r/family_of_bipolar

My friend doesn't accept her diagnosis/has Anosognosia. So she won't get treatment. I'm very sick and her last manic episode cost me 8months of my health. I had to step away. But it pains me.
I love her but I'm too unwell and need her to get medical help.
I am autistic and find the LEAP method impossible. I can't do it.
She wants to know why I have stepped away. I'm scared to tell her in case I cause an episode. I don't want her to suffer because of me. But I want to say the truth- Until you have medication and psychiatric support I'm not able to be friends with you for my own health.

Can people accept their diagnosis even with anosognosia? Would it harm her to talk her the truth?

My heart is broken.

I'm a 20-year-old female student, and my dad has bipolar disorder. When he's off the meds and he starts having a manic episode, it's very bad.

He leaves the house, he goes begging on the street, and when he gets money, he gives it to other people, he bad talks my family, especially my mom, his parents usually take him in because he has nowhere else to go, but they treat him really badly, they cuss at him. And my mom doesn't allow him to come in the house when he has these manic episodes because he's stealing or he's cussing or he's acting. He's not violent, but he's verbally violent with her, especially, not with me.

They live in another city, and I went to another city for university. And today I was supposed to leave the city to go back to my hometown, but I heard like he was ringing my block doorbell, but I didn't see him, I just heard that someone was ringing, and I had a feeling that it was him, so I didn't open. And he probably left and he went to his sister, who called the hospital because he should have been going to the mentally ill hospital to take his medication and get back on his feet. So he left, he lied to my mom that he's going there, he took some money, but he actually came here, first to my house, then to his sister's house. And I have to leave tonight to go back to my city, my hometown city, and I don't want to see him here because I just cannot take it anymore. He's been like this all my life, and even when he's on the meds, he's not the very best father. He rarely showers, he rarely cleans after himself, he only makes a mess and make everything around him stink with his unshowered body. And he's lazy. I don't think he's worked something in his life, like a serious job, only side gigs and things like that, and he treats my mom very bad. My mom doesn't love him, she just stayed with him throughout the years.

And I just wanted to share my experience here, and I wanted to know if I am an asshole for not wanting to deal with him. I'm not, I don't want to go out and search for him, trying to convince him to hospitalize himself, because I did that before, and I just feel like it's not my responsibility. Yeah, it's bad to be off the meds, and I know that he's not thinking clearly, but even when he's on the meds, he's not a good person, so I don't know. My mom alerted the police that he lied about the place he was going and that he's mentally ill. And I just, I just don't want to see him. I kind of just don't care anymore. I don't want anything to happen to him, but I just don't want to deal with him anymore.

Hey all,

My wife was diagnosed BP1 in 2020. So far she has had 3 manic psychotic breakdowns that have required 3-4 weeks of BHU care to treat.

In middle of May this year, she was diagnosed with Graves’ disease, and we lost our dog that we have had our entire 12 year relationship and shortly after she was hospitalized for 3 weeks with a psychotic manic episode.

I saw the signs, but thought this time was different. Boy was I wrong. Her mania ramped up over I’d say about 5 days and by the 5th day it was crystal clear that there was no avoiding hospitalization. She was convinced she was only hypo manic and it was manageable but I’m learning that this doesn’t really happen with BP1.

So has anyone found an effective way to prevent this full scale psychotic break? Or is it basically once this mania starts coming on it’s too late? I feel beyond helpless when it happens, and I always hope it’s not unstoppable without a BHU trip but this last time I learned that unless we find a way to cull her manic ramp up that it’s bye bye for 3-4 weeks. We have a 2 year old now and this last one was devastating for us.

She takes her meds religiously, but this time it just didn’t work, and her last psych was pretty horrible at helping as we called a few days before she was admitted but received no response. I feel like the graves + loss of our dog really tipped her over.

I appreciate any feedback here. If I could find a way to prevent a full scale manic break then I feel like a completely new chapter would be open in our lives. It’s so exhausting feeling helpless in these situations.

My mom's mania took off and rapidly spiraled a week before my wedding. I nearly had a nervous breakdown myself, as I was closing up a half year performance review at work and didn't have some of the wedding stuff lined up.

