awarded SSDI, he is permitted to earn a specific, though small,
monthly sum of money and still receive benefits. Also, if your condition
improves and you attempt to return to full-time employment, social security
will continue to pay your full monthly benefits for your first nine months of
work. (Scial Security Administration, January 2009, Publication No. 05-10095)

Rather than reporting to a
full-time job every morning, I now spend my time writing at Ross Park Mall
(Yeah, that sounds strange. Consider it bipolar); researching and reading
everything that catches my interest; singing in the choir, the car; and the
shower; studying the Pittsburgh Pirates; swimming; lifting weights;
cross-training and climbing. I can do these things in spite of bipolar disorder
because I can do them when I want to, how I want to, and without a boss
scrounging over my shoulder. And I can choose not to do them whenever bipolar
rears up – without the risk of getting fired or expelled. Of course, these
activities and all of my life are a bit easier without the pressure of being
obligated to a job while roiling with bipolar.

It was not my choice to have a
handicap and applying for SSDI was a last resort after 18 years of drastically
mood disordered employment. I know that I have made long, sincere, and repeated
effort to gain and hold employment. For those reasons, I will receive SSDI as
long as necessary, without shame. However, I hope that I will someday be able
to, at least partially, support myself through writing, preaching, and private
practice counseling – whenever I may be medically capable.

I won’t be able to write, preach,
or counsel as a full-time, or even part-time, employee, but if I can do it on
my own, whenever capable, with the freedom to not do it whenever not capable,
then I have the hope of being productive. Knowing that there is a safety net if
bipolar causes me to fall, I believe that it is possible for me to be
productive.

Again, I thank God that I live in a
country where the taxpayers are willing to compassionately support SSDI. It is
a blessing.

by Richard Jarzynka,  author of the book “Blessed with Bipolar”

Bipolar Disorder!

Just hearing those two words is enough to scare the hell out of some of you. And finding out that somebody has it is enough to cause you to run as far as you can from that person, just as fast as you can.

Well, I am here to tell you that I not only have bipolar; I am proud to have it! In fact, I am blessed with it.

Some of you have just decided that I am a crazy person. And I say, “So what?” Greater psychiatric minds than yours long ago concluded the same. And if that causes you to run away, well, I didn’t need you in my life in the first place.

Okay, now that I’ve got that cleared up, let me tell those of you who have the nerve to still be reading, what this is all about.

If you have bipolar, then I want to tell you that I know that sometimes it is pure agony like the rest of the world cannot know. I have lived that hell.

But I also know that you are some of the toughest, most rugged people this world will ever see.

Look at what you have already endured. Look at it and be proud! You have not just survived depression. You have seen the pit of despair, stood outside the gates of  hell, took a glimpse inside, and survived to tell about it.

You’ve gone through nightmare days without sleeping for a week. Your brain has raced faster, Faster!, than a rollercoaster and with steepr climbs and more crashing, ferocious dives.

You’ve had days when you knew full-certain that you could conquer the world – and nearly cracked when you didn’t make it all the way. And you kept on Fighting! You keep on Fighting! You are some of the toughest, most rugged, strongest SOBs in the world.

And if the world can’t deal with it, that’s their problem.

The “normal” world isn’t in such great shape, anyway, so I say, “Piss on normal.”

I want to encourage you. I want to convince you that this bipolar can be a gift. That it is a blessing. Take what we call symptoms, harness them,  get them under your control, and make them work for your good and the good of those you love.

Yes! We can love like no others. With an intensity unknown by the rest of the world.

The rest of the world doesn’t know the power of human emotions like you do. And it can be a good thing to know the intensity of those emotions. You know deep down what it is to live, and grab on to life, and let yourself be grabbed by it.

Harness those symptoms and emotions. Maybe you can’t get rid of them, but you can take them under your control and use them for good, for success. Like Van Gogh, and Abraham Lincoln, and Winston Churchill, and even Catherine Zeta-Jones, Ted Turner, and Jean-Claude Van Daam.

You can take those racing thoughts and turn them into a one-person brain storming session with the kind of fire that others can never know. You can take those grand schemes of conquering the world, get them under your control, and turn them into big but realistic – yeah, that’s improtant – realistic goals – and you have the hypomanic energy to make those goals happen. Do it! But don’t let that wild energy toss you off a cliff. Maybe you need to check out your plans with a trusted friend before it throws you into danger. I don’t care how good you feel. You need to know that you cannot fly. If you try jumping off of a building, you will be crushed on the curb.

Bu you can achieve great things!

Just living through this disorder is a great accomplishment.

And because of the pain you have suffered – BECAUSE  of the pain, not in spite of it – you can comfort and encourage others with the comfort and encouragement you have known. You think that is not a blessing?! It’s a gift straight from the hand of God. And if somebody tells you it isn’t, you tell them that’s a lie straight from the pit of hell.

