I often read your emails through a couple of times. Today I could only read it once, my blood pressure goes so high.

You can say that I don’t have to read them, that I can unsubscribe. From the perspective of having a serious imbalance. Sometimes I get my best laugh of the day by reading your emails because the things suggested are so absurd.

I do all the things that the so-called “professionals” say that I do, but even that doesn’t work. I am totally med-compliant Like most things it is best to just think about what these people are telling you to do, and figure out in your own mind if it is reasonable.

Too often we are given what seem to be “simple solutions” and then feel like failures when “sure things” don’t work.

Yes a positive attitude can help but sometimes, no matter how much you want something it is just not within our grasp.

A lot of those with the bipolar diagnosis (and their supporters) main jobs, are cruise directors on the Titanic just rearranging the deck chairs.

How can you remain positive, when each time you trust someone with bi-polar, they hurt you or use you, or disrespect you. For 5 years, I have supported my bi-polar brother, through suicide attempts, and over-medication, taxes, debts, jail, etc.. He seems to get a thrill from stealing or hurting the people who have tried to help him and then lying to their face… I am so over this…at this point, I really dont care what happens, since he will do what he wants to do regardless of any assistance (unwanted) I try to provide..
According to doctors, social workers, etc, he is a grown man.. I see the train wreck coming, but there is no way to stop it..as he has a right to make his own decisions.. He is going to wind up living out of a dumpster, since he has will make his decisions regardless of anyone else..
Positive, I am positive he is going to wind up dead or in jail

Such an interesting topic you bring up today. I am bipolar and I have to say that you cannot think your way out of being bipolar. There is no cure, only treatment. Currently my treatment is successful and I’ve been mostly stable for over a year and a half.

I am surrounded by positive thinking friends. Some of them think so positively that they will come right out and say you cause your own illness by your emotions and thoughts. They don’t know the real me or that I suffer from a mental illness, nor do I intend to tell them. So some positive thinking styles can be hurtful.

I went on a news fast for many years, but I hang with a very intelligent crowd and started to feel uninformed and ignorant. I want to know what is going on in the world, not just my little, isolated piece of it. When I go to the gym – I catch up on the news. Endorphins and intellectual stimulation at the same time. Different strokes for different folks.

My local support group is awful. You spend 2 hours and come out depressed. Put a roomful of manics together and it’s very unlikely you’re going to find a positive atmosphere.

Finally while I agree with you that striving for the positive will help a bipolar to stay stable and therefore happier, I have to add that with every episode, a small piece of my essence, confidence, & courage erodes. My world becomes a little darker and it is a bit harder to crawl back up to that happy place. You just can’t think yourself out of being bipolar.

Hi Dave and thanks for enforcing the positive mindset. The problem that my family has is with my son who is bipolar and a very, very negative thinker. He is the one who is responsible for losing friends and family because he causes so much depression in all around him with his negative thoughts. No matter how hard we try to lift him up and give him hope, he always comes up with reasons why all of our suggestions won’t work and seems to enjoy telling us that we don’t understand what he is going through. No, we don’t know, but we have told him again and again that we hurt too, because he is hurting and we love him. But it’s true, we are tired of always hearing “poor me”. He wants to be taken care of like a child but treated like an adult – he is 45 years old and SHOULD TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY FOR HIS ACTIONS AND LIFE – or am I wrong? Please help Dave!

Hey, dave I want to ty for todays post and all the other ones ive recieved from u, I have a lot problems myself of negative thinking which I’m working on in different ways, my girlfriend that ive been with for fifteen months, has a bipolar son, also some other issues, he’s mother and I had a argument one day about three weeks ago, and I haventbeen able to c them since then because it brought up so many bad, negative thoughts of me he doesn’t want to c me, it’s very hard loving someone and not able fox them, it’s the first for me, she also has 2 autistic kids as well I
Love very much, mostly of all I just want to ty for taking the time to educate yourself on learning about this mental illness, that I need to learn more about.

My experience is having to be overly positive to counteract the negative dimension of the bipolar relative we have who thinks he is the life of the party when in reality he drags everyone down with his sociopathic thinking and acting out. It is exhausting. The family is exhausted. Friends are exhausted. Children are exhausted. Even when he is manic he is very negative and nasty. And it is the nasty negative that is frightening to witness because of the abuse that goes on. So yes, it is important to stay positive with any illness and negativity only makes it worse but my experience with bipolar is that they simply look at the cup half empty instead of half full and then blame everyone around them that they are miserable or feel entitled to make everyone else miserable however they can. No matter what you do for a bipolar spouse it will never be good enough because they are so pathetically unhappy with themselves it taints everything else. If you ask my kids if they want him around they say he ruins everything. Now that “ruins everything” has changed with coping with healing from trauma which is very hard work also. You don’t realize what you have been dealing with until you get away from it and spend time with normal people. Normal meaning those who aren’t getting a kick out of being in trouble, causing trouble, or making other people miserable, as Lisa described above. People do stop caring when they have just had enough. And it takes twice the amount of time for the family to heal from the tragic consequences of the episodes, than it takes for the person themselves – and this I am told is because the person that has the bipolar doesn’t seem to care how they are affecting other peoples lives. They are too caught up in their own dysfunction and destruction. So yes, be positive when your relative is doing positive things to help themselves – therapy, taking the meds that help them interact in a way that is not hurting other people, being responsible. That is something to celebrate and be positive about. But I think it is more realistic to not live in the superficial world of “everything is just fine” when it is not. There is a lot of crazymaking that goes on in a home with a person with bipolar disorder and one of the mistakes I have made for years is staying so positive that everything would be better, because everything kept getting worse. And each time I pretended to not react or “stay positive” it meant that our bipolar relative would act out at a more extreme level to get attention like an ante up. Maybe being negative about the behavior and not putting up with it with it as positively would have helped more.

