Becoming a Grandmother

I've never had any children of my own. However, I have a beautiful stepdaughter, "K" who just had a little baby girl after 48 hours of labor. "AAP" weighed 6 lbs. 4 oz. and is 20-1/4" long. She has a full head of dark brown curls.

I'm as excited about this grandbaby as any grandma could be. I may get to go hold her this Saturday. YAY!

I went through the pregnancy with K, learning, vicariously, what it's like to be pregnant. Often, my Saturday afternoon visits with her were major uplifting events whilst in the midst of a rather serious depression.

One of the things that a bipolar individual MUST do while in a state of depression is to mingle with people. Don't talk about your state of mind: ACT AS IF everything is okay in your world. This goes along with the old addage: "Fake it until you make it." While that may sound trite, it really is not.

The tendency while in depression is often to whisk oneself away on a couch somewhere, and dwell on one's state of mind. This is called "self-rumination" and is a very bad thing to engage in. What happens is a set of secondary symptoms.

The primary symptoms are the depression, itself, caused by neuro-chemicals in the brain being out of balance. The secondary symptoms are what you think in reaction to the primary symptoms, such as, "Everything is hopeless; I'm useless; nothing is worthwhile," and so forth. By intermingling with people, such as perhaps going to Starbucks with friends; dining out with friends -- anything to divert your attention from your own inner self -- will help to dissipate the effects of the depression.