My fiancé was horrified at how my mom was behaving. He previously thought that I'm blowing things waaay out of proportions and just being a heartless daughter for not being as kind and forthcoming with my mom as with my dad and everyone else. He became a lot more understanding within that last week before the wedding.

I never hid the illness from him. She had an episode early in our relationship, about 6 dates in. Back then, he popped up in her social media because I added him as a friend, and she started texting him. I begged him to block her, and she was hospitalised with psychosis within a few days of that. He didn't think much of it.

I planned my wedding around minimizing triggers to her, as I knew that it would be a stressful and exciting occasion. I made peace with my dad not appearing, he has spent 20 years of his life managing her disease and has always been a major trigger for her. He has a new family, so him not appearing at my wedding wouldn't be as sad for him. But I really wanted his mom, my grandma, at the wedding. She is getting old, and she might not get to see her other grandkids getting married.

Apparently, it was too much. Mom's long time long distance boyfriend broke up with her about 6 weeks before that, which probably didn't help.

My grandmother and I spoke to mom's doctor, trying to get her hospitalised. But the doctor knew about the wedding, and generally thought that I'm blowing things out of proportions. I've been watching my mom's manias unfold for 15 years, and I knew that she will be involuntarily hospitalised around the time of my wedding – once the aggression towards everyone started and sleep ended mom needed 7-10 days to get herself into trouble.

So my wedding was going to be fun.

4 days before the wedding she brought 3 homeless men, one of them a recently released convict for murder, to her flat and was calling first me, and then my brother. I was at a boardgame party, so the call didn't last long. My brother was called next, and he recorded an hour of those men making threats about my dad's family, and all four of them were obviously drinking.

In the morning, my maternal grandparents went to my mom's flat and spent 6 hours trying to convince her to leave the flat and see her doctor. Eventually my called me, checking in on me, this time around she is convinced that I'm in danger, and I asked her to go with grandma.

It made her angry, but I then told her that if she doesn't get treatment, she can forget that she ever had children, and she will never know about her grandchildren. My brother is fully on board with that threat, and it worked. I don't think she remembers the threat, as she didn't mention it since, but she really lost it when she heard it.

She's been inpatient for 10 days now, and I feel horrible and helpless. She has built her life around her love for her children (my brother and I). She was the most caring mom when she was healthy. She still is endlessly supportive and her love for us is so unconditional and unreserved, when she is well. Yet, I am always chilly with her, and I am straight up cruel with her when she has her episodes, which probably doesn't help her at all.

I couldn't be more happy about my now husband though. He was wonderful through this, and he has done everything in his power to minimize stress and support me though this mess.

My bf (M28) has manic bipolar. When I met my bf I had no idea he was diagnosed with this, and early on he hid a lot of things from me. His use of weed (which he knew I did not like due to my upbringing) he lied and said he didn’t do it, I found out about a month and a half in. He also doesn’t take his medication.

I told him early on that I wouldn’t want to continue the relationship if he was going to continue to smoke, and we could just separate, because if he didn’t want to change I was not going to make him, it’d be just best to separate. He’d continue to beg me to stay that he would change and I believed him.

His grandma who I believe has undiagnosed bipolar, got into an argument one night, where she was telling him disgusting names, yelling because he had woken her up while she was sleeping. They got into a yelling match and she kicked him out. He had never shown me this side, but I felt so bad we ended up moving out. Everything got worse then, he would start to blame me for his grandma kicking him out etc. he started smoking more when he was not working and I put up with it for a bit till I told him again I felt he should stop, since it did not help with his outburst at all. He refuses medicine.

We’d get into arguments and I would tell him to leave for a bit because he would throw and break stuff and yell, and I did not want the cops called and for him to get in trouble. He’d go back to his grandma and tell her that I kicked him out and whatever else he believed so she grew to hate me, tell me things, call me names. He would excuse it and say that’s how his grandmother is.

This continued for months him wanting to stop, all of it, drinking, vaping smoking weed. But then I’d end up finding drugs hidden somewhere in an apartment that’s under my name.

