About Me
Rachel Latch
I am Bipolar. Specifically type 1 (manic highs and depressive lows). I was diagnosed in 2017 at the age of 24. My whole life had led up to that moment and there were many signs I should have picked up on. I remember telling my husband when I first met him in 2011 that my life was like a rollercoaster and every few months I would get super hyper and get stuff done. I also have family members who have been diagnosed. But even with that it still wasn’t easy facing the facts. My life is made more complicated with other diagnoses: narcolepsy, chronic migraines, and anxiety. I have been told that these illnesses don’t define my life or my personality. But it sure does feel like it sometimes. Join me on my goal to gain mental stability and find overall happiness.
General Information about Me
I want to make a change in the world, to help somebody. I only know my experience and I want to share that experience in hopes that it will help somebody, change somebody. I have a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Biology from Baylor University. I am married to my college sweetheart. We have been together ten plus years. I enjoy pop/hip-hop music, I love dancing around the house while cleaning. I did ballet for almost 15 years before I had a knee injury. I have had two surgeries on my left knee. I recently started to get into spin classes, but my knee was injured again. I have two German Shepard mixes, a boy and a girl and a female cat. I do not like outdoors, strangers, heat, and cooking.
More information about my other health illnesses:
-
Narcolepsy
A chronic sleep disorder that causes overwhelming daytime drowsiness. I often compare it to being awake for 48-72 hours. I could literally sleep anytime, anywhere (even with bright lights and loud noises). The excessive daytime sleepiness makes it difficult to concentrate and fully function. You might be thinking that narcoleptics must sleep really well, but that’s not true either. Narcoleptics have fragmented nighttime sleep. When we do sleep we often have vivid, dreamlike hallucinations. People with narcolepsy often experience a temporary inability to move or speak while falling asleep or upon waking. REM sleep can occur at any time of the day in people with narcolepsy. People with narcolepsy often transition quickly to REM sleep, usually within 15 minutes of falling asleep.
-
Chronic Migraines
Chronic: defined as having at least 15 headache days a month, with at least 8 days with migraine features.
Migraine: a recurrent throbbing headache that typically affects one side of the head and is often accompanied by nausea and disturbed vision.
For me personally I used to get about 15-20 migraines a month. Some of the lighter migraines I could push through. However about 10 migraines every month would put me in bed. I couldn’t sleep because of the pain. Sometime the pain is so bad I bang my head against a wall or pull out my hair. With pretty much every migraine I throw up, and thus have barf bags everywhere in my house, car, and purse.
-
Anxiety
I, like many other Bipolar people, have also been diagnosed with anxiety. I have both generalized and social anxiety. When it comes to generalized anxiety I find that I worry about people being mad at me and getting into trouble (even though I have done nothing wrong). When it comes to social anxiety I avoid, avoid, avoid. I am worried mostly about staying the wrong thing and being made fun of. When I go to grocery stores or such I wear headphones, a mask, and sunglasses, hoping to show strangers I DO NOT WANT TO TALK. I do not go to parties or loud, bright places because it just causes me too much stress. In the blog I will talk a lot about my anxiety and how I deal with it. It is of course something I have to deal with everyday and I find that it is even worse than my medicated biopolarness.