Diary of a Bipolar Explorer

In 2002 Lucy Newlyn found herself incarcerated in a mental hospital in Leeds. She had been sectioned under the Mental Health Act as a danger to herself and others during a psychotic episode after several nights without sleep. The psychosis was triggered by nearly three years of grieving for a dead sister, followed by a vigil at her father's deathbed during which she hallucinated that his hospital ward was a trench in the First World War. The episode uncovered psychiatric problems, which led in due course to a diagnosis of bipolar disorder. This condition, which involves extreme mood swings, is classified as a disability and requires medication; but it is also a source of creativity, giving access to some unusual dimensions of human experience. In her 15-year diary, Lucy Newlyn discloses recurring episodes of mania, depression, hallucination and paranoid delusion.