And you tell’em than I said so. Let’em come and take it up with me!

And some of you may be offended by what I have to say next – and last. And I think by now you can render a good guess as to what I think about somebody being offended by what I have to say.

The thing that turned my life around – the ONLY thing – the thing that made me know that bipolar is a blessing , was the day that I dropped onto my knees on the  psych ward floor and gave my life to Jesus Christ.

Adn I’ve been giving it to Him every day for the past 20 years.

I hope you’ll do the same because it’s the only way that we are going to see each other in heaven. The only way, the truth, and the life – Jesus Christ. You may disagree, but if so, you’re not disagreeing with me. You’re disagreeing with Him. He said it, “No one comes to the Father except through me.” I hope to see you there.

Blessed with Bipolar

I just read this line at the start of an article:

“The mother of accused hedge fund fraudster Anthony Klatch says her son is not to blame for allegedly defrauding investors of more than $2.3 million.”

And why does she think he is not to blame?” You guessed it. She says he has bipolar.

And I say, “B.S!”

I have bipolar and I have met many people who have bipolar. None of us has deceived people out of $2.3 million. In fact, the people I know who have bipolar would feel pretty guilty if they deceived somebody out 2 dollars and 30 cents, let alone 2.3 million.

The people I know who have bipolar take responsibility for themselves. They don’t want to make excuses and they don’t want people to weep and moan for them. They want to be treated as the capable, talented, creative, and intelligent people that they are.

These criminals who use bipolar as a defense, I mean, excuse, make it sound to others like reasonable behavior is out of our control simply because we have bipolar. Non-sense!

Bipolar is a challenge. It makes some things more difficult for us. Some things much more difficult. But it hasn’t kept us from succeeding. It doesn’t need to keep us from achieving great things.

Let’s show the whole blasted world just how good we can be!

-  Blessed with Bipolar

by Richard Jarzynka, author of Blessed with Bipolar

I do not like bedtime.

Bedtime is a pain.

Bedtime is frustration.

When I am tired and I lie down to relax, it most often does not happen for a couple of hours. My wonderful  manic mind does not want to stop entertaining itself. So, no matter how tired my body may be, my brain just won’t stop. It’s a good, but quite unusual brain. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. Except for wanting to be able to turn it off when I want to sleep.

But my brain just took me by surprise. It just hit me with the thought that maybe I don’t really want to be able to turn it off – even to sleep.

What? Why, I ask, would I not want to be able to turn my brain off and get some sleep. (My brain and I often have this kind of conversation.)

I also have restless leg syndrome, which further complicates my bedtime extravaganza. My legs and brain both go electric just as I am starting to relax. So, what good could possibly come from not being able to shut my brain down at night?

Is it possible that while I am lying there not sleeping, I do some of my best thinking – without knowing it. It might just be a time when, because I am not thinking about thinking, my brain unconsiously get out of its own way and subconsciously resolves all kinds of questions. Maybe it’s a time when somewhere in the back of my mind the seeds of success are being planted. Or the Holy Spirit is whispering into my soul.

Who knows? But it can’t hurt to choose to believe it.

Richard Jarzynka ,        check out “Blessed with Bipolar at www.bipolarman.org

by Richard Jarzynka,  author of Blessed with Bipolar

I was in church Sunday morning and I heard my pastor utter the word “Surrender.” It had nothing to do with his message, but it hit me harder than anything that did have something to do with his message.

I am a fighter. I have been a fighter for nearly all of my 49 years. I fought with my football coaches and got benched for the last three games of my junior year – at the risk of losing out on a college scholarship. I fought with my employers (and got fired a bunch of times). I fought a lawsuit against a law school without an attorney for over 4 years. I fought on the psych ward and bit a man who was trying to restrain me . . .

But I have learned the value of surrender.

I cannot be perfect. I cannot heal myself of bipolar disorder. And I cannot get through one minute of  one day without the grace of God. I must surrender to my absolute need for God. That isn’t easy for a fighter. I had to fight and fight and fight – against myself, against life, and against bipolar – and be beaten. I had to have the pride beaten out of me. I had to be humbled to the point of humiliation before I could admit my absolute need for God.

I hope it doesn’t take all of that for you to win the greatest victory of your life – absolute surre

by Richard Jarzynka    www.bipolarman.org

(From the first chapter of Blessed with Bipolar)

I don’t like book introductions. I
give them a quick look to see if they have anything to do with the alleged
subject matter of the text. If it’s a list of acknowledgments or irrelevancies,
I pass. So out of respect for those who are spending their time and/or money to
see if I have anything of value to say, (A tremendously humbling honor for me,
by the way. Thank you.) I wanted to get right at it. But I do think this whole
thing requires some upfront clarification. Thus, we have the “Explanation” in
the hole left by the Introduction.

