Remembering Like Memento: Living With Bipolar From the Inside

Originally posted by Neal Reid on his Facebook account on October 27 2025. Shared here with his permission.

People who've known me for a long time will remember what I was like back in 2015-2018. I want to remind you all, and let the newbies know, what I was like and how far I've come. You see, I've come to realise that bipolar is similar to anterograde amnesia, the condition Guy Pearce's character suffers from in Memento. Remembering things is a real problem when my symptoms are intense, so I have to write things down like Leonard Shelby, Pearce's character. Old Facebook friends will remember me speaking like this:

i'm posting absolutely every thought that enters my head as soon as it enters my head on repeat with no filter ad infinitum because Im the greatest person who ever lived whats happening over there oiyoufuckingcuntitlooksinterestingjsbasajdsld

My unmedicated episodes were like that, with a similar progression of thought. That was my mind's unconscious attempt to catalogue my thoughts. When you're unmedicated absolutely everything comes out, but, with each episode, I learn something new. I hone and refine, catalogue and document. I often forget the things that are important because that's the illness, so I write and take photos and post on here because I can find it again. I just wanted to say thanks for sticking with me through those times. New friends, you don't have to worry about that anymore.

I really have been very good in terms of taking it, but I always had alcohol as fall back. It has now taken one single unmedicated morning without drinking alcohol, and the help of a new Facebook friend Raquel Pinheiro, for my thoughts on this to come together, to understand the importance of taking my medication all the time, and, crucially, not drinking alcohol except in moderation. If it comes to it, it will be none at all.

Consider this both an apology and an introduction. Thank you all.

Edit: This was an unfinished thought. I get distracted by everything, which proves my point. Both conditions have similar problems with short-term memory. Shelby struggles to remember what he's done post the trauma incident, and I have to remember to take medication, eat, relax and even breathe properly. I don't mean I'll die. Just as people in a chokehold say they can't breathe (when what they really mean is they're frightened) I and others like me feel similarly about basic everyday stuff. I have to leave clues (photos videos, notes) much like the film's character, to remember to calm down, how to calm down, when to calm down, why to calm down. This is stuff I shouldn't have to think about, right? And that's just one tiny aspect.

Mental illness is, to casual observers, noisy and disturbing. If I've ever pissed you off at a gig, and I know I sometimes have, this was either through bipolar, or other stuff (alcohol) that I was taking to try to control the noise inside me bursting out. It was a fools errand, of course, as many of you have witnessed. It's not always the time, sometimes I was just being the twat I am, but it is usually. We all have our own problems, I just thought this might help both you and me and mine to remember.

[image: Memento by Christopher Nolan Poster]

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