I finally feel a have a good handle on the reins of this illness. I’ve been stable, meaning no hospitizations since 2009 or 10 maybe? I’ve had bouts of hypomania and high anxiety but continued working every day and go through them without hitting crisis mode.

Meds are still always a work in progress but I started doing better with more regular therapy and less meds. Therapy mainly focuses on confidence building and I finally feel strength in holding my own values and worth in a world that doesn’t always care about those things.....to shortly summarize.

So there are many different views of what stability is. I see that some of you do t count “situational” depression as an episode. But because my depression gets pretty severe to the point of contemplating suicide, so I definitely count depression that lasts more than a week as an episode. So far no good cause I have to think about my future. I’d rather live day by day and not worry about the future.

I am recovering from my 5 year battle against my diagnosis which found me in the embrace of self medication and at a standstill for most outward achievements. I haven't had a major mental health emergency in 2 years and I owe that to my son, because when I found out I was pregnant I stopped questioning why I was bipolar and Instead started gett ing help for my symptoms. Since then I've gained new levels of stability over time and made more progress that I previously fell behind on like work and school.