Elis de Guerre
Bio
Elis de Guerre Articles
I live with bipolar II disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, ADHD, and complex PTSD. I take Effexor, Klonopin, Depakote, and Adderall. I knew I needed to talk to my psychiatrist about what changes I’d need to make before we could try to have a baby. The chances that none of these medications would affect a growing fetus was impossible in my mind. But I never expected what Dr. G told me.
Read...Let the #LGBTBabes party rage on, my fellow rainbow darlings. You're beautiful. You're supported. You're loved. And you're perfect just as you are.
Read...[CN: suicidal thoughts, self-harm] Why is it OK to minimize the symptoms of a serious, debilitating, chronic condition with no cure just because it’s mental, not physical?
Read...Undoing a marriage costs five times as much as it does to tie one up with a bow, and the paperwork is even longer. I've cried so hard I've thrown up my dinner in a municipal lot, exhausted myself with memories to the point where 7 p.m. seems like reasonable bedtime, and contemplated spending my wedding anniversary alternating between taking a pair of scissors or a lighter to my wedding dress.
Read...Two months ago, I filed for disability for unmedicated bipolar disorder. I had spent weeks dangling from tiring hands over a spiky precipice – or so it seemed. There were days of crying at my desk, days of inexplicable panic attacks in the face of a normal workload.
Read...I’m a person who needs to know the facts. I bring a notebook with me to every doctor’s appointment. I record important meetings. The research list for my memoir is pages long. Why should pregnancy be any different? And so the research began.
Read...t interests me that I can immediately think of the gifts of anxiety, panic, and even my spurts of agoraphobia. Being tense in body and mind, living with fear that feels real even though I know intellectually it isn’t, experiencing the migraines, chest pains and choking sensations — these aren’t things that lend themselves to my happiness.
Yet the compulsion to stay at home, brought on by edginess and unease outside, keeps me productive. Anxiety makes me communicative, even if just through electronic means. The worry about judgment pushes me to write better, to edit more thoroughly, to answer the voice in my head saying “You’re not good enough” with a defiant “Then watch me improve.”
I can feel proud of my cleavage and my combat boots. I feel fierce in drop-crotch sweatpants and preppy sweaters. I carry my edge with me and, with it, my own brand of femininity. Best of all, I consult no one but my own eyes. I don’t ask permission. I don’t seek what’s in fashion.
Read...In the past four months, I’ve undergone a veritable dating hurricane. I ran out on my 10-month-old marriage in August. I texted my decision and departure to my closest friends, live-tweeted my flight from upstate New York to the New Hampshire seacoast, and have written extensively and publicly about separation, my estranged husband, and the terrors of emotional pain ever since.
Read...Last week, my mother came home from work, found the shower faucet leaking hot water, and told me to "get my head out of my cunt, and start thinking about other things."
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