The Flamingo Diaries
Sinéad O’Connor. Isaac Newton. Winston Churchill. Ernest Hemingway. And my sister, Loren Jackson. Besides being hugely talented, what these people had in common was bipolar, a severe mental illness characterised by significant and sometimes extreme changes in mood and energy. Take my beloved sister, for example, who was diagnosed in 2017 and took her own life in 2022. Like many people with bipolar, Loren experienced periods of deep depression and times when she was incredibly energetic and creative.
Loren was diagnosed at the same time that my husband, Graham, was told he had terminal lung cancer, so I simply didn’t have time to research her illness, as I was so busy supporting him. In 2022, after Graham had died and when my father began showing signs of dementia, it became apparent my sister was growing increasingly unwell. I got as far as asking my friend Sarah Owen to send me the updated version of her brilliant book, Bipolar Disorder:TheUltimate Guide,but didn’t find time to read it, as I was so caught up in caring for Dad.
When someone takes their own life, the first question loved ones ask is, ‘Could I have done something to prevent it?’ In my case, I can’t help feeling the answer is yes. If I’d done my research, I might have known people with bipolar are 20 times more likely to take their own life and I might have been able to get my sister the expert help she needed. But the groundhog-day routine of making sure my dad wasn’t neglected by his carers meant I didn’t find that time. And then, one day, my sister was gone.
Even now, I haven’t had time to process her death, because Dad died three months later. So when Sarah told me about the charity Bipolar UK’s Pole to Pole Challenge, I jumped at the chance to take part. I loved the concept of Pole to Pole, which involves covering 20,004km, the distance between the North and South Pole, with every participant adding the distance they run to the total. Sarah and I chose to run 9.5km – a figure the charity suggests because it represents the average number of years it takes for someone to get a diagnosis of bipolar.
