Hi,

In fact, I hope you had really good holidays, as I did. I did work a lot (I always do), but still, I did enjoy the holidays. I have some great plans for the coming new year, as you will see over the next few months. Well… Did you make any New Year’s resolutions this year? I’ve given up making them, because I always seem to break them (unfortunately)! They were always the same anyway…To get better organized, etc. Just like most people.

The thing is, in order to stick to your New Year’s resolutions, you have to be realistic. Like, if you want to lose weight, you can’t just say, “I’m going to lose 10 pounds in a month,” because, well, that’s just not realistic, is it? It’s also not very healthy. It would be more realistic to have a goal to eat more healthy and to lose weight (inches) as you go. Doing it that way would also take less pressure off you.

It may be difficult for your loved one to set goals and be realistic about them as well. For one thing, they may be thinking about the past year (in relation to the new year coming up)… And dealing with some disappointment in relation to that. They may have had some resolutions that they made that they failed at, and be feeling bad about them. Especially if these resolutions had to do with their recovery from bipolar disorder.

What I mean by being realistic versus unrealistic is this: They may have expected more from themselves this past year than they were realistically able to perform (in light of having the disorder). So they had unrealistic expectations of themselves. They may have even unwittingly set themselves up to fail. So they may be disillusioned. Or even depressed.

They may have the same unrealistic expectations of you as well. They may have some set idea of what the perfect bipolar supporter is in their mind. But it may not be realistic. In fact, it may not even be right. For example: It may even lean toward enabling. And if you succumbed to their idealistic version of what you’re supposed to be as a bipolar supporter, you could very well

enable them, instead of being a good supporter in actuality. So instead of helping them, you would actually be hurting them in the long run. So maybe you have to be the one who stays

realistic when your loved one gets unrealistic. Then maybe you can sort of direct them toward

being more realistic, in a gentle way.

You can also help, as I was saying earlier, by having your own goals and expectations be realistic. For example: Although you should expect them to pay consequences for their actions from a bipolar episode, you can go a little easy on them as regards their recovery in general, and not expect them to recover maybe as quickly as you would like, but to understand that it will

take time for them to recover. Thinking realistically, you can resolve to be more understanding that they will recover in their own time and at their own rate in the new year.

Well, I have to go!

Your Friend,

Dave