I’ve maintained a positive attitude throughout all my sister’s episodes, but today I feel so bloody tired. We’ve fallen out (yet again). This happens with alarming frequency now, it never used to be this bad. We can spend hours on the phone, me being positive, her being negative and as much as I feel I should be 100% supportive, after one of these exceptionally draining conversations, there’s noone to support and help me. My husband is fed up, my children don’t know whether they’ll see their Aunty anytime soon and throughout this, I have to keep a smile on my face and be there. It’s incredibly testing and quite frankly don’t know if I want to continue being the supporter. I like to think of myself as positive person, but her constant negative energy is wearing me down. Interestingly, this blog has now become more than slightly negative (which was never my intention), but I feel better because I finally got this off my chest. Many thanks for that! ; )

Dave,
Could I refer to this article on my blog?
Wendy Love

I think a focus on positive thinking is valuable. I also believe we have some control over our interpretations of any given circumstance, but our capabilities are limited.

Having bipolar disorder symptoms is one mitigating factor, but there are many others, like fatigue, that affect all people.

I agree that in the midst of a depressive episode, a “think positive” plan is not an option, and there is no justification for feeling bad because you are during that episode, unable to think positively.

Coping with a major depression is a daunting task, and doing so is a success, which is commendable whether or not any happy thoughts enter your mind. You probably cannot even give yourself the credit you deserve for coping to the best of your ability.

There is another reason to allow, with some limits upon yourself, so-called “negative” thoughts to integrate and flow freely in your consciousness. That is that “negative” thoughts serve important purposes.

“Negative” thoughts can, for instance, alert you of danger or of things that are, for you personally, events or places better avoided.

As an analogy, if you cannot swim, and your friends invite you on a trip to the ocean, you will likely have negative thoughts about the prospect of the trip, even though your friends are looking forward to a great time. Your “negative” thoughts about some situations protect you. They are adaptive for you, so it is arguable whether or not “negative” is an accurate description—for you, only you.

That does not make your friends, who have “positive” feelings and thoughts about the ocean, wrong. “Positive” thoughts are adaptive for them, because those thoughts motivate them to do something they enjoy.

So, thoughts, both your own, and those of your friends, distinguish you from one another. Naturally we all have things we like, and things we do not like. “Negative” thoughts have value because they reflect individual identities.

What if your friends love the ocean so much that they dread the time when they have to get out of the water and return to the beach? At that time, they have “negative” thoughts about the beach. But those comparatively “negative” feelings do not transform their whole mindset. They haven’t become “negative,” but the change indicates the degree to which they feel “positive” about being in the ocean.

All of this is simply to say that having “positive” and “negative” thoughts can reflect preferences and personalities.

For instance, the question of whether or not support groups are “positive” or “negative” is a subject of debate here.

Like many aspects of recovery, what is, to one person, “negative” might well be very “positive” for another. No one can tell another person whether or not a support group is good or bad for THEM, but each person determines what is “positive” or “negative” for themselves.

In any case, it is worth considering the fact that there is more than one support group available, that there is no possibility that any of us has visited all support groups, of every kind, in order to make a blanket statement that they are, without exception, “negative.” Likewise, it is impossible to state with certainty that any one support group is always “negative.” We are shortsighted if we fail to consider that group dynamics, attendance, and general atmosphere change constantly, just as individuals do.

A last point to consider is that labeling any individual as a “negative person” or a “positive person” is neither useful or accurate, as it is inevitable that ALL of us are capable of being “positive,” “negative,” and everything in between.

Thankfully, human behavior is much to complex and interesting to be categorized in this “either-or” paradigm.

Some people consider our thoughts as behaviors. Again, I do not believe that is to say that we have complete control over those thoughts/behaviors. But I do think this is a very useful model for observing ourselves, our thoughts, and how those thoughts affect attitudes and behaviors.

It is true that some of us, depending upon circumstances, habits, or psychological needs, “behave” in their thoughts in a way that is not positive. Regardless of our opinion of one particular person, what if we thought of their “negative” attitude as the result of a behavior? That would mean we could think of what they are DOING as “negative” without writing off the person. Absolutely, it is still important to avoid that person IF it harms you.

However, look how much more power we recognize for ourselves if we know that we are “behaving” in a negative way, rather than having looked in the mirror and labeled ourselves “negative people,” which is an indictment of our whole character. “Behaviors” suggest the potential to CHANGE those actions/thoughts/attitudes which we find are not helpful.

Interestingly, categorizing ourselves or others as either “positive” or “negative” is thinking in polarities. This might appear to make our choices easier, but it does not credit any of us, as adult human beings with being as complex, adaptive, perceptive, and capable of shrewd discriminating between what is “positive” for us, as unique people. In fact, we are, each of us, capable of all of that.

This is an ongoing process. I like to pay the most attention to where I fall (at any given time), which place, somewhere between the polarities of “positive” and “negative,” because that awareness, rather than judgment, teaches me to develop into the person, and the soul, I want to be.

Be positive! Even when you’re negative, you win–as long as you keep your eyes open…

Sorry I meant “Family Member” not “Shona” even though some of what Shona said was amazing as well.