Right now he hasn’t smoked or done anything and everything has been good. And even expressed wanting to get on his medicine. But now any time something slightly happens that he doesn’t like, he goes off, starts bringing up the problems I have with my family, saying I’m the reason why we got the apartment, saying that his grandma is right about everything she says, saying my ex abused me for a reason. And I’m so controlling because I don’t want him to drugs. And then within a few minutes will start crying and saying sorry that he didn’t mean it and expects me to be okay, and if I’m not he goes off again. I feel so tired, and anxious, I feel like I’m walking on egg shells. His family enables him so bad, have never encouraged him taking medicine and in his grandmas words “I should be happy with him because he can provide and take care of me financially” and his grandpa saying “he’s got a mental illness so I need to be the bigger person” I suffer from major depressive disorder so this always feels like a big kick in the face. I don’t know what to do anymore. Any advice on dealing with someone who has enablers, bipolar family or an addicted bipolar partner?

He SCREAMED in my face that he wanted a divorce. He accused me of cheating, insisting I fess up to it for months and making life hell. Then it turned into accusations that I've been abusing him for years, called me a narcissist, turned my stepdaughter fully against me. It culminated in him attacking me and hitting our dog, for which I got a protection order. I fought as hard as I possibly could for 6 months to get him to see reason, to get back on meds, to come down to reality, and ultimately I had to let go. And now that I've officially given him what he asked for by filling for divorce, he's "confused". He's bringing up past partners of not only me but my sisters for some reason? And comparing how bad they were, insisting he never did anything as bad as any of them yet he's been cast out by my family (which, duh, those partners were too, hence why they are exes). And I don't even know what my sisters' exes have to do with anything as he wasn't even around when they were in previous relationships.

I had to include the protection order in the divorce filing. They specifically ask if there have been any cases in the last 5 years, and he needed to see the paperwork again to see where the judge wrote that she found a case for domestic violence, like he still can't believe it. And not in an "I don't remember" kind of way but full-blown denial.

It's like he was playing a game of chicken for a year and now that it's in writing, he's lost as to what happened, but not even in an introspective way but genuinely disbelief that he's sick and I would do this to him when he did nothing wrong and it's all my fault.

He's being weird about photos I'm taking off the walls. I told him I took down the ones of just me and our daughter figuring he wouldn't hang up pictures of me in his new home. He said he hasn't deleted any from his phone. And I just don't know what to make of this. He's still cycling. His moods are a gamble on almost an hourly basis. Still unmedicated, but not fully manic anymore, but he hasn't reached a point of seeing reason or even acknowledging the damage he did, and I don't think he ever will. It's still all my fault to him, but he wants to get sentimental, sappy, and sad NOW? A full year after everything he did to blow up our family? I don't get it. And while I'm not turning back now, it hurts so much because it's a glimpse of the person he used to be. And I'm tempted to console the person who did this to us.

This illness is so f*cking cruel.

Hi, i'm a romantic partner of a person with both bipolar and schizoaffective. I'm 19, she's 18. I myself have stpd, so i desire clear communication.

She has been bad with it always, though. But i managed to navigate it at least. I clearly met her at a mania and i suspect a depressive episode right now, but i can't be sure and she wouldn't tell me.

The point is: two days ago i had worsening of my condition, i felt awful and texted her asking if we can meet up. She replied that no, she isn't feeling good rn. It was fine, i found help elsewhere.

However, what makes me question what's going on is that she didn't check up on me or anything. She knows very well i could've been harmed.

Is this normal during a depressive episode? Bc it's either just my stpd speaking or she stopped caring.

My younger brother is diagnosed with Bipolar 1 and Autism and he's just now becoming an adult. We've lived together for five or six years now? Something like that. I took him in after a severe episode left him unable to continue living at our parents house. At the time we didn't know what was going on.

He's completely mentally tormented. He can hardly leave the house.

I tried helping him get a part time job but he ended up threatening to kill himself to his manager and walked out, his manager called the cops out of fear for his safety and he ended up in the emergency room. I tried helping him enroll in two classes at the local community college, he made it a week before he had a mental breakdown and ran out of school crying. At which point we unenrolled him.

He has no friends at all, and I can't get him to visit family with me anymore, and I can't get him to go out just the two of us. I brought him on a beach vacation with my father and sister (both unrelated to him) and he spent the entire week crying in the shower. I try to bring him on local nature trails, I try bringing him swimming. But he won't. So he stays inside always.

