I am currently going through a very joyous and energetic moment. For the past 12 days I have been feeling euphoric, and so many good things have come about!

• I’ve discovered the joy of sewing. I never did sewing before, but I’ve done several small projects already and I’m waiting on some specialty thread to arrive so I can finish altering a skirt of mine.
• I’ve started a blog and have been writing nearly every day.
• I’ve fulfilled a childhood dream by getting a doll I always wanted and having Raggedy Ann has been a very emotional and comforting experience, much more so than I expected.
• I had a breakthrough in dealing with leftover trauma of growing up trans, and that in turn has led me to …
• Questioning my sexuality and realizing that I really am strongly attracted to men despite having lived most of my life as a lesbian.
• I have a sort of date tomorrow (with a young trans woman) and this will be my first date since 2002.
• I’ve really become much more expressive with my hands, I’m walking differently, swinging my hips more, for example, and just generally feeling much, much more comfortable visibly expressing myself femininely. Some sort of old inhibition I wasn’t even aware of has fallen away.
• I’ve found it much easier to talk about sexuality with others, a thing I have always been shy of, and I even shared a partially nude photo of myself for the first time in my entire life. It was quite liberating!
• I have had a breakthrough in my religious practices. Years ago I could feel and manipulate my body’s energy, but after returning to atheism around 2005 I lost that ability. This week it has come roaring back and I feel much more in tune with myself and my Goddess.
• I’ve just been having a ton of energy and getting lots of stuff done.

Mind you, this is not without a (potential) downside. For the first time in about 20 years I am having a hypomanic episode. Back in 1999 I was diagnosed as Bipolar II, a kind of bipolar disorder characterized by a lack of full blown mania. Instead I can get hypomanic, which is characterized by lots of energy, feelings of euphoria, a flood of ideas, more sexual openness, and other nice things. Sound familiar after reading the list above? But it also includes a risk of overspending, taking more risks, and being more sexually active. I’ve been having these symptoms as well.

So far, though, I haven’t had any real downside, and I’m hoping the end of this hypomanic episode will come slowly and gradually instead of being a sudden crash into depression, as it is with some people, including me in the past. My current medications have been working very well for the past decade, and I think this episode is probably more due to a combination of good things happening in my life, and is not a sign that my meds are no longer working right. Knock on wood!