Without support eventually you will die.
It's not if, it's when. Because it is so
debilitating it is so crushing it
crushes the will to live. The only reason
I am alive right now, my wife Anne, told me
that she’d have real difficulty living
without me. My sister, Eileen made it
clear that she really wants me around.
That’s the only reason why I'm here
today.
[Music]
If I'm not medicated the moods change
can change by the hour.
And I can go from being suicidal to
being quite high all within the course of a
day. So trying to get through a normal
Day. It's almost impossible. I knew I was
ill when I was Fourteen. At twent-seven I was severely
depressed and suicidal and I was just very
fortunate I didn't kill myself. At thirty I
met Raymond Rupert MD who was also a
psychotherapist and he worked with me
for five years. And after that I was on
Lithium. Ray saved my life with the
Psychotherapy, the lithium changed my
life in that for the first time I
understood how other people can get
through a day without finding it to feel
like a marathon, emotionally.
The medication lithium, when it works for
people it just changes everything. Like
you're in a thunderstorm and all of a
sudden the storm stopped and it's beautiful
and sunny out and you're in a Caribbean
island. It's like ‘Whoa so this is how
people do it.’ As good as it was, there are
side effects it makes you a bit tired, it
makes retain body water, you tend to put
on weight, you know it slows you down and
makes you more docile. So I went off it.
I became convinced after a few years that
I was cured. Within a week I had a car
Accident where I got in a rage with a
guy but you know, um… on lithium no problem
off lithium, um, road rage it's like Dr.
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. But it was enough to
convince me that maybe I should go back
on my meds.
This year I had dental work done, they
put me on really powerful pain killers
and when I came off in a few weeks later
I wasn't right and I deteriorated and by
Easter, I was suicidal. I said to Anne, I said
‘I can't do it anymore I can't keep going–
I am going to kill myself.’ Anne just said, ‘I
can't do this anymore.’
She could no longer live with the idea
that she might come home one day and
find me dead. And couldn't live with the
ups and downs of the illness. Even though
I managed to come out of the tailspin,
I'm in the process of separating from my
wife of twenty-three years. I do not blame her at
all, I'm so thankful that that
she's been with me all the time she has
been, you know. In some ways it's a relief,
we still love each other, you know
we're still very caring toward each
other. She checks in on me almost every
Day, um and I don't have to worry anymore
that I need to be bringing Annie down,
you know what I mean?
[Music]