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I suffer from Bipolar 1. It's a real problem even with all my other diagnoses and even with medication it isn't managed too well except my manic episodes have slowed down and are less frequent and dont last as long. How do you manage your bipolar?

Hi, Everyone! Just discovered this place. Looking forward to chatting and supporting other members. I have had mental illness for most of my life and am on disability because of it. Between emotional and physical pain (not to mention "horrormones"), I have quite the challenge of navigating through life. I have figured out a lot, however, through the help of my psychiatrist, my therapist, and my medications. I feel I take too many medications, however and would like to talk about that, as well as other issues. I am an artist working in all kinds of media, and when I am working I am in my happy place. Art and crafting has literally saved my life. Looking forward to meeting you!

Hi everyone. I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder (Type 2) at 26. I am now about to turn 50. BD has broken my heart and those of my husband and sons. 'Normally' I am kind, fun-loving and outgoing. But BD has regularly stomped on all of that, replacing it with despair, dark depression, irritability and rage. Not to mention immense shame and embarrassment. Anyways, I have had some very good years in between, but am currently back to chasing the 'perfect' meds recipe, but remain dogged with mood instability and awful side effects. Yesterday, my brother told me he just found out his good friend is giving cannabis oil to his daughter, with brilliant results. I would greatly appreciate any feedback with regards to the possibility and results of using cannabis oil to treat BD. Thank you so much and God bless you.

I am 20 years old and have had depression and intense mood swings all my life. I don't really remember being happy except for fleeting, extreme moments out of nowhere, and the rest of the time I was depressed. I wanted to die since I was 8 and also suffered/suffer from bad anxiety, some paranoia (mostly about social situations) and Nonverbal Learning Disorder which made school even more difficult and scary. Around age 14 my depression kept getting worse and my friend, who has had bipolar disorder most of her life, told me that I sound like I have the disorder. After the school and my parents learned of my s****de plans, I went to several therapists. They all told me that what I had was clinical depression, and I was in no way bipolar. Lately though, things have been getting worse. Since then I've been on anti-depressant/anxiety medication, Celexa, and in the last few years (since graduating high school) I have been barely depressed at all. Almost normal. Since dropping out of college things have been getting worse. I have no self-esteem because I'm not smart and have no talents, and often I think that I should kill myself because I have trouble with my brain getting so freaked out that I can't go to my internship that I'm only at because of an occupation class that I paid for. I think my self esteem problems and inability to get a job, plus the fact that I can't go to college, contribute to my new problems. I don't know what's wrong with me. My mood swings are getting worse. I'll be fine and about to go to my internship (an office job) but I have extreme sensitivity about clothes so if something is uncomfortable, it'll start an episode and I'll come back home and be unable to go to work. That happened a few times last week and today. I feel s*****al, depressed, and have urges to kill and hurt myself. It's uncontrollable and I hit myself, bang my head, etc. without realizing it. I'll notice later that I have bumps and bruises on my head or other places. Sometimes I scream, break things, I can't help it. I don't want to. It really upsets my mom and sometimes she makes it worse. I have no idea what to do. I also feel the need to scrape at my skin which helps. Sometimes drawing blood. Last week I noticed a really scary manic episode. Much worse than most of my happy episodes. Usually, when I'm in a happy mood I go to my girlfriend's house, we do things and have fun, and I spend all my money on toys and junk food. Also I refuse to pay attention to any of my responsibilities and my laundry almost never gets done because I'm either too happy or too sad/tired to do it. This time, everything was heightened even more. I had a noticeable sex drive (which calmed down after I started dating my girlfriend 2 years ago and is almost never an issue), I was hyper and jittery (I am almost always too fatigued to do much, so this was weird), and I couldn't stop laughing for hours. I noticed myself running through the hallways, rolling around on the floor and making weird noises at my mom. I had no control over this. I was SO HAPPY that it just happened. And I was happy for absolutely no reason. In fact, just the day before I had been very depressed and panicky. I wasn't on a sugar buzz; I hadn't eaten in probably an hour or more. This was just out of the blue. It scared me and it lasted until the next morning, though I was able to sleep normally. The reason it scares be is because I know if this happens again, I'll have little to no control over what I do. My parents will be mad at me for acting funny (my dad, at least) because that's how he was when I was a kid and would get hyper and weird. I could lose my internship if I act this way again. I might unintentionally flirt with or hit on someone. I could jump off a cliff just because it looks fun. I'm really scared. It doesn't seem like it's going to happen again, but who knows. Today I had an out-of-the-blue depressive/anxiety episode. My happy episodes usually directly follow my times of extra depression or anxiety. Last time I visited a psychiatrist, she told me that my symptoms sounded like Bipolar but that because of my sleep patterns, I don't have it. I sleep around 9 to 10 hours each night and I'm only disrupted by my cat. So I don't think I have bipolar, but I know SOMETHING is wrong that my medicine is not helping. Does anyone know anything that might explain this? Something that will help?

