1976 - Growing Up Bipolar is a disturbing, but darkly humorous and life-affirming mental health memoir by Mark Fleming, a Scottish writer and musician. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in his 20s, this book is heavily reliant on his actual medical case notes as an inpatient and outpatient, but is also set against the wider picture of the chaotic but inspirational post-punk scene of the late-1970s and 1980s in his native Edinburgh. Through an unflinching, unsentimental eye, Fleming takes the reader into bipolar's depths of depression and unnatural highs of mania, and is candid about his experiences of locked psych wards, the debilitating side-effects of potent anti-psychotic drugs, and the wonderful and weird but terrifying places his deluded mind took him to.
The subject of mental health has been described as permanently contemporary, with awareness of vital importance in challenging ongoing misconceptions at a time when one-in-four will have issues at some point, while depression can be a trigger for suicide, still the single biggest killer of males under-45 in Britain. Fleming rolls back the years to a time when mental health was far more heavily stigmatised, his unravelling health a journey into the unknown for himself and his family.
His story focuses on key events before, during, and after his peak bipolar spell (1987-1990). Delving deep into the psyche of a chemically-imbalanced mind, he relives a tragic event during the heatwave of 1976 that left the indelible stain in his adolescence the possibly led to illness in later years. (Mental injuries are cited as a common prompt for bipolar disorder, while the majority of patients are diagnosed in their teens and 20s). He also ponders why lithium treatment was considered the sole antidote to his situation, and why he was left to languish on this potent medication for almost three decades.
Much of the book's timescale overlaps with Grant McPhee's award-winning documentary, Big Gold Dream: The Sound of Young Scotland 1977-1985. So, 1976 - Growing Up Bipolar is so much more than a lurid story about the fallout of mental breakdowns. It is a celebration of the rejuvenating potency of music, at times a vivid celebration of Scotland's electrifying indie and post-punk music and cultural scenes, awash with enthusiastic anecdotes about gigging, songwriting, recording sessions at BBC's Maida Vale studios, and teenage obsessions with sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll. The cathartic impact of John Peel's BBC Radio 1 show and a long-time devotion to Manchester post-punk legends The Fall figure prominently.
Bestselling Edinburgh author Irvine Welsh read an early draft of 1976 - Growing Up Bipolar entitled BrainBomb (named after a song title by cult Newcastle post-punk band Punishment of Luxury). His comment, "It moved like a rocket, and it's mashed my head!" was so apt.
