From not sleeping, to Sleeping a Little Bit More

12/7/2025

So, what have I been up to lately? Well, definitely not sleeping, for one. One aspect of bipolar disorder that I did not know about, or rather, wasn’t aware of its prevalence, was sleep disturbances. So much so that I’ve been keeping a sleep journal to share with my psychiatrist, and I suppose, you! Basically, since November 12th, around the beginning of my first recorded manic episode, I have been surviving on 2-4 hours of sleep per night, with completely sleepless nights peppered in between. The weird thing? I don’t feel tired at all. 

Just today, I woke up at around 2:00am. Since then, I have been reading, coloring, grading papers, answering emails, walking my dog, and watching TV. Just normal, “awake stuff.” Here’s an example of last night’s sleep journal entry:

12/7:

Tired at 7:00pm, took lithium, went to bed

Drifted in and out of sleep

Woke up at 9, scrolled on tik tok until 10:08pm

Not tired at all but tried to go back to sleep around 10:15pm

11:41pm still awake not tired at all

Woke up at 2:00am not tired at all, got up

6:20am still not tired, have been up since 2:00am

This is a pretty average night for me these days. It is currently 8:52am. I’m a teeny bit tired. Like, I think I could probably snooze for a bit, but thanks to mania, I have no desire to do so. My mind is running a mile a minute. I can’t stop. 

Mania can be kind of nice at times (maybe that’s a manic delusion, who cares?)! For example, I got all of my work for the the day completely done- I will probably check my email one or two more times throughout the day, but otherwise I feel pretty good about where I am with my grading, although it could definitely be better.

12/14/2025

Things are actually starting to look up! I have slept for most of the past two nights, and even started sleeping in my bed, versus crashing on the couch. My mind is still running quite quickly, although the new mood stabilizer I’m on- lithium, combined with my usual meds I’ve been on for a while- seroquel, gabapentin, zoloft, ativan (PRN), and olanzapine (PRN), have been helping a lot. 

Up until a couple of days ago, I was sleeping maybe 2-3 hours per night, sometimes-most of the time, not at all. Anxiety has been through the roof, hallucinations have been wild. But the past two days have been considerably better. And I hope things keep going in this direction.

What have I learned throughout this time? Mania is weird. And it fucking sucks. I just want to feel normal again. But what is normal, when it comes to schizoaffective disorder? Only time will tell.