So, I don't know what this was a couple nights ago. But I suffer from Major depressive disorder and general anxiety disorder. I was crying because I felt so worthless. But as I was doing this I was on Skype with my boyfriend. And as I cried, I remembered all of the nasty things my ex boyfriend and his friends told me. And all of a sudden I just started to laugh uncontrollably and then after I laughed for ten minutes I started crying again. Then I felt so alive that I was about to bust out of my body. I told my boyfriend I wanted to run five miles. And I wanted to have sex with everyone. I never acted like this before . And I started to talk so fast. I almost threw up. Then when I calmed down enough and I was about to go to sleep, I was scared someone was going to watch me in my sleep and hurt me. The next morning I clung on to my boyfriend at school, telling him not to abandon me . I asked him to double check his doors and windows to make sure there locked. I was scared all day . Now, two days later I wonder what that even was. EDIT: I am NOT abusing any medication or on any street drugs

So, I don't know what this was a couple nights ago. But I suffer from Major depressive disorder and general anxiety disorder. I was crying because I felt so worthless. But as I was doing this I was on Skype with my boyfriend. And as I cried, I remembered all of the nasty things my ex boyfriend and his friends told me. And all of a sudden I just started to laugh uncontrollably and then after I laughed for ten minutes I started crying again. Then I felt so alive that I was about to bust out of my body. I told my boyfriend I wanted to run five miles. And I wanted to have sex with everyone. I never acted like this before . And I started to talk so fast. I almost threw up. Then when I calmed down enough and I was about to go to sleep, I was scared someone was going to watch me in my sleep and hurt me. The next morning I clung on to my boyfriend at school, telling him not to abandon me . I asked him to double check his doors and windows to make sure there locked. I was scared all day . Now, two days later I wonder what that even was.

So, I don't know what this was a couple nights ago. But I suffer from Major depressive disorder and general anxiety disorder. I was crying because I felt so worthless. But as I was doing this I was on Skype with my boyfriend. And as I cried, I remembered all of the nasty things my ex boyfriend and his friends told me. And all of a sudden I just started to laugh uncontrollably and then after I laughed for ten minutes I started crying again. Then I felt so alive that I was about to bust out of my body. I told my boyfriend I wanted to run five miles. And I wanted to have sex with everyone. I never acted like this before . And I started to talk so fast. I almost threw up. Then when I calmed down enough and I was about to go to sleep, I was scared someone was going to watch me in my sleep and hurt me. The next morning I clung on to my boyfriend at school, telling him not to abandon me . I asked him to double check his doors and windows to make sure there locked. I was scared all day . Now, two days later I wonder what that even was.

Never posted to a message board before, actually can't even see what I'm typi g for some reason so I apologize in advance for errors. I'm struggling at the moment with restricting. I've been hospitalized several times in the past for anorexia, and realized I've lost too much weight recently. So over the last month I've tried to put some back on and have gained 3 pounds. But now I'm freaking out about it. Trying not to, but am anyway. It's sending me into a panic. I know I have to gain weight, but I don't like it.again, sorry for any errors but as I type this, can't see the words! Sorry for the ramble.

