Bipolar Disorder - An Easy to Understand Explanation of This Common Mental Illness

Bipolar Disorder

Bipolar is a real, tangible disorder. It is as real as diabetes or MS. It affects symptoms, behaviors, and moods. Side effects of this illness are just as deadly as untreated heart disease. It is playing with Russian roulette with an invisible gun.

Bipolar (BP), a mood disorder, is a mixture of depression and mania. Dependant on the specific type of BP , the person with the illness can spend a variable amount of time in each state. A 'typical' BP affect person spends 3 months in darkness, then 3 months in light. It is a complete array of mood and emotion, this disorder and those who are affected by it.

Like an Alaskan season, the darkness does not end for long periods. In the dark periods, depression is a close dear friend. Depression can show many faces from suicidal ideologies and idealization, self medicating with drugs and alcohol, antisocial behaviors, changes in eating and sleeping habits, and helplessness coupled with hopelessness. Energy levels drop. BP people do not want to leave the house, they lose pleasure in things that they used to adore, they sleep for endless hours but do not get joy from it. It is difficult for them to see the light at the end of the tunnel. They romanticize death and the benefits of 'ending it all', thinking it noble or better for those around them. They plot and plan suicide. Many carry it out. A percentage of 1 in 5 succeeds. In 'normal' populations, that rate is MUCH lower.

When the page turns and mania creeps in, the mood lightens. At first, it is a pleasant and refreshing change. Gone are the daydreams of guns and car crashing, replaced feelings with optimisms and expression. Delusions of Grandeur can manifest in manic phases. High energy, self-confidence, and sexual intensity return. The BP person feels like they can do it all! Sound great? Not so much. Because concentration is interrupted by the need to move, the need to go and do, seldom do projects or ideas see completion.