As you already know, I have bipolar
disorder. And since seemingly everyone who has ever written about the condition
has told the horror story of raging mood swings, crippling depression, agitated
and angry uncontrollable energy, racing thoughts, bankrupting spending sprees,
broken relationships, sex-catastrophes, and just about every other sordid human
experience that could be blamed on an irascible mood, I thought I might write
about how Jesus Christ has made this “disorder” into His amazing, awe-striking,
abundant gift to me!

I am not going to let you wander
and search for the theme of this book. Here it is right between the eyes: When
I am weak, then I am strong. For God’s strength is made perfect in my weakness
and in all things (even manic-depression), He works for my good. (2 Corinthians
12:9-10, Romans 8:28)

Therefore, since everybody is
almost always beset with some degree of suffering, I offer these good works of
bipolar disorder that God has done in my life.
I set forth these blessings of bipolar to encourage you to seek the good
that God is doing in whatever hardship, weakness, or pain that you may be
enduring.

Some of what I write in the
following pages can be playful and even silly at times. But since ‘silly’ is derived
from the Old English word saelig,
meaning ‘blessed,’ a little playfulness does seem appropriate for a book
entitled, Blessed with Bipolar. Please know, however, that I am not
making light of bipolar disorder or any other pain that a person may be suffering.

I know personally the depths of the
hell of manic-depression. I am not writing to deny that agony. I am writing to
declare that, in spite of the hell and through the hell, God is doing a
miraculous work in you. I know this because He used bipolar disorder to do a
miraculous work in my life beyond anything I could have dreamed – or suffered.
I truly now look at my experience of bipolar disorder and see it as a blessing.
I want you to know that there is hope. And that His name is Jesus Christ. I pray
in His Name that He will empower you to one day see bipolar disorder as God’s
blessing upon your life.

I understand that if you are
currently struggling with depression, this may sound like full-bore nonsense.
In fact, if somebody had said these things to me during an episode of agitated
depression, I may well have told him that it was a bunch of balderdash. (I
would not have said “balderdash,” but what I would have said could not have
made it past Xulon Press – the Christian publisher of this book.) I would have
told that person that he was nuts if he thought anything about bipolar could be
a blessing – a gift from God. But that notion is no more crazy than this
statement from one of the most brilliant men of all time:

“. . . so I wouldn’t get a big head,
I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in touch with my limitations.
Satan’s angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to
my knees. No danger then of walking around high and mighty! At first I didn’t
think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and
then He told me, “My grace is enough; it’s all you need.” (2 Corinthians
12:7b-9a, The Message Paraphrase)

God will perfect His power in your
weakness. Embrace Christ and His power will dwell in you. Ask, seek, and knock
for the power of His Holy Spirit to explode within you. And keep on asking,
seeking, and knocking (aggressively! with a little fire in your spirit, and
with a heart expectantly overflowing with praise and thanksgiving for what God is
about to do) until the Holy Spirit’s power explodes throughout your life. And
bipolar disorder will be a “a slight momentary affliction” preparing you “for
an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure.” (2 Corinthians 4:17)

BLESSED WITH BIPOLAR on AMAZON.com

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By Richard Jarzynka,  author of BLESSED WITH BIPOLAR

• Casey Anthony gives mental illness a bad name.
• Who is the most mentally healthy person you have ever known? What is it about that person that makes you think he/she is mentallty healthy? Do you want what he/she has? Would you want to be like him/her?
• I was down on myself and feeling guilty a couple of weeks ago and I thought, “So, I screwed up again?! So what?! I know I’m not perfect. God knows I’m not perfect. I’m a sinner and Christ died to pay the penalty for my sin, but I’m never going to be perfect. Not on this side of heaven. So, give up the guilt. Be forgiven. And let the Holy Spirit help you to be the best imperfect person you can be.”
• When nobody expects you to succeed, you really don’t have much to lose – except time and money.
• I don’t want to hear anybody calling Congressman Anthony Weiner bipolar. We can’t lie like that.
• “When Jesus family heard what He was doing, they thought that He was crazy and went to get Him under control.” (Mark 3:21, Contemporary English Version)

Bipolarman.org

“There is NO condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)

And you need to recognize the massive difference between being convicted of your sins and condemnation.

The Holy Spirit convicts us of your sins – out of His great love for us – in order to bring us to repentance. And when we repent, we are instantly forgiven. Any guilt we feel after that is a lie. It is the false condemnation and lying guilt of the enemy.

Whenever I start to feel that false condemnation, I growl, “In Jesus’ Name, according to the Word of God, I declare that there is NO condemnation for me. I am in Christ Jesus. In Jesus’ Name I reject the condemnation and guilo of the enemy. It is false. Be gone from me satan. In Jesus’ Name, the Lord Jesus rebukes you, sagtan. Be gone. Thank you, Jesus. I receive your forgiveness.”