What is bipolar disorder? ( psychotic symptoms and treatments )

What is bipolar disorder?

Bipolar disorder isn't a personality trait, its a mood disorder. The only way you will know is by seeing someone qualified to diagnose you. If you have bipolar disorder chances are anyone in close contact with you will recognize something is off. They may dismiss it or think it's something else, but will notice changes in your behavior. Bipolar one disorder involves symptoms of us
a(hypersexuality,recklessness,racing thoughts,only needing a few hours of rest a night, more goal directed activity, being more talkative, grandiosity, and being more physically active or having difficulty sitting still). Along with this you may experience depressive episodes(I'm not bothered to list symptoms). In bipolar two you will experience a less severe form of mania called hypomania, and depressive episodes. Hypomania doesn't cause as much problems as mania, and will never have psychosis. If you have had a manic episode everyone in a mile radius will have noticed and you will have likely be put in a psyche ward or jail. In bipolar one you may have psychosis (hallucinations, delusions, disorganized thought or behavior), in bipolar two disorder you will never have psychosis. People with bipolar two disorder will experience most of the time depressed and rarely have hypomanic episodes. These episodes usually last a few days to several months, although there is a rare form of bipolar disorder when a person can go from one extreme to another multiple times a day. Chances are, you don't have bipolar disorder. People with bipolar disorder usually have a family history of bipolar disorder or other mental health issues. Around 2 to 4 percent of people have either form of bipolar disorder.

What does it feel like to have bipolar disorder?

Imagine you’re getting ready to go on a night out. You can’t decide what to wear so you try on every item of clothing you own. You’re in such a rush and getting so frustrated that you literally tear the clothes off your body and discard them on the floor, bed, any surface in the room. You are not worried that you’re ruining every item of clothing you own because this is exactly the right thing you should be doing right now. You leave your bedroom an absolute state. Clothes, make up spillages, products scattered everywhere. Litterally everything you own is scattered across the room. Total devastation. But you don’t care, you leave to go to the club and have a great night.

The next morning you wake up, head banging, vomit on the floor. You’ve slept on the sofa because your bed was so covered in the mess you couldn’t get into it. Your hangover is so awful that you can’t move from the sofa even to get a glass of water. Your body is in pain, you feel you will throw up at any minute, the worst headache in history. It’s so bad you think this hangover might actually kill me please please let it be over. You remember all the embarrassing, awful things you did last night. You are filled with shame. You will never be able to show your face in public again you are so embarrassed.

When you are finally feeling well enough to move to your bed you see the utter devastation you left in your bedroom last night. How on earth are you ever going to put it back together.

Except the frantic craze of getting ready was a month long sleepless episode where you’re running round in a rush of euphoria. You’re delusional, do dangerous things, your mind is rushing so fast your body can’t keep up.

The hangover is a six month period where you sleep 20 hours a day. If you brush your teeth you’ve had a good day, leaving the house or maintaing a job is impossible, and all your friends have deserted you because of the terrible way you treated them when you were manic. Life is so pointless, dark and despairing that you want to die. But you don’t have enough energy to get out of bed let alone to kill yourself.

When the darkness finally lifts, the devastation left from getting ready for the night out is your life. The ripped clothes on the floor are broken relationships. The make up stains are the regrets, anger at yourself, and damage to yourself that you will stay with you forever. The products scattered on every surface are the the bills piled up on your kitchen table. You’re finally well enough to have some kind of normality.

Can you fight bipolar disorder without medication?

Short answer: YES, but you'll suffer unnecessarily.

You'll grapple with depression and suicide with nothing to alleviate your brain chemicals to get you to a point where you can function despite the emotional pain. You'll fly high and freefall with mania or hypomania with nothing to help your brain calm down enough to get you to point where you can stop and think straight before you do risky, damaging, and hurtful things to yourself and those closest to you.

There's a reason people with bipolar get hospitalized and a percentage of them die of suicide: it. can't. be. handled. alone.

If you have issues with the medication, that's alright and perfectly fine. It means you care. But you have to speak to a psychiatrist about these issues so they can help you find the best treatment for you. For most people with Bipolar, it's mood stabilizers to prevent or at least lessen the intensity of the dangerous highs and lows; antidepressants to aid you with depression when it strikes; and psychotherapy or talk therapy to help you detect your own early markers of mania and depression, discover triggers as well as stressors that exacerbate mania/hypomania and depression, develop coping strategies, and address underlying issues that contribute to your condition or prevent you from finding stability. Depending on additional factors such as severity and frequency of episodes, additional symptoms, etc., the psychiatrist may also recommend antipsychotics and anxiolytics.

A truly holistic approach to bipolar treatment would include lifestyle changes alongside medication and psychotherapy. Exercise and physical activity helps lower the severity of depression, and mindfulness and meditation can help lower the severity of mania and hypomania. Diet is also crucial; what we eat affects our moods. Having a regular routine also puts you in a space where you can function by force of habit despite your high and low episodes. Translated, this means you can still work or care for your kids or go to school even if you're dragging your feet to get to where you need to go. Otherwise, depression or mania can make you drop the ball on one or many things, and that can destabilize your home, work, school, or personal life. A regular routine also means getting a fixed sleep schedule. You can afford to break it one night but too many nights in a row can destabilize and hurt your mood. You need quality sleep so your brain can rest.

But again, these lifestyle changes — on their own — are not enough. Without medication and psychotherapy, you're like driving a tricyle with just one wheel. It's gonna be a slow process with nothing to help you with the dangerous highs and lows and no one to help you structure and guide your treatment.

Again, don't make it unnecessarily hard for yourself and your loved ones by refusing to see a psychiatrist and taking meds. Big pharmaceuticals do unethical things, but you don't have to suffer your next depressive episode just to stick it to them. What does one bipolar suicide mean to them? Nothing! And if it's side effects you worry about, that's understandable. Your psychiatrist would understand, and if they're good, they'll work with you to find a medication that's best for you.

Finally, have a healthy mindset when it comes to medication. They're not there to solve your problems for you. They're just there to help you function despite the depression and mania, so that you're strong enough to fight the darkness when depression drowns you in pain and apathy, and stay grounded when mania threatens to drive you to extremes. It's hard to do it without meds but you also can't rely on meds alone.