Sketchbook Peek - Two Seasons
by Lydia Makepeace
Updated 12/2/15
Last week I revealed a very personal part of who I am - the fact that I live with Bipolar Disorder and am creating a series that visually portrays what it feels like to live with this disorder.
Below is sketchbook peek of a painting I’m working on. It depicts a tree split between winter and summer. Living with Bipolar Disorder can sometimes feel like living in just two seasons - a cold, barren, dark winter or a day glow summer where everything’s too much.
With Bipolar Disorder there is a struggle to achieve balance and nuance. Emotional and mental states can swing from extreme to extreme without the transition of fall into winter or spring into summer.
A depressive winter season obliterates all self esteem, leaving me a shell of a former self. Sometimes I doubt whether I was anyone at all and begin to believe I will know nothing but dark days and void. Then comes the manic summer season where nothing can stop me. I can do anything. I’m the most interesting, exciting person in the world! Life becomes a whirl of activity. The colors spin. There’s a rush of ideas, so many I must start them all - RIGHT NOW. I go, go, go till I’m exhausted. A crash comes, and it is as if there never was a sun. I feel like nothing - a black hole that sucks the life out of everything and everyone around me.
Though they feel like they’ll last forever, moods pass. Seasons change. With the aid of medication, therapy and healthy choices I’m developing the ability to live in a full range of seasons.
Check out the finished painting HERE
Read last week’s post here - I’m coming out...