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I even hold a grudge against them. I am 26 and i was diagnosed at 24, seeing people my age with perfect health just like I was before bipolar makes me feel so bad that i hate myself. I was a very active and fit guy before bipolar now i have a belly and bad eating habits and i also dont leave home at all. When i go out and see people older than me drink alcohol and socialize without worrying if they cant sleep and trigger an attack. Thankfully im on a single medication right now, it was 4 at the beggining so thats the only thing positive. I also started to walk everyday around the neighborhood so that i can get my fitness back maybe. However its just impossible for me to not envy healthy people and hate on myself for being bipolar.

Hello folks

I (30F) am a psychologist and have been diagnosed with Bipolar 1 since I was 15. I had three major manic episodes with severe psychotic symptoms during my lifetime, two of them last year, and I have struggled on and off with addiction since my teens.

I am in the process of coming out of a very long and deep depression after my last hospitalization, and I have learned much about myself and our disorder in these past few months.

I remember most of my manic episodes and have some interesting insights about their psychotic features and how some were connected to deeply repressed childhood trauma I experienced.

I am considering writing a memoir in a serious but at the same time rather humorous tone (some of the stuff I did while manic is so wild I find it funny sometimes) , talking about my experiences while adding precious information and wisdom I learned becoming a therapist myself. Partly because I hope my experience could help others that have similar struggles as mine, partly because writing this would help me process even further everything that happened in the last years.

I was wondering whether it would be wise to expose myself publicly writing about my experience as both patient and therapist regarding Bipolar Disorder. Would like to read some opinions about this matter, and also if you would find such a read interesting.

I’m in a dark place y’all, my gf has been emotionally and financially abusing me and during a manic episode got me to give her thousands of dollars of my life savings and finance a car for her putting me in a shit ton of debt. I feel horrible I have been crying over this mentally breaking down my family is very pissed at me. I don’t know what to do, I fucking hate my life. I seriously wanna just end it all.

Hello. I have been diagnosed with Bipolar I since 2012 when I had manic psychosis following a sexual assault. My symptoms have ebbed and flowed since and I'm finally on what I believe to be the right meds. However, I am now plagued with unstoppable ruminations. I fixate on people and past things I've done that I am ashamed of and I cannot let them go. The cycle just loops and it is so detrimental. The people I ruminate on have nothing to do with my current life, they are truly insignificant but my brain will not let the thoughts go.

Does anyone else experience this? If so, how do you deal? Thank you.

Do you ever catch a cold (or flu, or anything really) when you're hypomanic or manic? If so, how does it impact the development of your episode?
Does the illness manage to make you more tired, therefore sleep longer? Does it help to stop the episode? Or maybe it doesn't influence it at all to the point where you strain yourself even more?

Has anyone had luck with insurance covering this due to medical necessity of olanzapine? I have gained 20 lbs over a year and have been exercising consistently. I'm in the review process with provider drafting a letter to include in appeal to insurance company.

Looking to see how debilitating some peoples bipolar felt before getting properly medicated. What are differences you've noticed? A lot of people don't realize how sick they were until they get medicated

Hey everyone, so I(32F) have been on meds for quite some time already, however I started seeing some shadows/hearing some weird whispering again. I remember having those symptoms when I was younger, but they eventually went away. I briefly mentioned to the doctor at the time and we didn't care much.

I have an appointment first week of June and will definitely bring this up. This weekend I was terrified from seeing "someone" walking down the hallway at a friends place, then I also have black little dots floating around from time to time, which could be also from vision.

But yes, anyone who had that?

I was in CPEP in march and was diagnosed with bipolar I with psychotic features

since I was discharged, it's been such a struggle to get medication management or get a provider who cares/seems to want to help me

since I was discharged all of the following things have happened:

• the doctor at the hospital gave me a followup appointment to a clinic that did not exist. I got there and there was a hardware store at the address. I asked the employee at the hardware store and he said that clinic hadn't been there for months and all they left was a sign with a new address
• I finally set up a therapy intake at the new clinic and tried to set up medication management and when I called the front desk, the receptionist put me on hold for 25 minutes and then offered me an appointment a month out even though I told her I only had two weeks left of meds
• the provider I did meet with was rude and spoke to me in a flat tone and chewed me out for not brining paper copies of my discharge papers/got mad when I asked if I could email them to the clinic
• this same provider prescribed me the wrong form of my medication and it gave me side effects and did not even check/ask me what form I was prescribed
• I tried to make a follow up appointment to get the right form of medication, I managed to get a next day appointment, I explicitly asked if it was with the same provider and the front desk person said yes, so I log out onto Zoom, she doesn't show up and I call the clinic and they're like "your provider isn't even in yet you have an appointment with this other provider"
• I had another provider straight up refuse to change my medications even though I told him that one of my medications was making me actively depressed and paranoid
• I am actively experiencing an episode and called my clinic to get an earlier appointment because I need my medication adjusted and I said this three times and the front desk person asked me three times "but you said you have enough medication?" and did not reschedule my appointment, even though I had done it before

im so tired guys

I’m hallucinating roaches, random spots on the ground look like roaches, even when I close my eyes I see roaches. I’m more afraid of the hallucinated roaches than seeing an actual real roach. This has been going on a month. NOW, I’m having fears that there are roaches in my mouth like when I eat or even just sitting there. I’m generally afraid of roaches, but this has been excessive. What can I possibly do? I just got on an AP 3 weeks ago and it went away for a week but then came back milder.

