What it's Like to Live with Bipolar Disorder

I am definitely over simplifying this but that because it is meant to share my story, not really educate on the disorder as a whole. Bipolar disorder is a mood disorder characterized by very high highs and very low lows. There are two main types, bipolar type one and bipolar type two. What you have is characterized by how long it lasts and your symptoms.

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I have been seeing a psychiatrist since I was 16. I was diagnosed with having major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder when I started to see her. After learning a little about bipolar in a college psychology class, I realized I had symptoms of both depression and hypomania at 17. I told her my thoughts about having bipolar disorder and she brushed it off. Less than a month after I turned 18, I had my first hypomanic episode.

For four nights, I did not sleep at all. During the day, while my family was gone, in a total of five days, I hooked up with five different guys. I downloaded an app and asked them if they wanted to come over. Obviously, since they were 18-23, they said yes. My thinking was so out of it that I forgot my dad had cameras outside the house. He saw one guy's car on the camera. I was kicked out for a couple nights. Luckily, I was close to my neighbor at the time and she let me sleep there until stuff settled down. After the hypomanic episode ended, I went into a deep depression, as I had many times before. I got very self destructive, hurting myself however I could and even trying to end my own life.

That led to a psychiatric emergency room visit where they actually determined I was fine to go home. Like I said, not the first time. I didn't want inpatient and I knew what I had to say to avoid it... The truth. Doctors didn't seem to realize how bad my mental health had gotten even though I had been to the psychiatric emergency room countless times.

My psychiatrist asked at my next appointment about that emergency room visit. I told her about the hypomania. Every symptom, all the bad stuff I did, how hard I crashed from it. She didn't believe me.

I was too scared to start fresh with a new therapist so I stayed with her, on the wrong type of medication, until I was 20. At that point, I started seeing an adult psychiatrist. I told him everything about my past and he immediately agreed that it was bipolar. However, he said it was type one. I knew that was wrong, as my hypomania has never lasted a week. It has always been 4-5 days, meeting criteria for type two, not type one. Eventually I stopped seeing him because I was discharged from the program he works at.

I then, at 22, started seeing the psychiatrist I have now. My first appointment was a little over an hour because there was so much in my history that I knew she wanted to hear from me. I told her everything... How I was misdiagnosed for years, even after having several hypomanic episodes, how I was then told it was type one, and so much more.

When I told her he said it was type one, she asked me how long these episodes are. I informed her that they are always 4-5 days with the same symptoms every time. She told me it is type two like I suspected for years. What I didn't know is that there's another name for it, bipolar depression.

I have been on the same mood stabilizer since I started seeing her in February 2023. It has been great at preventing hypomania until this week. I didn't see the signs until yesterday but it explains a lot of my behavior that is, for me, abnormal. The first sign that was there, that I thought nothing of, is how on Monday I wrote four pieces. I have never done that before.