But he's miserable. He isn't somebody that enjoys being inside alone all of the time. He's hard to be around, always on edge, always crying, always upset and often having emotional outbursts.

He has a therapist. He has a psychiatrist. And he's on medications. We're going through the long process of trying to get the medication right but obviously, we're not there yet. But we're working on it.

When I first took this on we didn't know about his mental conditions. I knew he was troubled and struggling. But I had been troubled and struggling too. We don't come from a good family. I saw myself in him and thought that if I gave him what I thought I had needed, that he'd be able to grow and thrive. But I think I was wrong.

I've given the last five years of my life to this. I'm only 30. I have no friends and no life and not because I can't have either, but because of how much extensive care and attention my brother needs, and because I've decided to neglect myself in the pursuit of helping him get better. It's a compulsion, really. Every time I do something on my own I feel the weight of his need clawing at the back of my mind, screaming that he can't be alone. And so I find it hard to live.

And I'm home with him. But I feel like a battered spouse. I hear him come out of his room and my heart drops. I'm scared of him. My nervous system is shot. I feel like I can't breath, like every step and every word needs to be carefully calculated or else he might plunge into some sort of depressive self loathing and I might have to deal with it. I'm just exhausted.

I don't know what to do. I feel like I'm not helping, like we're not making progress. And he has nowhere else to go. But I'm so sad and tired and hurt and I don't want to live like this.

Reading this sub breaks my heart - to see not only the frustration and exhaustion of you all dealing with us bipolar people, but the horrible sadness and desperation you feel watching a loved one disintegrate.

I’m so unbelievably lucky my family held on, and frankly I don’t know how they did. I wouldn’t, and couldn’t blame them if they didn’t. I’ve been stable now for a few years - but good god, it was a horrifying and traumatising time - not only for me but them. It wasn’t until I was stable and fully accepted my condition that I could even comprehend the sadness, fear and heartbreak I’d caused my parents, never mind give them the grace and space to have their hurt and healing. I thought taking meds quietly, hiding symptoms and going to therapy when asked was enough, but I never believed I was ‘ill’ - because I didn’t want to be. I wanted to be normal and capable. I hid a lot of things until I couldn’t because I was so ashamed of being a wreck.

So, as someone with bipolar and psychosis - I just want to say not only thank you and I’m so sorry to my parents and friends, but to all of you here. I don’t think I’d be able to cope seeing my mum or dad fall apart the way they had to see me do. I don’t know how they did it, or even why. I’m just so thankful they did.

Do what you can for the people you love, but don’t destroy yourself in the process. Not all bipolar is the same: some of us will never get better, some of us will never see. Some of us will, and will do everything we can to make amends, even then it might not be enough. Seek carers support and protect yourself and your wellbeing.

I hope to god I never have to experience what my friends and family did. To those with the strength to continue fighting/ advocating for us when we can’t and don’t understand, you’re worth your weight in gold.

Are there less stressful environments to help loved one get through manic episode then hospital?

Wife was diagnosed with Bipolar 1 last month after going into psychosis and needing to be hospitalized, barely had the chance to get things set up, process and learn things. Had only one psych and therapist meeting. Already had to take her back because she was starting to show worsening symptoms again. I wanted to get ahead of it before it got worse and thats what the Dr and therapist recommended. She was forgetful and had a couple of little to no sleep nights before I took her but still responsive.

The next morning and the next couple days she went into full blown psychosis. I dont know what happened. I have a feeling the environment of being there again made the stess and anxiety worse.

Are there other options than the hospital?

44M-SA-Me/47F-FA-Wife (fearful avoidant)
I am not a therapist. The possibility of my wife having BPD is based on our couple counsellor's suggestions to look into it as he did inner child/EMDR with her individually. Wife is in denial overall. That and also my long time experience with a phenomena that really didnt make sense unless I assumed there are two distinctly different personalities.

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So it ended for us after 9 very unstable, rocky marriage and this post is not about that, I have made other posts around it. I could not take it anymore as well as she was suffering every other day.

In a very short summary, she swings into two personalities, one thinks I am best thing happened to her and other finds me so horrible that I think she worries about safety.

