Finding Balance in an Unbalanced World?

The move is done. My over reactions from my last post have been calmed for a number of weeks. My sister-in-law & brother-in-law have come and gone, along with the bbq/shower.Terry found a job, which is awesome. He's learning web design with a company where a family friend works. She got his resume last Wednesday and started work today. That's a huge weight off our shoulders now, we have income!  Bills will start getting paid again when he starts getting paid. I had my meeting with the EEOC this morning, which was completely nerve-wracking. I'd worked myself into such a state that I could barely answer the ladies questions. Then GreekTown called about the incident where I was one of 7 people stuck in an elevator at their casino for 40 minutes, people including my claustrophobic mother-in-law, and my pregnant, scared of heights sister-in-law. Not to mention my terror of falling to my death. Yeah, my fear is strangely specific. No big deal. In the meantime I've continued reading mental health stuff.

I've actually been reading mostly about emotions. As always my goal is to be off of medicine. Is it possible? I'm not sure at this point, but I've been researching what kinds of emotions are in the "normal" spectrum and what kinds of emotions need to be dealt with as abnormal. This article from psychcentral.com doesn't really have any new information, but it's a great reminder of all the things I forget as I get busy and want to "do it all". This special forced summer break I'm going to spend a lot of time deciding what my "non-negotiable" to do items are. Also, figuring out the routines and the patterns I need to maintain a level of emotional stability. My thought is when I get those things figured out I'll have a much better handle on when things are getting out of control. Hopefully I'll recognize sooner when my patterns are swinging too far away from home base and need less medication and doctors appointments. When I was a kid my mom's patterns were so regimented that I didn't have serious issues, even without medication, until college when all those patterns needed to be held by myself. If I get those patterns back, with all of my new knowledge of bipolar, and my developing knowledge of my needs to be successful, I may be able to live safely, without episodes, minus chemicals & doctors. Time will tell. It's week 1 of new patterns so its way too early to know. Years too early. But it's a nice thought!