By: Alan Monnelly Bipolar disorder is a complex yet manageable condition. It is a condition that affects moods, emotions, and energies and can be challenging in many ways. A person with bipolar can lead a normal and healthy life but it takes work and knowledge to...
World Bipolar Day Campaign Submissions are now closed. Thank you so much to everyone who participated. You can still get involved by sharing your story and using the hashtag #BipolarTogether!
By: Steven W. Wilson It arrived out of nowhere. Like a cloud opening, engulfing me in fluffy white nothingness. Descending from above and swallowing me whole. The year: 1958. I was a fourth grader residing in Delaware, Ohio. Overnight I tumbled from a life filled with...
By: Sam Bowman For many, living with bipolar disorder can feel like a rollercoaster ride of ups and downs, ins and outs. People who have the disorder experience extreme mood shifts, taking them from extreme highs down to extreme lows. These changes in mood can greatly...
April 3rd, at 2:00 PM PT Register for the free webinar with Dr. Manpreet Singh here. Recent research in bipolar disorder has been geared towards using neuroscience tools to develop an understanding of how symptoms emerge and continue, and how treatment might alleviate...
Author: Gregg F. Martin Ph.D. Each of us will know someone with a mental condition – family, friend, neighbor, colleague, or self, as more than 60 million of us are afflicted, or one in five Americans. Encourage them to get medical help and treatment. Untreated,...
Author: Natalia A. Beiser I counter negativity about mental illness by acquiring and displaying survival skills. I do not let having bipolar disorder hold me back from completing anything. I strive to be a great example of how to live with mental illness. I was a...
Social media has become a powerful tool for connecting with friends and building a sense of community. Though, social media usage can have both positive and negative effects on mental health. On one hand, social media can provide a platform for people to connect and...
One click. One share. One like on social media can send an individual into a spiral of spinning anxiety over their body, actions, and words. The damage social platforms cause to the minds and hearts of teenagers across the world is devastating and detrimental to the...
Mental health plays a very big role in everyone’s life. There are some people who have theirs in mint condition and appear to be well put together, and there are others who cannot bear to go on with their lives anymore. In my 17 years of being on this earth, I...
By: Gregg F. Martin Ph.D. Suicide is one of the most misunderstood and stigmatized of human experiences. We need a call to arms, not in the sense of weapons, but rather with people working together. Most suicides result from a combination of two things: a mental...
By: Jake Being enrolled in college while having bipolar disorder can be a tough task. College is an exciting time for many, as it marks the beginning of a new chapter of life. However, when dealing with a mental illness this time period can be very stressful. The good...
By: Cassandra Stout There’s something about a fresh start that creates the desire to tweak your life. And a new year is a fresh start. Why not resolve to practice more self-care each month in the coming year? Here’s my 12-month calendar of self-care tips to try. Most...
This trajectory of trauma hit its peak in January 2022. An ill-informed rocket ship that took flight against my will, needing so many prescribed pills this was not a thrill and I didn’t try to kill myself yet myself went missing because this body would shake and shake...
By: Sam Bowman Emotional support animals (ESAs) are more popular than ever. As of 2019, the National Service Animal Registry had nearly 200,000 support and service animals listed — up from just 2,400 in 2011. While some animals are used to help people with...
by Melinda Goedeke A woman and her child sit tightly together in their stranded car hoping and praying help is on its way. Snowflake after snowflake rapidly envelopes the car until it cannot move at all. Nearly out of gas, the car remains off, and they snuggle trying...
For anyone who has suffered depression in the winter months, I feel you. A few years ago, before I recognized the pattern of my depressive episodes, I sunk deep into a pit of despair every January. It was like clockwork. First, I’d be hypomanic–eager and...
By: Sam Bowman Mania is challenging to deal with on its own. Add impulsive spending to those manic episodes, and you’ve got an additional layer of difficulty to overcome. Grounding yourself after an episode and finding out you’ve spent all of your savings on trinkets...
The orange crayon made the setting sun possible as he held on to the string taking him upwards attached to the rays attached to the orange balloon that was made possible by the birth of creativity, outside the lines as the string swayed as chaos ensued as the orange...
Dear 16-Year-Old Sophia, You will have made it. You will have made it with flying colors and will be proud to represent the rainbow flag. You will have made it with your dream of being a unique, talented, and published poet come true with your book three masterpieces!...
As the last American soldier stepped aboard a C-17 cargo plane in Kabul in September 2021 and became the last soldier to leave Afghanistan, my inbox was filling up with messages of despair from Afghan war veterans. They were witnessing a disastrous end to the war for...
By: Margaret Fitzgerald I was a moody, undiagnosed, anxious bipolar child that self-soothed with food. I was always ten pounds overweight, and my parents catastrophized it. So many weight loss tactics were tried. One diet included eating only carbs until noon and then...
By: Sam Bowman Living with bipolar disorder can negatively impact many areas of life. It can be especially problematic, however, when you’re trying to hold down a traditional job or expand your professional network. However, as long as you’re willing to put in the...
Bipolar disorder can strike anyone, regardless of gender, race, education, or class, from pre-teens into our sixties. It is an equal opportunity disorder and can, at its worst, destroy lives and health, marriages and families, careers, friendships, finances, and more....