Hello, I'm wondering if anyone of you have any advice or can relate to my situation. I've been suffering from depression recurrently for 10 years and whilst there have been periods in my life when I've felt more anxious frequently these have been manageable until quite recently. After experience intense anxiety episodes I have now been off of work for nearly 4 weeks trying to fix myself. I've received cognitive behavioural therapy in the past for depression and am pulling on every technique I can for support. My biggest frustration is that whenever I visit the doctor and ask for help they offer little assistance other than increasing my medication, which has been altered 3 times this year yet I am still getting worse. They do not seem to recognise that this anxiety is a new and very challenging symptom for me. They keep saying it's a symptom of my depression and that I need the right balance of medicatio, then happily sign me off of work. I've also previously mentioned that I am concerned I may have bipolar disorder type 2, but they've basically told me unless I do something crazy,like try to kill myself I cannot be referred for psychiatric assessment. The trouble is when my behaviour is fluctuating there's no way I would visit a doctor, it's only in hindsight when I seem to regulate or become more depressed that I can identify hypomanic style behavioural trends. I'm so frustrated and unhappy with feeling like I'm not being heard or offered constructive support that will help me level out that I'm tempted to do something stupid so that they finally hear my struggle and somedays I'm not sure I'd even care if it all just ended. I'm trying so hard to maintain a normal life but it's getting harder and harder. I'm exhausted of the effort and I can feel that I'm loosing. Somedays I can barely get out of bed, let alone leave the house. How do I get the support I need before I loose the energy to fight for myself? Stephanie Jayne

Hello all! My name is Amber. I am a single mother of a 3 year old little boy. I have bipolar disorder, major depression, generalized anxiety, social anxiety, add, and insomnia, and RLS. I found this website today because i need to reach out to somebody. im very depressed and need a good friend to confide in that understands the struggle because i cannot talk to my family about it because they just don't understand. Somebody please help me. I need emotional support and advice badly! I have gone to the mental ward 4 times in 3 years and it hasnt helped. please i need somebody to talk to. Amber.

I had heard a lot about 'Silver Linings Playbook', a lot of good things. But I'm always skeptical of what critics say so I wanted to reserve judgement until I could watch it myself. I finally watched it last night. I don't want to spoiler it for anyone but it's a fantastic movie and I thoroughly recommend it to anyone, but if you suffer a mental illness it's a muse see!! IMO of course . Silver Linings Playbook (2012) 122 min - Comedy | Drama | Romance - 25 December 2012 (USA) Ratings: 8.0/10 from 105,942 users Metascore: 81/100 Reviews: 333 user | 349 critic | 45 from Metacritic.com After a stint in a mental institution, former teacher Pat Solitano moves back in with his parents and tries to reconcile with his ex-wife. Things get more challenging when Pat meets Tiffany, a mysterious girl with problems of her own. Director: David O. Russell Writers: David O. Russell (screenplay), Matthew Quick (novel) Stars: Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro | See full cast and crew http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1045658/

My name's Leah. Little bit about me: I'm a sophomore in college majoring in Linguistics and minoring in Computer Science; I want to make language learning software. I already have a website in the works for it. I also speak in varying degrees of fluency Japanese, Korean, French, and German. As for my mental health... Basically, I've had bipolar disorder since I was 15, and anxiety just recently popped for me about two months ago. It seems like I was having withdrawals from a decrease in dosage of lamotrigine, and I just haven't really recovered. My anxiety just never went away despite the other symptoms disappearing. My anxiety has evolved into a form of hypochondriasis and I find it really hard to not ask for reassurance and that sort of thing. So I came here because I want to meet people who have the same problem and learn better how to cope with it. Nice to meet you.

Hi, I introduce myself because I am a functioning individual, diagnosed with bipolar disorder. I have done it all, it seems. And while trial and error seemed to be a major league way of getting by in life, I feel like crying some times of guilt for all I've done. I am very outspoken and irritable, but I respect people's mental health disorders. I have one and know the mind can be a pandora's box sometimes. So I hope to hear good and bad things on this forum. Thanks for your time.