All simple so far, divorce feels like it will take away that constant walking trigger (which is me) and I can focus on my health. So far so good.

The issue is that I am genuinely worried for her the way things are unfolding. So over last 1 year, the frequency and intensity of these episodes have increased tangibly. Like the amount of hate and anger is just palpable. I see her shaking, screaming in high pitched voice in an angered state to which any sound/word/even moving body comes as offending/threatening. It used be trigger based 10 years ago, then perceived criticism became a trigger and now in recent times, I feel age is also playing a big factor in it. Like these meltdown have started to show time based patterns.

I dont believe anyone can really have normal body functions (brain health, memory, sleep etc)( if these episodes persists for long time and I am sure this is affecting her overall health significantly or it will soon. She is very healthy woman beside mental health stuff but also always has been on anemic side. She is in absolute denial to pursue serious therapy. In addition, I am worried about the pain, anger, helplessness she feels. In her opinion, I am walking away to a good life and that part alone is pushing her to extremes. I am genuinely worried about self half or sabotage.

On one hand she has talked about childhood abuse, bullying farther even today, parental traum. On other days, she thinks its all made up and her therapist have filled her mind with crazy theories about her parents. The swing I see about me, is consistent across every person in her life.

Her family (parents, brother, sister) doesn't know any of this. Also all of them have abused her and still abuse her according to her. I am close to her parents and family, and at least in current adult life, they are all warm/kind/proud of my wife and its very sincere, I dont want to extend that to childhood since obviously I was not there to see. I just have current story which is actually very warm and kind from them. They just think I am abandoning her which mostly comes from her sharing stories when she is angry. When she is good, she is a kind woman who would not talk about me to her family. Its like writing bad reviews only when you dont like the product and her parents absolutely have no idea about trauma side. Despite encouragement from me/couple counsellor/therapist, she has not talked to them at all.

Here comes why I care besides basic empathy for a partner of 10 years. Our 5 year old. My wife is a good mother since anger typically doesn't show up in mom-son bonding so I am trying to have 50-50 schedule where the kid bonds to us both. The painful part is that the data and the trajectory of last few years really worries me. I see this moving towards something very dark. e.g. there had been a couple nights where I stayed up thinking she might do something to harm me out of anger. Some really tragic moments where she tried to sabotage my relationship with the son who has grown roughly with 50-50 time split with us. (Just two of us ..me/kid...have gone to week long trips fairly often over last 5 years, that kind of bonding where I have played the role of primary parent.)

She doesn't have any close friends with whom she shares all this. There might be someone who might have some idea but reaching to that friend would be like breach of trust, since whatever I will share is kinda like... hey, these are issues with my wife, can you watch over for her in the future and be around?. It sounds really shitty despite the intentions. I want to talk to her parents, her older brother who could possibly support her unconditionally (handle her rants, anger and be there for her) but the issue is that the they are actually the source of perceived trauma and abuse so sharing with them is a big gamble. I will be honest, knowing them for 10 years, I have a feeling the childhood has been some tragic series of misinterpreted events where both parties are right in their ways.

Its not like she has consistent therapist and in my opinion, without full acceptance, she doesn't even believe therapy can help much at all.

So what are my avenues here? I certainly dont want to watch over her because the moment she feels that kind of care, to her it appears pity and she absolutely goes berserk. I plan to truly isolate myself with good intentions.

Realistically, it sounds like for me... accept what you got, and dont control the future. Kid will turn out to be ok kind of situation but I still wonder like an ENFP would.

