An Introduction to Cyclothymia

http://www.sebastianmarshall.com/an-introduction-to-cyclothymia

by jakeonthemove • 15 years ago

9 3 15 years ago

thiagofm• 15 years ago

Hell of a useless wall of text.

What Marshall's saying here is important. However, I don't think he said it as well as he could have, or as well as the topic deserves. I go through similar (if less extreme) cycles, and the depressive state can be debilitating. I looked at this as a serious affliction and set about "curing" myself about a year ago. I was ultimately successful after about a few months of concerted effort, at which point I became mediocre and may have blown my chances at moving directly to Stanford next year.

I've since reverted (because I couldn't take how bad I felt that I was subjectively accomplishing so little), and am in the process of studying this personality type to try and find a better answer. I think I'll draft an analysis myself in response to Marshall's and submit it if it comes out decently.

Out of curiosity (and to satisfy my hopeful hunch), are there many other HN users with behavioral patterns like this? I'm hoping to find similarly impassioned individuals on my way out towards Palo Alto/Stanford.

Mz• 15 years ago

I can't get through the whole piece at the moment. (My apologies to Sebastian and others.) I have my own issue: Atypical Cystic Fibrosis. This is associated with heat issues (people with CF are often warm-natured, though I was always cold-natured until I got my anemia under control). Anecdotally, there is an association between genetic disorders and high IQ. There is also an association between high IQ and various issues, like ADD, ADHD, OCD and a few others. The association is strong enough that some people refer to such issues as "co-morbidities" of very high IQ (presumably for lack of a better term and also to indicate that high IQ can and does frequently come with a host of issues and is not all upside).

FWIW: When I was very, very ill and in a lot of pain and on all kinds of drugs, I did all kinds of crap I would never do "while in my right mind". Although I have no reason to believe I am manic-depressive, I do experiences crashes of a sort because I have physical limitations and simply run out of energy. Getting myself fundamentally healthier has take a lot of the edge off my emotional reactivity, reduced the depths of crashes, and made productive times more grounded, saner, healthier, more sustainable experiences.

I am off to piddle around with a game. Again, my apologies for not myself being in good enough shape to really do this topic justice. I am posting anyway in large part because HN moves extremely fast, so if I don't do it now, the opportunity will be lost, likely before I am up to doing the topic justice.

Peace.

An Introduction to Cyclothymia

Related Stories