That's a great idea!

My name is Karen & I have a wonderful bipolar boyfriend.

He's currently recovering from his 4th episode, during that time he nearly destroyed our relationship & I (thankfully) found this place.

The term rollercoaster describes being close to someone with bipolar well, but now we're back on the level road & getting back to our future together.

I've really enjoyed meeting others in my situation on here, it can be a very lonely time when your loved ones don't understand.

Welcome!!! :)

Hi Jess and Kred. My name is Tracey and my mum has struggled with bipolar for two years now. She makes things a lot worse for herself by drinking like a fish, but I'm trying to be more understanding and supportive towards her. She has now gone off her meds, but seems to be doing well for now.

I hope we can be there to support each other!

Hi Guys,
My name is Debby, and I have a 12 year old daughter who was recently diagnosed with bp. It has been a roller coaster ride with the meds and we are still struggling to get it right. It's been very frustrating.

I'm looking forward to talking to others who have been through or are going through this.

I think it's col that they've set up this community, I've met a few in the same boat in the bipolar one.

It can help to be part of that community too, to get the perspective of people with bipolar & try to make sense of it all.

Hi I'm Barbra and one of my younger sisters suffers from bp and other mental illnesses. She just tried last week to kill herself so its been rough to say the least.

Barbra-- I hope that she is doing okay! How are you doing with it?

I'm sorry that your sister is struggling barbara. She's lucky to have you supporting her though. Hope things are improving for her...

Excellent!! - I was a member of the Bipolar community on here, but found it didn't have many people who had a loved one who is bp.
I messaged Doug about it, and it seems to have worked!!

Anyway, my mum is 61 and has been bp forever. She had three manic/psychotic episodes before i was 8, each resulting in long hospital sections.
She then went 22 years without a manic episode for 22 years, but had periods of hypomania/ mixed episodes - was never quite right.
In the last 9 years, she has been sectioned 5 times. The first couple of times she came off her meds and went straight back up again, the rest her brain chemicals changed and she started to go up - but thought she was 'better' and didn't get her meds raised, and would then come off them and end up psychotic.

She has been out of hospital for almost a year now and is stable on Depokote and Olanzapine, but she suffers bad anxiety attacks and won't go out of the house unless someone is with her.

The last nine years have been pure hell at times, my mum is violent, aggressive and abusive when manic and would turn up at my house any time of the day and night yelling, cursing.
She also suffers severely from the grandiose feelings and become omnipotent in her mind, puts herself in very dangerous situations.

Me, during the time my mum has been up and down, I have had two children. I am convinced that what triggered this batch of episodes is me getting pregnant - when i told her the news 9 years ago, she said 'I hope I can handle this'. Not congratulations.

She is a difficult woman, who's personality only allows her to think of herself - the bp accentuates this.

I have and always do everything to keep my mum safe and well, but I have to protect myself and my family too.

I am an admin on a UK based Bp site, but feel sometimes I have to hold back on how I feel because most of the people on there are bp and I don't want to upset, plus i am admin.
Here hopefully I can be more myself.

Over the years I have become pretty knowledgeable about bp, had to be, my mum won't.

She is doing much better and is actually coming home today. So I'm glad.

Hi, my name is Tracy and my boyfriend is bp. I have known him most of my life but we started dating not to long ago, and he was diagnosed about 2 years ago, and has been on his meds pretty stedily for a year now. He has problems with alcohol and has problems with drug use in the past. He is still up and down all the time. His last episode was about a year ago.
Im so thankfull for this community.

Hi everyone - myt name is Mer.

I just discovered this new DS community -- I've been active in the BP community since January (when there were just a few hundred BP's on here). My husband is BPI and my 22-year old daughter is BPII.

My husband and I met as teenagers - and have been happily married for 31 years. He has been disabled for the past 3 years with crippling depression - but only dx as BP about a year ago. We now realize that he has had two major manic episodes - but it isn't the "happy shopper" mania that I always thought mania was -- so I didn't know what it was until I became more educated about the disorder. Our daughter has had depression since she was in her early teens - chronic insomnia, ADD, migraines, and other typically co-morbid diseases/disorders. My husband was dx as an adult with ADD, and also has migraines, etc.

Fortunately, they are both very compliant with their meds, and accepting that they have BP. We now realiize that my mother-in-law is an undiagnosed BP (now SHE was the happy shopper -- bought a 36-ft power boat once on a whim, while both she and her husband were working multiple jobs just to make ends meet). My husband's grandmother was also hospitalized for 40+ years in a mental institution. So - there is definitely a genetic link in this family......

I am constantly researching all I can about bipolar - but honestly, this site has given me more info than any other source. And I've made a lot of friends here in the past 8 months.

Barbra - I hope your sister is doing better. Jess - I talk to your mom MHA on here all the time.

It's been a bumpy ride - and I'm sure there will be more bumps to come -- nice to have this community to share our challenges and suggestions.

my ex, who is still a good friend of mine is bipolar. he was diagnosed when in high school, so probably about 10 years ago. he hasnt seemed to have accepted he has bipolar, althought i think his recently manic episode has helped prove a little to him.
he nearly lost his family and friends, and probably has actually lost some friends.
he also nearly lost me by pushing me away. we are still friends, and i havent given up hope of another go. but time will tell. we both do still love each other though.
my friends havent been that helpful with all of this becayse they all have there own problems, so i am hoping that being here i can sort some feelings out and talk to ppl with similar problems.
one of my friends has told me that we can talk about anything but my ex, because she thinks i am just trying to get myself hurt, or that im addicted to him or something.

Hello all,

My name is Chris and I am married to a bi-polar gal with a 2-1/2 year old son. There is so much to tell but for now I'll leave it at that. I am very grateful that they have opened up this new forum.

Hi-
my husband is BPI. (he is "misanthrop" on DS). we have been together since before he was dx with BP in the early 1990's. we just celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. for the most part he has been stable until this past year when we had a slew of triggers which caused a really rough ride. it was during this time when i started to educate myself more about BP. found this site to be really usefu, and continually supportive. glad they formed this community specifically for us.

feel free to message or "friend" me- always looking for more people to relate to my situation.

-C

Hi there...i'm so glad they added this community for us!

My relationship with my ex fiance, who i believe is bp, recently ended. We've been on and off for the last year and a half. It's effected me a great deal, so it's been really helpful to find this site.