Hello, I’m looking for advice on how to deal with an upsetting situation I have found myself in.
Last week I gave birth, the pregnancy was complicated in the last few weeks and I ended up requiring an emergency c section. To say the least, it was traumatic for me and my husband. We live across the country from his family. Due to the circumstance, our pediatrician recommended we hold off on large, extended family visits until baby is stronger in a few months (September). In the meantime, we were advised to be selective with visitors. His family is notorious for not having good communication skills and everyone thought we were not allowing ANYONE to visit until September. I am close with my MIL and *assumed* (without explicitly communicating) that she would visit sometime this month. I thought we had told her she was the exception to this rule but my memory is foggy as the last month of pregnancy was a nightmare. Long story short, the family was disappointed that we weren’t going to “allow” a grandmother to meet her grandchild for 2 months (false). My bipolar SIL, who I am not close with at all and have interacted with just a handful of times, took matters into her own hands and sent me a scathing message when I was 6 days postpartum- accusing me of being a manipulative, controlling monster, an awful wife, daughter & sister-in-law, and breaking everyone’s hearts in the family. She stated she does not trust me and made it clear that I am not accepted. The tone of the message was incredibly angry. I immediately contacted my MIL and other SIL to clear up any confusion. They were horrified and told me that she had been experiencing one of her “episodes”. They were very apologetic and told me it was only a matter of time before I would be on the receiving end. She is unmedicated but self medicates with alcohol and other substances. My husband sent her a message letting her know that her actions were unacceptable and we will not be communicating with her until she offers a sincere apology, and even then, trust and respect must be earned. I have NO idea how to deal with this. I don’t think his family knows how to deal with it either. It seems that everyone is afraid of her and also afraid of losing her, so she consistently gets away with this kind of abuse.
I am so hurt. To receive treatment like this as a first time freshly postpartum mom, after a traumatic birth, hormones crashing, no sleep, c section recovery.. I’m beside myself. I guess I’m looking for advice or insight on how to move forward and how to protect myself and my daughter in the future during situations like this.

Hello, my husband has bp1, when I was dating him I already knew that he had bp1 but I had never lived it, a few days ago we were talking and he told me that his parents verbally and physically abused him when he was a child, he had already told me this before but this time it was different, it was like he repeated the same things over and over again in the conversation until he started talking nonsense and that’s when I figured.

He says to feel free but he doesn’t stop thinking and saying things it’s like his mind doesn’t stop, he says he feels good but he didn’t sleep all night and he want to be in the pool all day, the last episode he had was in 2023 and after a while he started to stop the pills, I feel that I can’t talk to him it’s impossible he’s very irritable and although I try not to contradict him it’s difficult when he want to do what he want to do, I love him so much and is so hard for me to see him like that and caring for him in this moment has been so hard, at least i got him to take the medication and now he is sleeping but wow I feel so drained, we’re just 23 and we trying to start a life together alone for the first time and we’re so far from home right now so I’m basically alone with him and I still need to go to work and I can not even do my job properly in this moment. I need help.

The "second patient"is used to describe a family member or caregiver whose own health is affected by someone else's illness. When someone has bipolar disorder, most of the attention (understandably) goes to the person with the diagnosis. But partners often end up carrying a lot too. You're watching for mood changes, helping manage medications, handling crises, and trying to keep life together. Over time, your own stress, sleep, health, and even your sense of who you are can start to suffer.

I recently read some research about the challenges partners face, and it inspired me to write about it because I don't think we talk about this enough.

I'm curious what others think. Have you ever felt like the "second patient" in your relationship? Does that term fit your experience, or is there a better way to describe it?

Article: https://www.heldseen.com/connectingthedots/loving-someone-with-bipolar-disorder-youre-in-this-story-too

Hello all.

I’m new to posting so bare with me. I think I’m mainly wanting to vent but would love some advice if possible.

My sister was diagnosed with bipolar in her early 20s. She is now in her mid 30s. She took medicine and saw a therapist in her first few years of diagnosis but then completely stopped both. She’s been unmedicated for quite a while and I truly feel like she’s in psychosis or manic almost consistently. Talking to her is impossible as it makes no sense. It almost sounds like she’s speaking another language. She will switch topics or just her wording sounds like she’s speaking in poems. I’m not sure if that makes sense to anyone. She has an obsession with technology and her phone tracking her or affecting her to an extent that doesn’t making sense. She’s obsessed with germs and always thinks everyone including her pets are sick on a weekly basis. She is married and her husband does not know her diagnosis… even though he has come to my parents with worries they have not shared this with him. She has a 3 year old child and I truly worry for him sometimes. She’s a wonderful person and good mom but she needs medicine (in my opinion.) she watched my daughter one time with her husband once, and when I got home asked me what all the yellow squiggles in my house were. (There obviously are none.) she’s never watched her since and she has asked multiple times only for me to tell her im not comfortable with it.

