How I Put Bipolar Symptoms into Remission

There is a silent language the body speaks—an ancient current that predates intellect and carries truth through sensation, rhythm, and breath.

For years I lived disconnected from that truth, misdiagnosed, misunderstood, and labeled by systems that had no language for the kind of pain I carried. Diagnoses came like prescriptions for an inner world that no one had taken the time to sit inside.

I was labeled with Bipolar II Disorder. These were the words used to describe my symptoms, but they never touched the root of my experience.

No one asked what my body remembered when I stood in silence.

No one asked what I was putting into my body—what chemistry was shaping my brain.

No one asked what my breath revealed when I exhaled decades of held shame.

Through psychotic breaks, spiritual awakenings, and the long, slow alchemy of becoming whole, I have come to understand that I am not simply a patient or a diagnosis.

I am an artist.

I am a creator.

I am a mother.

I am a daughter.

I am a child of God.

And I am also, in many ways, a case study.

Mental health, for all its models and manuals, has often overlooked the body as a site of memory, intuition, and transformation. In much of Western practice, the body becomes a bearer of symptoms. In ancient traditions, the body is understood as an oracle.

Now these two worlds must meet.

In the emerging field of Metabolic Psychiatry, researchers are beginning to explore the deep relationship between metabolism and mental health. Work from clinicians such as Christopher M. Palmer suggests that the roots of many psychiatric conditions may lie in the functioning of the body’s energy systems, particularly within the mitochondria—the structures responsible for producing energy in our cells.

This perspective invites a radical shift: mental illness may not only be a disorder of the mind, but also a disorder of metabolism. If that is true, the body must once again become central to the conversation about healing.

Through somatic breathwork, meditation, sacred stillness, and periods of fasting, I began to listen more closely to the language of my nervous system. I started to realise that the subconscious is not a mystery to be solved, but a frequency to be tuned into—a quiet intelligence that has always been guiding us home.

During this time, I was also searching for relief from deep physical pain in my lower spine. In that search, I came across the Carnivore Diet after simply typing how to decrease inflammation into a search engine.

At the time, my motivation was purely physical. I was desperate to find relief.

But the spine, for me, also carried a deeper symbolism. I began to see it as a reflection of the unsupported child within me—the inner child who had longed for the unconditional love and stability every child deserves.

As I worked with my body through breath, stillness, and nourishment, I started to recognise that healing was not only about addressing symptoms. It was about releasing the stories the body had been holding for years.

Looking back, I can now see that the shifts in my bipolar symptoms had already begun long before I had the language to explain what was happening. I wasn’t consciously trying to treat my mental health—I simply began incorporating intermittent fasting into my daily routine, following what felt natural to my body.

Without realising it, I was also eating in a way that closely resembled what is now called the Carnivore Diet.

This was during my time living in South Africa. It wasn’t a deliberate health strategy—it was simply how we ate. Our meals were rooted in traditional foods: liver, heart, whole cuts of meat, and long barbecues known locally as a braai. Dishes like chicken dust and even cow’s head honoured the whole animal and carried a richness modern diets often lack.

At the time, I had no framework to understand what these changes might mean for my mental health. I was simply living my life. Only years later, through the lens of Metabolic Psychiatry, did I begin to recognise what might have been happening in my body. What once felt like coincidence began to look more like a pattern.

When I later returned to the United Kingdom, my lifestyle and eating patterns gradually changed. I began to regain much of the weight I had previously lost as I adopted the more common dietary habits around me.

Yet something significant had shifted. The symptoms associated with Bipolar II Disorder never returned.

What remained, however, were more subtle residual challenges—periods of anxiety, lingering mental unrest, and persistent physical discomfort, particularly chronic pain in my lower spine.

Over time, I began to question whether these physical and psychological symptoms were connected to the dietary shift I had made. In contrast to the nutrient-dense foods I had eaten before, my diet had moved toward a pattern lower in fat and higher in carbohydrates—a pattern common in many modern Western diets.

Looking back, I believe this transition played a role in the inflammation and physical discomfort I experienced during that period of my life.

It took years of reflection, practice, and experimentation to fully understand what had been happening in my body and mind. By the time I began to explore the principles of Metabolic Psychiatry, I started to see the connections that had been hidden in plain sight: how metabolism, nutrition, and nervous system health all intersect with mental wellbeing.

I realised that my periods of remission were not accidental—they were the natural outcome of aligning my body, nervous system, and environment in ways that supported my brain’s energy systems. My mitochondria, the tiny powerhouses within every cell, had been nourished, and in turn, my mind had stabilised.

Today, as a Healing Artist, I carry this knowledge into my work with the Tribe Frequency Method. My approach is not about repeating my journey for someone else—it is about giving tools and practices that help people listen to their bodies, understand their inner frequencies, and reclaim their wellbeing. Whether through somatic awareness, breathwork, meditation, or mindful nutrition, the body becomes a guide, the nervous system a teacher, and healing a lived experience rather than a concept.

Sharing my story is not about offering a formula or promise—it’s about showing what is possible when we honour the intelligence of our own bodies, and how aligning with that intelligence can transform not only mental health, but our entire relationship with ourselves.