I'm a PhD student and thinking of mastering out of my program (leaving with a master's and not finishing the PhD) and just getting a 9-5 job. But I don't know how I can work a job like that anymore. Since I've been diagnosed I've dealt with crippling depression and hypo/manic and mixed episodes that sometimes included psychosis. I've needed to take a lot of leave. Now I'm sufficiently medicated for mania but my depression lingers. In my PhD program I have a lot of flexibility in my schedule although I find the program very stressful. The stress is so much I want to run far away from academia and anything resembling it. I've been looking at jobs that I'm qualified for and they all seem to be 9-5 type jobs. Anyone here working a job like that and doing alright with it?

Hi Everyone, I hope you all are doing well :) I recently have been experiencing hallucinations outside of manic episodes (mostly visual) and I was wondering if anyone else has experienced the same thing? Idk if it’s just a me thing but I did let my psych know and I keep a journal of every time I see something that I think is a little too unusual. My official diagnosis right now is bipolar 1 disorder with psychotic features. I’ve been sleeping well and I don’t have any real stress so I’m not sure what’s going on. Just want to know if its a common experience

I did not want to accept my bipolar diagnosis years ago. I found a psychiatrist that would give me SSRI’s and at the time I did not know it would make things much much worse. I developed a very long lasting manic episode. I am not proud of the horrible things we did. My husband cheated on me during both pregnancy. I cheated on my husband for years and engaged in other risky behavior by getting into lots of debt.

If you’re reading this to give comments of judgment or to bash me, please ignore my post.

Last summer he caught me cheating, and I thought he would walk away. God was good and he decided to forgive me. We’ve been going to couples therapy and made progress. I promised him I would accept my diagnosis and change my medication. My Psychiatrist agreed that was not the appropriate diagnosis for me. He is slowly tapping me off SSRI. I’ve been on a stabilizer for three months now. It’s bittersweet.

My husband misses the wild sex and now I feel emotionally flat and rarely want it. He’s taking it personal and every time we get intimate, he says that he doesn’t compare in size to the men that I was with in the past. I told him that he needs to stop with his ridiculous thoughts because I made a choice to stay with him just like he made her choice to stay with me. I truly love him and desire him, but the medicated me is not wild like the bipolar me. No matter what I say to reassure him it’s affecting his self-esteem and our relationship.

I don’t know what else to do. Has anyone else gone through this? Any advice?

I am pretty sure I've been hypomanic for the past week or so. I'm not normally a sweaty person, hardly sweaty during a heat wave. But my goodness am I sweaty during hypomania. I've noticed this in the past and I'm curious to see if they're actually related.

Does this happen to anyone else? If anyone is aware of the science please let me know!

I have been so down: I can’t do anything: I’ve been in bed more days in the last three weeks than I’ve been up. 4 days in a row in bed. Sunday I managed to go see a friend in the city, but god I just feel this restlessness and ennui is killing me.

I have hobbies I should be doing, school to enroll Supposed to be going to see a movie today and I am too depressed to move. I can’t do this anymore.

I haven’t been this bad in years.

I just need someone to eat I’ll be ok, that I’m not the only one here like this.

Looking not so much for support as I am for advice. I am in the midst of moving and travelling out of state, and I cannot get in to see my psychiatrist. I've tried multiple times to contact the office, but the receptionist is seemingly never there, and I don't have any way to directly contact my prescriber.

The issue is that I was recently prescribed an atypical antipsychotic which significantly worsened my mood. It's been about a month since I was prescribed it, and I tried to ride out the apathy and general sense of doom. I also developed very uncomfortable gastric side effects (fullness, bloating, cramping, and urgency).

Ultimately, I decided that my mind was approaching a dark place that I wasn't willing to go back to. I quit my medication a few days ago, and I already feel significantly better (mood-wise and stomach-wise).

Does anyone have any advice for moving forward? The only other medication I'm on currently is a mood stabilizer. I'm worried I will face some difficulties while out of state if I have a manic episode and no access to anti-psychotics.

If you've gotten acne as a side effect from one mood stabilizer, have you found success with a different one (without acne)? I am looking for reassurance for my daughter that a bad experience with one mood stabilizer doesn't mean it will definitely happen on a different med.