I’ve tried to bring up the topic of her mental health multiple times. Even sharing how postpartum I realized I have OCD and trying to connect with her and she completely shut me down. She gets very angry and mean when the topic is brought up.

My parents are no help and I believe they are just constantly walking on eggshells and won’t speak up. Just saying how she needs more sleep. And encourage me to see her when I explained how it’s too hard.

Her refusing her diagnosis and treatment has truly affected everyone’s health in our family. She is draining. Has anyone else dealt with this? I’m at a point where I’m accepting that I’ll never have a relationship with her like I want. That she will never really know me. That for my own health I have to distance myself greatly. I love her and I’ll always be here if she really needed me… but I think I’m at a point where I have to love myself more.

Hello! I’m stuck. I love my sister so much, she’s my blood; but I just need some help from other people with bipolar.
I don’t know much about it, but she says she’s bipolar-paranoid, she’s been diagnosed for a few years; and I don’t know how to comfort her when she starts believing our family is against her.

She thinks we’re out to get her— she’s said herself, she thinks people are after her and that the whole world is out to get her. She gets very angry with us, but then later will be just fine.
I hate to say it as well, but she dose have bipolar disorder, but she also.. isn’t a good person? Not because of her disorder, but because of other ways then she acts.
Anytime I try to bring it up with her she immediately says it because of her bipolar, and gets very upset with us when we try to help.
If she dosent like what we made for dinner one night, and we make something she’ll eat; she won’t eat it. So when we’re eating she starts saying to us that we don’t love her enough and that we’d make other people food that they wanted but not her.
Theres a lot of other things, I can explain more but this is getting very long.

Is this apart of being bipolar? I get upset when she blames us and starts yelling but I stay quiet. I want to help her but I don’t know where to start. Is there anyone that experiences anything similar?
Thank you.

(Sister is early twenties)

My wife was diagnosed as bi-polar 1 last month based on the fact that her Dad has it and she was admitted to the hospital for what they called a manic episode with psychosis.

Idk for some reason, Im just not convinced. Somethings going on but is it really that? I reas about all these extreme cases of people being violent, and crazy mood swings or being super impulsive with money or ideas. Ive been with her almost 15 years and never witnessed any of that?

This year has been rough, it doesnt help that she puts a lot of pressure on herself to be the best. We both have high stress jobs with lots of hrs, a decent size house to maintain, a cat to take care of, a sister that moved to a different state, parents getting older and showing their age. We're in our mid 30's, we always talk about the possibility of having kids and the biological clock thats ticking on that too. She had really bad flu this year, chiropractic issues. And just other little things that add up.

The week leading up to the episode she had a really long week at work, maybe a couple hrs a sleep a night, she normally has trouble sleeping, doesnt help that the cat wakes her up 4 times a night to get fed. She took her IUD out to possibly start that process of future kids. Between Friday and Saturday maybe up to 36 hrs straight. We couldnt get her to sleep, she just couldnt get herself to shut down, we were trying otc sleeping pills, camomille tea then we decided to try OBD gummies, but we are people who have never tried any of that type of stuff, i was hesitant about it and knew that wasnt the answer, but I let the dispensary decide which to take, the ones we tried had 1 mg of THC in it, and she took 4 within an 8 hr span.

Idk, I just really believe her poor stress management and anxiety, led to insomnia, then to the start of some paranoia and begginingas of psychosis and then the gummies pushed her over the edge. But because she was in a manic state and her dad has it, they called it a day, pumped her full of bipolar meds and sent her out the door.

Now here I am again another stressful couple weeks at her work, high anxiety, the twitching TD? and forgetfull ness, side effects of meds? and lack of sleep.

Just curious what people think.

I went to a psychiatrist expecting a simple and old fashioned depression diagnosis… that’s what I thought I had. Instead she said she suspects Bipolar II and started me on lamotrigine (25mg to start).

I haven’t fully processed this yet. My mom had been given several different diagnoses over the years: BPD, bipolar, schizophrenia, depression, it’s changed depending on who she saw and when and she always refused treatment or my dad forced it on her. She had episodes where she’d scream, get intensely irritable, and there was physical violence, she’d hit me or when she hit her lows the apartment was a MESS, there was no food and I didn’t had a mom for a while. I have spent my whole life terrified of becoming her, and now there’s a real possibility that I have some version of what she had, and I don’t know what to do with that.

