I am still manic so please forgive me but I am on the comedown. I just wrote 3 pages in Word trying to tell my story but I couldn’t express myself correctly so I’ll boil it down. I’ve been manic for up to the last month and a half or was manic, crashed and am manic again. I tried to kill myself 13 days ago using (a fuckton of) pills. I very nearly succeeded. I am home and healing. Yesterday my sister was listening to me talk and broke the spell by just asking “have you considered you might be manic?”. For the first time in 40 years I acknowledged that, yes, I was manic, it explained nearly everything very neatly and that meant I was actually bipolar. I am ready to heal.

While I’ve been out of the hospital, I was asked by my wife if this was her fault “do you not want to be with me?”, we’ve been together more than half my life, “no, I’m sorry you thought that, I didn’t want to be with me.”

I’ve been unpacking why, trying to direct my energy to something productive instead of the constant masturbation and weed smoking I want to do.

(With the help of others) I’ve began to understand. When I was a kid I used to bleach and dye my hair, I would wear cut-offs, fishnets, Doc Martens, running around with green hair and a band tee (I’m a cis-man BTW). I got made fun of. I conformed for my own comfort, I eventually entered the service, and when I got out I continued masking for 17 years until I exploded.

I’ve always let through little bits of my true personality, when it was time for new sun glasses a few years ago I got the largest pair of aviators I could find in the store and made sure they were gold with the darkest tint available. I have an affinity for the loudest shoes I can find, I have a pair of brooks that are bright yellow, at work, people call them my tennis-ball sneakers. Once or twice a week I like to wear magenta scrubs (I get made fun of and the next day I come back in blue or gray), I used to parade around my house in skirts I picked up at the thrift-store and I “joked” with my wife that when we renew our vows, I get to wear the dress. (Did I mention I’m cis? I promise I am). But I’ve never owned it and let my freak flag fly, I’ve always protected my feelings, stuck in my own head “what will people think?” has been my mantra.

That nearly killed me. So I acknowledged who I really am, I shaved my wild, unkempt beard, I got my left ear piercing re-done and had my right ear done to match, I dyed my hair a lurid blue. I have not gotten any tattoos though I now know that, in the future when I have the money, I will. I don’t currently have plans to cross dress again, that may have been a phase or not but if I want to in the future, guess who’s going skirt shopping?

When I made my attempt I was a broken man in his early 40s with nothing I could see to live for, when I return to work, I will be a broken man in his early 40s with a future. When I go back it will be in my magenta scrubs, with my tennis-ball yellow shoes, my blue hair, and my piercings. Fuck what people think.

I’m (hopefully) done guarding my feelings, masking my true self, a peacock who wants to be the prettiest princess at the ball. I have a lot to work through with my counselor but I’m excited for that, I am now on a path of discovery and I’m excited to re-discover who I truly am.

And, for the record, when my wife and I renew our vows, I get to wear the dress.