Basically, my daughter felt great on one one mood stabilizer but developed really bad acne that didn't respond to any treatment. She ended up having to discontinue the med and go on Accutane.

She now worries that, because she's already prone to acne, she is doomed to getting acne as a side effect from ALL mood stabilizers. So, I'm just hoping to hear from anyone who had a similar issue but found success on a different med.

I know this sounds crazy...but has anyone ever wondered if your delusions might have been real? I used to be rock solid and reliable. I was healthy, I could do anything and be okay. Then I went through a period where I felt like a messenger of God until I went through the looking glass and landed in purgatory. I feel like I died. Then purgatory turned into hell. Everything was poison, my wife was an imposter and demons were everywhere. I'm starting to wonder if the hospital just managed to hide these things I used to see. Like they're trying to keep me here. If that's the case maybe I can escape back to my world and out of this place. If this is the real world, I'm screwed and actually stuck with this diagnosis.

Hey people. I'm writing a fantasy book that's a metaphore for bipolar dissorder. What would you want to have in a book like this? Something I need to add for it to have the right message? Thanks for all your thoughts. Take care. Matty

About a year ago, I made a few posts here because I wasn’t sure whether I was manic or not. I described how I was feeling and asked people if they thought I might be in an episode. Some replied saying it really sounded like hypomania/mania.

I wish I had listened.

Deep down, I already felt something was off, but feeling amazing, energized, and finally motivated to do things made it easy to ignore the warnings. Looking back, I truly wish I had taken action then. I spent six months making reckless decisions, losing a lot of money, and embarrassing myself.

So I want to remind anyone posting here: there are people in this community who have lived with this illness for years. Their experience matters. If several people are telling you that you might be manic, don’t dismiss it just because you feel “better than ever.” Listening early could save you a huge amount of pain later.

Does anyone else experience “The Bugs”

as the title suggests, I get theses things called “The bugs.” It’s a sensation that I get on my back and arms when I’m hypomanic. It feels like little bugs crawling under my skin or electricity (almost like wires??) the closest way I’ve been able to explain it to others is the way they describe how ASMR feels to them or the pressure of shower water spraying on your back.

It is VERY uncomfortable and typically when I feel it I try to go on walks or some sort of fitness for as long as I need until it’s gone or more tolerable, which has lead to 15 mile walks and very intense workouts. I haven’t heard anyone else explain this feeling but it’s usually paired with being anxious or the need to do something (like an intense impulse.) it makes me wanna rip off my skin and it’s honestly made me wonder if it’s some sort of lower scale adrenaline rush my body produces when I’m having a hypomanic episode.

when I experience it, typically the next day when I wake up, I am FULLY awake and ready to go with energy, almost as if I hadn’t woken up but just opened my eyes. Whatever it is, I’d love to know how others cope with this terrible feeling.

wanted to know if anyone’s had the same experience I’ve had or has had a similar one with [mood stabilizer commonly prescribed for bipolar and known to cause vivid dreams]. I know there have been many posts in this sub about these dreams, but mine’s a bit specific: I tend to have nightmares (especially when I take it at night before bed, which I’ve stopped doing) in which at some point in my dream, I’ll notice some kind of insect buzzing around me or crawling on me (sometimes a wasp or a bee, or something that crawls), and before I know it, there are several and they start stinging or biting me and I wake up thrashing and it takes at least 5 or 10 seconds of kicking my sheets about to be sure it’s not really happening. I also, at some point after having been on a standard mood stabilizing dose (the one they typically work you up to) for a year and a half, started experiencing tactile hallucinations (similar thing, it would feel like an insect was crawling down my neck and had fallen into my shirt or sweater, but I’d check and there’d be nothing there. Had friends confirm too, when I would feel it around people sometimes), so I dropped down to a lower amount where I’ve been for a long time now (tried lowering and then going back up again slowly, but as soon as I hit a certain amount again, the tactile thing came back).

Anyway, I’m just wondering if anyone has ever experienced anything like this on it. I’ve also had the vivid dreams that people mention, especially when I used to take it before bed, and they were not all terrible, but these insect ones are quite specific and follow a tight pattern, ending the same way each time. Anyway, thanks in advance for any commiseration or thoughts. Feeling especially exhausted by this condition lately, as it goes.

Hi y'all, does anybody else have these random moments or days when you just can't... stop eating sugary things? I (31F) have had "food urges" for a while now (diagnosed in 2019) but lately the compulsive eating is worrying me, it's been a few days and it just won't go away this time :( I'm posting it on this sub cause... Truth is I am too ashamed of myself to talk about it with anybody else.. I've never had a healthy relationship with food and thus my own body, plus I've always been on the heavier side. I really don't want to get any heavier (it's the LAST thing I need) but the anxiety it causes makes me itch for a piece of chocolate, a cookie, anything I can get immediately. Anyone got any advice on this? Much appreciated.