Hi,

You know I have a lot of people that work for me, right? Well, I have some that have worked for me for a long time…And some that don’t work for me anymore. Do you want to know the difference? The people who don’t work for me anymore stopped learning. They just kept working off the knowledge they had learned before, and it was outdated. I run a company that is always changing, always growing. And you just have to keep up with it. If you don’t keep up with the growth, and learn new things, you just can’t improve in your job. But the people who have stayed, have done just the opposite. They don’t keep going on old knowledge. They keep up with current trends. They keep learning new skills. They keep improving, so they keep getting better at their job. That’s why they are so valuable to me.

You have to learn and progress. You have to keep learning more and more about bipolar disorder. You can’t just keep going on the knowledge you learned when your loved one was first diagnosed.

Here’s an example: We all have old photographs, right? If you are a parent, every year your children get pictures from school. Well, you don’t keep every picture every year and display them (or else you’d run out of room, wouldn’t you?). Each year, you probably replace the old one with the new one. It’s like replacing old knowledge with new knowledge. It’s not like you throw the old photographs away, you still keep them. You never forget them. You just may put them away in favor of the new ones. Because there’s always growth, you see?

Here’s another example: Say you have a garden. You can’t keep growing new flowers or vegetables off old soil. You have to keep tilling that soil each year. You don’t get rid of the old ground, you just till the old ground, making room for new ground. Again, like new knowledge on top of old knowledge.

So here’s how it relates to bipolar disorder. (You knew I’d get there eventually, right?) The point of all this is that you need to keep learning and progressing. If you have a doctor who doesn’t do this, then they may not be the best doctor for your loved one. If they are like the employees I talked about in the beginning, are they really doing a good job? The best doctors I know continue learning. They keep researching. They read journals all the time. They check the Internet for new information all the time. They attend seminars. They go to lectures. They go to symposiums.

Sometimes they’re even the guest speakers! They attend bipolar support groups and even learn from supporters what their problems are with their loved ones and learn that way. They sometimes discuss difficult cases or problems with other doctors or specialists so that they can learn.

If your doctor isn’t doing these things, and just keeps doing what they learned years ago, then you might have a problem. Because new things are being learned about bipolar disorder every day. Check up on them. Ask them questions. If they hesitate, or if you think you know more than them, then there might be a problem, just like there was with my employees. You have a right to the best treatment for your loved one. And you need a doctor who is always learning new things about bipolar disorder.

Well, I have to go!

Your Friend,

Dave