By: Melinda Goedeke Spying on a lobster the size of my leg while gently swaying back and forth 70 ft. below the sea is both exhilarating and meditative for me. I even secretly like the anxiety of knowing that with each breath my oxygen is depleting. I swim swiftly...
By Natalia A. Beiser Please note: These are Natalia’s experiences with Lithium and Dialysis. Not every patient will share the same experiences. I have now been on dialysis for one year and two months. The psychiatrist and I have had the Lithium dosage at a level that...
By: Cassandra Stout As a social lubricant, alcohol takes top billing. But if you have a mental illness like bipolar disorder, alcohol and other substances tend to tank your mental health. I’m not going to lie: alcohol temporarily helps decrease the suffering that...
Actors, Institutions, and Networks My recovery could not happen without myriad actors, institutions, and networks among those actors and institutions. When I wasn’t enough, my family saved me. When family wasn’t enough, friends helped out. When friends did all they...
By: Chris Chambers It can feel like Bipolar Disorder alters who we are. After all, it changes thinking, emotions and behavior. We typically view who a person is based on those qualities. Believe it or not, our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors are not who we...
She is asking me to wish upon something I cannot see, to believe in there is another side and a way out, but light pollution and pollution of light; yearning for my eyes to ignite with the sheer amount of power from the hands waving the countless neon glow sticks (at...
By: Sophia Falco He resurfaced as I was drowning at the park, dragging me down further on such a pristine day: children running about, playing hide -and-seek, laughing, groomed dogs barking, chasing muddy tennis balls and some not muddy yet I tried to seek refuge away...
Screen print art is used with permission of Conor Martin Part III of V: dealing with depression and psychosis After resigning from command of NDU, I spiraled then crashed into a depression that was increasingly characterized by diminished energy, hopelessness,...
By Margaret Fitzgerald After my initial manic episode at eighteen, my friends were making purchases for their dorm rooms and packing up for far away colleges. I was chronically depressed, which often happens after coming down from a manic episode. Friends were saying...
By: Stanley Clark Life-threatening conditions like cancer can affect more than just a victim’s physical well-being. For example, a study showed that 32% of cancer patients may experience one or more diagnosed mental health conditions, including anxiety and mood...
By: Sam Bowman Struggling With Time, Energy, and Relationships The most prominent symptoms of bipolar disorder are the highs and lows you can feel at any given time. Going through episodes of mania and depression can take a toll on your mental, emotional, and physical...
June 19, 2022 Dear Dad, This Father’s Day I want to celebrate your role in my life. Especially how you helped me through my bipolar diagnosis and functional recovery. Three years before I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, you shared some wisdom with me that...
By Melinda Goedeke I laugh sarcastically every time I watch a commercial about medication for the treatment of bipolar disorder. Unkempt young men and women are shown in dark, depressing places with vacuous eyes and downtrodden faces until they take the miracle...
Formerly known as “manic depressive illness,” bipolar disorder is a term that, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), comprises a cluster of related disorders that are characterized by distinctive and extreme shifts, or...
By: Trevor Simonson If you are anything like me, you struggle for consistency. My life runs in peaks and valleys. So many valleys. A never-ending game flirting with progress, but always feeling like I am back at square one. Square one. It isn’t real. We are always...
Part I: “You’ve done an amazing job…Resign or you’re fired…You need to go get a mental health exam.” It was mid-July 2014. I was 58 years old and after more than three decades in the Army, I was a two-star general and President of the National Defense University...
By: Chris Chambers Lately, I’ve been writing solely about my Bipolar Disorder. In reality, Bipolar is only part of the picture for me. My nervous system is very challenged. In addition to Bipolar Disorder I am living with cPTSD, in recovery from eating disorder, and...
By: Cassandra Stout It seems everyone and their mother is traveling these days. And that includes those of us with mental illnesses. For those of us living with mental health conditions, especially bipolar disorder, breaking from our usual routine can have disastrous...
By: Christina Broderick My childhood was what I considered entirely normal. As a kid I had a great family, nice friends, performed well at school and participated in extra-curricular activities, becoming highly involved in sports during my teenage years. College began...
By: Neil Mccarthy The brief—but fictional—scenes in this piece show the bias with which people with bipolar (or any mental illness) can be treated. With some luck, maybe we can evolve into a new way of treating people who are already suffering. — The Director of the...
How to Make a Dopamenu to Give Your Brain the Stimulation it Needs Have you ever found yourself doom scrolling the internet, desperately seeking stimulation for your depressed brain but being too tired to think of a healthy way to do that? When we’re depressed, our...
By: Neil Mccarthy The brief—but fictional—scenes in this piece show the bias with which people with bipolar (or any mental illness) can be treated. With some luck, maybe we can evolve into a new way of treating people who are already suffering. — The Director of...
Author: Christina Chambers The nervous system is so incredibly complex. I often think of it as the ocean of the body – we have really only just begun to uncover portions of what exists. The effect of psychiatric medications on the nervous system is no exception. It...
by Melinda Goedeke I’m often asked whether or not I saw the signs. What I hear in that question is blame and responsibility; assignment of fault. I didn’t see the signs because there weren’t many to see; I saw Laura – my delightful, radiant, and complicated...
by Melinda Goedeke I’m often asked whether or not I saw the signs. What I hear in that question is blame and responsibility; assignment of fault. I didn’t see the signs because there weren’t many to see; I saw Laura – my delightful, radiant, and complicated...
