Feeling Good in Bipolar Disorder: The Wonders of Euthymia

I feel good. I shouldn’t, but I do. I’ve got all sorts of nasty things to worry about right now—recovery from a scary surgery and looming major plumbing repairs not the least among them—but for some reason, I’m neither terribly anxious nor unduly upset. I simply feel content.

I had a dream last night in which a strange man offered to buy my life. It’s not for sale, I told him. Come on, everybody has their price, he countered. So I thought about it long and hard: What would my price be? If I could have anything, what would I sell myself for? And still, my answer was no. I realized, as I was waking up, that I was happy with my life the way it is—worries, flaws, and all. I’m doing what I want to do; writing gives me purpose and meaning. I enjoy where I live, despite the unreliable plumbing. How many people can truly say that?

It’s weird to feel so satisfied. I’m used to wanting more—more money, more love, more stuff. Isn’t that the American way, to be reflexively dissatisfied? If you doubt this, go watch TV for half an hour. You’ll be poked and prodded by the best that Madison Avenue can offer, to make you long for what you don’t already have. It doesn’t even matter what it is, so long as it’s something different. Am I wrong to be happy with what I’ve got?

Hmm…My bipolar disorder has conditioned me to examine every feeling and analyze every emotion. That’s how I keep myself safe; I stay on top of my moods in order to corral them when they go awry. So I just can’t help myself; I have to question this contentment. Is it mania? Definitely not. My judgment seems sound—I’m not taking undue risks, sending floods of emails at 3 a.m., buying nonrefundable plane tickets to Tibet, or talking like Minnie Mouse. Could it be hypomania? Alas, I’m not feeling the intense creative inspiration that usually accompanies my hypomanic episodes. The world is not coming together in blissful spurts of connectivity. Strangers aren’t striking up conversations with me in elevators because I’m so inherently charismatic. So, not hypomania, either.

Finally, I took an extended trip through Google, and I just love what I discovered.

There’s actually a medical term for what I’m experiencing. It’s called “euthymia”—which, according to Merriam-Webster, is “a stable mental state or mood in those affected with bipolar disorder that is neither manic nor depressive.” Don’t you adore words? It gives me a tremendous sense of pleasure to wrestle meaning from abstraction. I feel beautifully defined now. I’m euthymic.

It’s always been important for me, not just as a human being but as a mental health consumer, to be able to put concrete names to the ephemera of my mind. It helps my doctors understand what I’m going through, so they can fine-tune my treatment. It’s no different than owning a car, and being able to point to a carburetor and tell the mechanic, “My carburetor is acting up.” Knowing the right lingo gives you credibility and power you wouldn’t otherwise have.

I know now why I wouldn’t sell my life at any price, even in a dream. Who would barter away euthymia? It’s what I’ve worked so hard to find—a normal, tranquil state of being. In fact, an article in the New England Journal of Medicine described “durable recovery” from bipolar illness as “eight consecutive weeks of euthymia without a switch to mania or hypomania.” It’s a glorious goal that I hope I’ll reach, but I’m taking this one day at a time. As I said, I’m satisfied.