Moody Storm painting - bipolar mixed mania

Moody Storm by Xanthe Wyse

It's been a while since I've done a painting on canvas (maybe a year or so?) My energy is limited and I have been focussing on my writing plus an ACC compensation process which has been very stressful. I haven't finished blogging about that yet but needed a break from it.

My anxiety levels were high this week, with racing thoughts, typical of mania mixed episode for me. Walking with music and medications weren't enough, so I felt the need to process with a painting, inspired by the five colours of a new ring I have been wearing. My mind was racing with potential 5-letter words and once I started sketching out some ideas, my anxiety was significantly eased. I decided to proceed with a painting (always ends up improvised). I decided on the words 'mania', 'moody', 'avoid' and 'mixed'.

I painted some without music, some with. Either way, it was meditative in action, which takes me out of anxiety temporily. Intially, the painting was called 'Moody Cow' with cow print around two edges of an intensely coloured grid. 

I call these kinds of paintings 'visual mind maps' as they are loose mind maps of links and associations that I am processing. My childhood nickname is 'hidden' in plain sight at least three times. The colours have symbolic meanings, so did some of the shapes, such as a traffic light. I had some fine black and white paint pens from rock painting, so added some words and song lyrics plus some definition. Incidently, my writing is more legible here than when I write in my journal. This is simply because I need to slow down to write with paint.

There was a layer of metallics which muted the colours significantly. Like a protective armour over the intensity of shutdown emotions. (I am diagnosed with bipolar 1 disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD). I didn't want the full intensity dulled, so I brought hints back. Layers upon layers, like the complexity of my minds, that words can't fully express. 

I ended up with a mess in the corner, so I turned it into a storm. At that point, the name of the painting changed to 'Moody Storm,' which is also what I have named my ring.

Moody Storm under artificial light

The painting was done in less than ideal lighting in a pretty dark room, with an artifical desklamp. So it looks very different in natural daylight to artificial light. The artifical light brings out the metallics more and also casts a warm tone overall. The main pic is in natural light but still indoors.

Song lyrics were written along the edges. The song that stuck out the most was 'I'll Stand by You" by the Pretenders. I didn't actually choose this song. I was letting songs 'choose themselves' and skipping any that didn't really fit my mood or the theme.

Mixed mood aka mixed features

I experience bipolar disorder and PTSD tangled together. I wanted to capture in visual form what a mixed episode is like - intense yet cluttered. Confusing yet in a weird way, makes sense. A mind that is busy and won't shut up. Until I paint, then things slow down a lot, so that I am absorbed completely into it, improvising as I go. Observing the themes I process, only pausing briefly to jot down in my art journal anything significant, without breaking my flow. Then walk away for to have a break while a layer dries. No idea how long I spend painting each layer. Probably at least 20-30 minutes.

A mixed mood episode aka 'mixed features' is both features of bipolar mania and bipolar depression together. In my case, the PTSD is usually activated too. It feels like being torn apart in different directions. My anxiety can go from manageable to very high. Mixed mood is when I am most likely to destroy symbolic objects, to get a temporarily release from it. These days, I destroy less stuff, so mood episodes are more under control. 

Sometimes, I destroy my own paintings. For me, it's part of the creative process. Although, most paintings have been adopted out.

A mixed mood episode can look similar to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), although this is ruled out for me, as I lacked enough clinically significant features in childhood. There is overlap with the difficulty with focus (until I hyperfocus) and also being more impulsive and more easily frustrated. ADHD doesn't have the episodic mood features though of bipolar disorder. Mood affects everything, including sleep, appetite, libido.

My mood has been all over the place lately, with temporarily relief while painting, as the colour temporarily eases my pain and anxiety. Music helps when I am 'frozen' and gets me flowing and also so I don't 'overthink'. I probably painted a third of the time without music though, for this piece.

Sometimes, I've felt a bit high, other times, low. I shut down intense emotion to the extreme and at the end of it all, there were some emotions linked to loss, grief and loneliness. At times the intense emotion was expressed but after I did the painting, rather than during. Much of my anxiety is because I don't know what I'm really feeling at the time and my head is filled with rapidly linked thoughts.

The painting captures my state of mind recently (intense, jumbled, links), plus some of what I was processing. The deeper aspects, I have noted in my journal, and will talk to my psychologist about (I am still in therapy for PTSD).

I thoroughly recommend creative expression as therapy. My psychologist's advice is 'just don't go too fast and make sure you stop to eat, rest etc'. The great thing about creative expression is that it's indirect and goes deeper than just talking.

If you're unfamiliar with painting, I recommend acrylics, as they are easy wash up and can be layered. If you don't like something, can paint a thin layer of white, then paint right over the top of it when dry. Also, abstracts are ideal for experimenting and for expressing mood. Anything goes with abstracts. Also a tip a professional artist gave me is to only mix 2-3 colours plus white together to keep colours vibrant.

resonated with bipolar

This painting really resonated with other people with bipolar disorder. Even though they won't know the deeper themes of what I was processing, the mixed mood was obvious. Described as an expressive beautiful chaos.