The pattern that seems to fit me: when I don’t sleep well, I get this energy surge and start cleaning everything, and sometimes it cuts out halfway through and I leave things a mess. Then I have real lows where I can’t function at all. Nothing like what my mom went through outwardly, but enough that a professional saw something.

What scares me most isn’t the label. It’s my son. It’s any future kids I might have. I never want them to grow up not understanding why mom is suddenly yelling, why she’s irritable for no clear reason, wondering if today is a “bad day.” Wondering if I’m going to be there for them or being feeling relieved the day I die… I don’t want them to have the same fear of me that I had of her or the resentment I still can’t get rid of.

This all began about 4 weeks ago with my mom (59). Around 10 am the day this started, she had a perfectly normal and regular phone call with my sister (26), and by noon the same day she call me (M30) and was talking all sorts of nonsense. By 4 pm that day she was in an utter delusional panicked & manic state, believing she had uncovered an intricate family real estate fraud targeted against her and that all of her technology (phones, computers, router, home security system, fire alarms, etc) had been hacked and people were coming to kill her.

For background and context leading up to this, my mother has worked a work-from-home technical job for that last 7 years. She was miserable at her previous job, and ended up starting a new job in January where she was much happier. In late March, the company did a 10% layoff and she was impacted, which sent her into a severe and deep depression. Six weeks later - her step mother, who helped raise her, passed unexpectedly. They had a very complex relationship and were not on good terms when she passed. Then, 4 weeks after that, she had this sudden shift in her mental state, exhibiting severe signs of paranoia, mania, and erratic behavior.

In the days that followed she continued going through these manic states and where she would talk a million miles per hour, she was actively forgetting things she was saying or forgetting things that happened, and thought everyone around her was conspiring against her. During this stretch, she ripped out the home security system and cut the wires at 1 am one night, she filed a police report about her “compromised technology,” She made her husband buy a new router, and other devices. She would disappear for hours driving without her phone. She started to blame my stepdad for all the hacking she believed was happening.

With all of this going on, we tried everything to convince her to get evaluated or go to a hospital because of the sudden shift in behavior. She claimed she was of “sound mind and body” and didn’t need to do that. We consulted with local Mental Health Crisis Centers and hospitals to determine how we can get her help. Ultimately, we had no success leveraging them to convince her to get evaluated and we were unable to get a proper justification for an involuntary hold for 72 hours despite the extremely erratic behavior and sudden shift in mental state. She also is able to mask in front of different people, like the crisis center team - emphasizing that she’s fine and that she doesn’t understand why she’s being ganged up on.

In the weeks that followed, the heightened manic states have subsided a bit, but she continues to act extremely strange. Conversations are short, she lacks any emotion, she is losing belongings, she’s starting to make impulsive decisions like trying to buy a new car, move out of state, and wanting divorce her husband. She has stopped participating in her regular activities and will sit at home all day doing who knows what, or go on random drives (erratically).

We are extremely concerned, frustrated, tired, and scared that this is our reality now. We feel as though we’ve exhausted all options to try and get her help and she refuses to see a doctor. She’s continuing this decline and self sabotage and we don’t know how to help, or what this could be. I’m hoping to find someone that has experienced something similar and can help give advice on what we can do, if anything, or if this can get better. We just want our mom back.

My dad is currently in Southeast Asia and is having a hypomanic episode. His Facebook is never ending with live updates of my parents trip, political messages, and quotes. What is depressing is that this always happens when he goes on a trip with a significant time zone difference. He gets poor sleep then spirals out of control.

I'm not sure how to help him as I try to walk him though what happened on previous trips and have attempted to drill into his head the importance of sleep.

Another unfortunate issue is he doesn't like how psychiatric medications make him feel, so he self medicates with marijuana and of course he doesn't bring it with him on international trips.

I feel bad that I'm not on this trip to help my mom manage his behavior. I always foresee this episodes occurring and it's unfortunate it always happens. Does anyone else here have parents who become hypomanic on trips? How do you prevent it from happening?