I have been thinking a lot about the role of boredom in my life lately and how it can actually be an indicator of life balance, stability, and mental wellbeing. I don’t often experience boredom because as a full-time mom, wife, and PhD student, I usually have many plates spinning at once. However, in theContinue reading “Making Friends with Boredom”
Category Archives: Mental Health
Bipolar, Weight & the BMLie
I never really had a problem with weight gain from my bipolar meds until some months into the COVID-19 pandemic. A year prior, I was a group fitness instructor teaching Zumba and Beachbody’s TurboKick and PiYo classes multiple times a week. On top of that, I was participating in a 300 hour yoga teacher trainingContinue reading “Bipolar, Weight & the BMLie”
Healing Journey: Staying in my Lane
Given that it is a full moon in Aquarius, I thought a reflective post would be fitting. Full moons can be charged with so much energy, excitement, and anxiety making it difficult to stay grounded, focused on the present, and stay in our lanes. I love Rachel Cargle’s Instagram post “On: Staying In Your Lane”Continue reading “Healing Journey: Staying in my Lane”
Op-Ed: Extended Medicaid Benefits Provide A Lifeline for New Moms
The United States has an embarrassingly high maternal mortality rate compared to other highly industrialized nations. The majority of maternal mortality happens after childbirth — close to a quarter of pregnancy-related deaths take place between six weeks to a year after childbirth. So, it is baffling that federal law only guarantees 60 days of pregnancy-relatedContinue reading “Op-Ed: Extended Medicaid Benefits Provide A Lifeline for New Moms”
3rd House Astrology: My North Node in Scorpio
Astrology is one of the key tools in my mental health arsenal that has provided me language to process my experiences of madness as well as my more subtle daily intuitions and impulses. For instance, moving along my healing journey, I have becoming increasingly aware of how much I gravitate towards the uncomfortable, the unknownContinue reading “3rd House Astrology: My North Node in Scorpio”
Healing Journey: Mad Pride
As I learn more about the various experiences of people with mental illness, the more I appreciate the complexities we encounter when naming ourselves. Out of the global psychiatric survivor movement of the 1980s and 90s emerged different language to describe our experiences as survivors of psychiatric abuse, ex-patients who recovered or were misdiagnosed, andContinue reading “Healing Journey: Mad Pride”
Euthymia: Neither Manic nor Depressed
The uninformed public may believe that people with bipolar disorder are volatile constantly, swinging between mania and depression, but this mischaracterizes our actual lived experience. In fact, those of us who have received a correct diagnose and are following a treatment plan experience a stable mood known as euthymia. Stemming from the Greek word forContinue reading “Euthymia: Neither Manic nor Depressed”
Medicated Moods: Depression
I have only recently come to the realization that I can still experience mood shifts while medicated. For years after my bipolar diagnosis, I assumed that if I was taking my medication as prescribed that I would be symptom-free. Boy, was I wrong. Even after fine-tuning my medication regimen to the point where I experienceContinue reading “Medicated Moods: Depression”
Healing Journey: Postpartum Post-Mania Recovery
Navigating pregnancy without medication, my manic moods swung for months between the ecstatic highs of euphoric mania to the agitated episodes of the dysphoric variety. This experience was not only emotionally taxing; it took a tole on my physical body as well. I experienced a decreased sensitivity to pain such that I was prone toContinue reading “Healing Journey: Postpartum Post-Mania Recovery”
Chasing ‘Normal’ | Seeking Stability
The Oxford Dictionary defines recovery as “a return to a normal state of health, mind, or strength.” But what is a normal mental state? The biomedical model of mental illness has tried to convince us that binaries — normal and abnormal, stable and unstable, sane and insane — exist. Proponents of the recovery model reinforceContinue reading “Chasing ‘Normal’ | Seeking Stability”
Nadia Naomi Mbonde 