Sisters, Friends & All Things Broken

Sorry this entry is so close behind the last one.. but I felt like it was something that just had to be said.. so yeah.

I remember when my sister had moved away and after a year or so after being back in touch with her, she was just completely fine. No one mentioned the bipolar and she was just like she always was, a happy bubbly teenager. Completely normal, no one who met her would ever think there was anything wrong with her, I even forgot from time to time.
And she fell in love.. like really in love, more in love than I've ever seen anyone in love before. And I knew the guy (and his brother) and they were both so lovely. His brother was my age so I talked to him loads and although him and his brother had all this pretend fighting and hatred for each other when he talked to me he was always saying how great his big brother was. And the times when I spoke to him, he was really nice, and I was glad my sister had fallen in love with such a great guy, and glad that he loved her back just as much.
But when they got together.. things changed. It was alright at first, they got on really well and joked around and had fun. She'd always come and tell me about all the fun they had out at the park or at the movies and all the sweet things he'd said. She told me about their first kiss and how nice it was to hold his hand and everything. But then.. they started arguing more and more and she would come and tell me how she'd cried for hours, how he wouldn't listen and how he didn't care.
It killed me almost as much as it killed her to think of how he treated her... and when she was sitting there thousands of miles away, crying down the phone, it made me cry. She'd tell me every time that she'd just be strong.. he had one more chance then that was it..
But i lost count of the times she rang me in the middle of the night and just cried..
But this is all in the past... At the time, it broke her as much as she said her bipolar had.. he messed with her head, as if it hadn't been messed with enough. She could see it, she just kept forgiving him, because she truly believed he loved her and that he's change for her..
Truth is.. no body changes, and if you think they have, you're dreaming.

I'm not saying this story is exclusive to people who suffer from bipolar disorder, not in the slightest, I'm seeing it happen now... I'm just saying it's a sad thing that someone you love can hurt you as much as a mental disorder can. I guess what I'm saying is.. be strong, and listen, please. I've seen it happen.. and it killed her, the strongest person I know, killed by a mental disorder and then by the man she loved...

Don't let me see it happen again :)




Who do you think you are?
Runnin' 'round leaving scars,
Collecting your jar of hearts,
And tearing love apart,
You're gonna catch a cold,
From the ice inside your soul,
So don't come come back for them,
Who do you think you are?

Jar of Hearts - Christina Perri

Like Sister, Like Sister

I felt like I needed to have a post dedicated to my beautiful sister, just to tell you guys all about her really and to try and help explain why some people with Bipolar Disorder choose not to take medication for it (it's not because we're mad! I promise).
My sister Alex, as well as being the strongest person I know is also the most beautiful and talented person I've ever met. She's a bit of a tom-boy but she's dead pretty. She's really bubbly and easy to get along with, or at least that's how I always think of her. She's a very talented musician but also very shy. Don't ask how she can be both bubbly and shy at the same time, she just is, one thing that people say we have in common a lot. Bubbly but shy :) She's plays guitar very well and has a voice like an angel.
Anyhow onto the thing I admire the most about her, her strentgh. She is an extremely strong person.
So yeah... When I was 12 and she was 15 she was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder II. I'll not go into how she told the family and the truly awful night before she moved away from home to live half way around the world. But I will tell you that that night was the worst night of my life. 
My parents tried, and succeeded (after a while), to make me forget about it. They acted (and still do act) like she never existed, like she was never part of our family, never real.
I didn't have any contact with her for a couple of years, and it's only recently that I've been in touch with her again. It turns out she moved to Australia to live with some close friends out there. She started school and just a normal life, she claims their her family and they claim she is theirs. She goes by their surname and loves them all very much. She's very happy out there and they've given her loads of support through the disorder.
Alex went on various medications that the doctors advised for her condition and each one of them saw no improvement, some of them made her feel and act even worse. She won't tell me much of it, I think she feels like I need protecting from it all. And now that I've been diagnosed with a form of Bipolar disorder it's like she wants to tell me even less so her opinion and decisions don't effect (affect?) me. She has told me though that she had some hard times with the drugs and all the doctors she went to were really like pushy and wouldn't let her stop them when she felt worse. I felt horrible when i heard if my sister, older and bigger, yet seemingly so much more fragile, being forced to take drugs she didn't want. And when I was diagnosed I just plain refused. My sister had got through with sheer willpower, so why wouldn't I be able to?
She's strong now, stronger than ever. Enless you know her really, really well you wouldn't even know she was bipolar.
And that's without meds. So that's why some people choose not to take medication, because some people have seen that willpower can be just as strong as any medicines.
I must stress that this is not always the case, and when I told my doctor I didn't want any meds. he told me I was crazy and to get out of his office. So yeah.. different people have different viewpoints.

So basically what I'm trying to say, is that with the right people around you, anything is possible, and I've got my amazing sister Alexis to thank for showing me that. :)