My PCP thought I likely had PTSD, but my therapist and I didn't feel that I met many of the criteria. I know that I experienced traumatic events that continue to effect me, but I don't know that I have PTSD "officially".

Did this diagnosis come from a doc, or a mental health professional?

It came from a clinic MD

Does the other direction count? I was in psychotherapy for 20 years before the VA published its first in-house article on PTSD. The PTSD theories explained allot of symptoms that previous dx'es glossed over.

He said i have bipolar disorder

But the therapist said ptsd

That has happened quite often actually Girlscry......

They have many of the same symptoms .... A lot of doctors won't offer a specific diagnosis now .... :They refer to 'labels' I think for this exact reason

Different treatments work for PTSD however we often have some of the same treatments as well.....

Therapy more then medication treats PTSD.....and medication more then therapy for bipolar..... Big hug.....xo

However a person can also have both disorders.....

I would work with a psychiatrist as well as your therapist and try not to worry about it too much as the symptoms can be treated.......xo

Omg i love your name
Not really sure. If i started off on the right foot i see the psy Monday again for a re evaluation

I was wrongly diagnosed for years and then got diagnosed with CPTSD with a psychologist, family doc and recomfirmed recently by pdoc

Yup, my diagnosis progressed with as the research developed, and the research developed as historical events emerged. My first diagnosis was depression, when the first generation of antidepressants came out in 1985. The historical event was my divorce #1. Then in 1995, I was diagnosed bipolar and PTSD both, when the first new bipolar meds came out.

Finally, in 2009, I was diagnosed PTSD only, when a VA doc diagnosed me. By then the Iraq War and its frequent use of Improvised Explosive Devices against US soldiers there had brought attention to traumatic brain injury. It turned out I had been in a car bombing as a missionary kid overseas when I was living in a war zone at age 9. Six more years of combat during that period of my brain development was the real source of my symptoms.

Rather than be upset that it had taken so long to pinpoint my diagnosis and its cause, I was so happy I became a hospital chaplain on a brain surgery unit at a major medical center in 2009 so I could help others with brain trauma like me. I'd been a hospital chaplain in ER, Alzheimer's, and heart transplant units since 2001, but my diagnosis made me eager to help brain trauma patients like myself

As SunCloud says, the symptoms of PTSD and bipolar disorder overlap, even though the causes of them are so different. So it's common to have a diagnosis of one when really having the other, though it's entirely possible to have both at once. Then years I was treated for bipolar and PTSD weren't lost years; my symptoms were treated all the while until mental health medicine caught up with me. You're fortunate to be going for reevaluation nowadays when mental health medicine is more up to date, so good luck to you Monday when you see your psychiatrist again, Girlscry.

He wouldn't see me for the reevaluation
And instead insists that i should try lithium

I am very hurt. Y someone nit aleast trying to hear my point of view and am even confused as to what to do now