I Like This Word Better Than "Crazy"
Friday August 1, 2008
The other night I saw Girl, Interrupted for the first time. Two things really struck me. One was that it took place in the '60s, which meant I was about the same age as these girls at the time. And I never knew anyone who used language like that in the '60s. Maybe I lived in a cocoon.
The other was a line clear at the end of the film. In voice-over, Susanna said, "Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It's you or me amplified."
Amplified. Wow. Yes. My anxiety is fear, amplified. My depression is the blues plus introspection, amplified. My mixed episodes are those plus stress, amplified. My hypomania is - what? Seems like it's more than an amplification of a good mood. I don't know. I've had so few normal good moods in my life.
So I'm not crazy, but my brain pushes intensity of mood and feelings to extremes.
What about you? Are you not crazy, but amplified? Leave a comment.
~Marcia
Comments
In response to your line, “So I’m not crazy, but my brain pushes intensity of mood and feelings to extremes”:
I was always the life of the party because I would always take things to levels that others wouldn’t. I didn’t know that I actually had bipolar and was usually in the midst of hypomania at the time.
Amplified. Yes. Brilliant.
i love that! What a great way to describe it
I agree, I like that definition of crazy better. People do say that I’m intense!
I am as crazy as h*ll. The difference is that since I stabilized on meds that I am nuts on purpose!
Wow! Amplified! I have tried often to place myself in the shoes of those suffering from depression, hypomania, etc., and have felt at a loss. What a great way to look at symptoms we all experience, and try to picture them amplified, so we can be more empathetic.
I’ve seen that movie several times and never caught that line!! How fitting
My username on a lot of sites, the name I’ve come to deeply identify with, is volatilesublime. So, yes, I can totally identify with “amplified” as a term for us. Because everything FEELS so much more intense, doesn’t it? The colors are brighter, flavors more intense, music louder and more moving, etc.
Great i feel so much better now… found this just in time.. thought i was a lost cause…been crying all night and this morning..from lack of understanding from my family and friends.. thanks
I really like this. I just listened to an interview with Dr. Otto Wahl, author of “Media Madness: Public Images of Mental Illness”, and “Telling is a Risky Business: the Experience of Stigma”. He was on CABF’s podcast, Flipswitch: the Bipolar and Depression Connection. Disclosure- I work for CABF and am sometimes on Flipswitch
Dr. Wahl was talking about how words in day to day speech reinforce stigma. Little things that wouldn’t normally occur to me – “such and such happened and its ‘driving me bonkers’” etc. It started me thinking about new ways to express things. Your post is very timely!
Shira
Amplified works nice for me
Much nicer than deranged madman, for example.