Slowly, he put the newspaper down on his lap (to stall for time, I’m sure). “No, darling. You were a, uh, delightful surprise.”

Hmmm. Even at the tender age of 6 my olfactory system was developed enough to smell a fish.

There is a 10-year age difference between my sister and me and 7 years between my brother and me. Because of that, I’m fairly confident the conversation the night of my conception did not go like this: “Ken! Send the kids to the neighbors, light the candles and hurry — I’m ovulating!”

God has a sense of humor. Out of all the ovaries in the world kickin’ it at that moment, he picked hers. Since she already had two perfectly healthy, perfectly normal kids, to have made a third would have been just plain dull. So He decided to toss a little fun into the mix. And fun I am.

I fought the good fight — roughly 22 hours’ worth — but inevitably the world, and the mom, won. I came out talking, spanked the doctor and promptly asked for a glass of chardonnay.

Our mother was a brilliant woman, a professional model, and did invaluable work advocating for handicapped children. She was also tormented by, among other issues, bipolar disorder (or manic depression, as it was commonly referred to back then).

It’s fair to say I copped a few of her genes during my transition from embryo to baby. Believe me, some of my character traits I’d rather have left in the womb, but like it or not, these lemons are mine, all mine.

While a depression does not define me, my bipolarity often does. I didn’t get a choice about having my disorder but I do own a (regifted) lemon squeezer. And as trite as it sounds, this lemons-into-lemonade thing, it helps me to take my power back and visualize just a few of my symptoms “small.”

Lemon: Agitated, interrupted sleep
Lemonade: I might pray, eat, write, eat, watch recorded episodes of The Ellen Show or eat. (OK, I’m working on the last one). Nearly all the time I will fall back to sleep, but not until 6 or 7 a.m. Sleep is so critical to me that I chose to work a job that started later.

Huge Lemon: Medication-induced weight gain
Lemonade: Purchased stock in a plus-size clothing manufacturer and, knowing I would set myself up for failure by overcommitting, I started with 3 walks a week and 2 glasses of water a day. (I’m not a big fan of the clear stuff). Any day – any time, that’s all I ask of myself.

Lemon: Shame
Lemonade: I must be authentic with those people that it is safe to do so. I’ve leapt first and worried about growing my wings later. I knew that the isolation of keeping my secret was too high a price to pay. I’ve lived much of my life in shame’s toxic shadow and I fight like a screaming banshee to shake it off. It is not easy to be open about bipolar disorder. It is not easy at all. But it gives the disease a much-needed face.

Lemon: Self-medicating
Lemonade: There’s no getting around this one. Nothing in great excess — and nothing in particular — but if I can calm myself down with some magic something, I’m gonna do it. So it’s 12 steps or I’m a dead woman walking.

Lemon: Perimenopause and bipolar??
Lemonade: I got nothin’ on this one.

On more than one occasion, it’s been pointed out that I “present” well. This psychological jargon translates into: me, looking just fine. By some unconscious effort, perhaps I do act in that manner. Still, no Oscar, or the riches that accompany it, arrives in my mail box. Go figure. Indeed, I am in grand shape. This is the only shape that I know. The nickname “Sunshine” found me some years ago and from my vantage point, my glass really is perpetually half full. I suppose it stands to reason, though, that it must therefore be partially empty. I generally resist that notion whenever I can.

I am aware I have not showered and my hair loudly announces that fact. As he looks through my folder and chats, I glance down at my too-tight navy sweat pants that I vaguely recall dressing in. Under other circumstances, I might be embarrassed by my appearance. But I care more about how soon I can get home and go back to the safety of my bed than what he might think of my fashion sense.

I do not have the energy to be engaged in conversation today. He sounds a little like that teacher in Charlie Brown TV specials…

Blah blah blah blah Bipolar Blah blah blah blah.

Pause.

He talks more but despite my herculean efforts to focus, I hear still just one word. Bipolar.

Is that all? What a relief.

I have nothing against open-minded bears willing to experiment!

A lifelong, mental illness? Oh, I see.

An exquisitely framed Harvard medical degree hangs on the wall across from my safe place on his couch. I am still and numb. Surely this well-intentioned professional, whom I have known for over 10 years, has to exercise a medical/therapeutic muscle now and again. Anyhow, everyone’s entitled to an off day and he is surely having one.

Still stunned, I sit in my car in the CVS parking lot. Unfolding, unfolding, unfolding the impossibly tiny paper insert. (Is there a warehouse in some Third World country where exhausted, undercompensated women sit and fold these tissue paper pamphlets for 18 hours a day?) I don’t know what I’m looking for but I am determined to become an informed and educated patient. I am on a mission to prove off-day-doc wrong. I am also searching for some comfort hidden between the chemical makeup diagrams and the usual “do not take if you are nursing” warnings (I checked. I am pretty sure that is not a problem). Somewhere in all the medical jargon, it will say “Les, this medication is not for you.”

After much eyestrain studying print a dust mite couldn’t make out, I am now enlightened to be on the lookout for a potentially deadly rash. I go back into CVS and grab a tube of hydrocortisone cream. Just in case. As I drive away, I imagine other commuters swerving and spinning; their cars out of control – blinded by my new scarlet letter – by the words emblazoned across my forehead….Crazy Chick.

Many months later, clarity began to arrive like dissipating fog from a steamy mirror. Like any loss (and in my view, a loss of somehow being “normal”) one is dragged, kicking and screaming, through all the stages of grief.

Shock and Denial: Dr. Off- Day is a flake.
Anger: I’m suing.
Bargaining: Dear God, I promise to quit swearing and taking packets of Equal from work.
Depression: Now that’s funny.
Acceptance: I’m at peace. OK Really? Not so much.

It took an excruciating year for me to find my crayons and connect a few dots, making even the loosest connection with my diagnosis. After my Crayola moment, I ferociously took on the timely and often expensive task of educating myself. I am now versed on everything from Bipolar I to Bipolar II to, thank God for my position on the BP spectrum, what’s sometimes referred to as “soft” bipolar. I like this fluffed-up term they use for “a little bipolar.”

Scholarly as I was, it took even longer to utter the words to anybody outside of my doc’s office walls.

Like a nervous teenager, pre-date, practicing in front of the mirror I stood…

“I’m Bi-Polar”
“I’m Bipolar”
“Hi! I’m Bi-polar”
“Nice to meet you, I’m Bi-polar”

I have found, and continue to find, that much of what makes me up – what characteristics I have are connected to bipolar disorder. And you know what? I like many of them. I just don’t know one thing, though: What in the world will I write on my Match.com profile?