Hi, how’s it going? Hope you are doing well.
I knew a man at one time who had a brilliant mind. He could find a solution to any puzzle or problem, and he always had something cleaver to say. This man happened to have bipolar disorder. And, like many with the disorder, he didn’t take his medications. He thought he was doing fine. After all, he wasn’t depressed, and that’s what matters, right?
Except that he was manic. He ended up spending all of his rent money on things that he didn’t need and were non-returnable. He lost his job because he got mad at work and started ranting about things he shouldn’t have. He burned bridges with family and friends by the things he said and did when he was manic.
Naturally, he got kicked out of his apartment when he couldn’t pay the rent. He couldn’t go stay with anybody, because he had made them all mad at him. And he couldn’t afford to get a new place, because he had lost his job. He became homeless.
Since he lost his job, he lost the medical insurance that went with it, which means he lost his ability to see a psychiatrist and get medications. So he stayed off his medications, even when he no longer wanted to be off them. Now he’s been homeless for years, and the man that knew how to fix everybody’s problems doesn’t know how to fix his own.
It’s easy to think he was a fool, or an idiot. After all, how could he neglect his responsibilities that way? Or even, how could he think he could be off medications in the first place? Unfortunately, though, this is a very common problem.
Much of the time people who have bipolar disorder think they can go without their medications. And that usually leads to a downward cycle. Sometimes it ends in homelessness. Other times it ends in death, when the person gets so depressed that they take their own life. Sometimes it ends in losing all of the friends and family that a person has.
This is why it is so important to have and follow a treatment plan. If your loved one has bipolar disorder, then a treatment plan needs to be written with their future well-being in mind. At a time when they can think straight, have them sit down and think about their mentalities when they are manic or depressed. Have them write themselves reminders for those times as to why they should continue to follow their treatment plan even when they don’t want to.
Keep those reminders in a place that is easy to get to. Then, when they get to the point that they don’t want to take their medications or otherwise follow their treatment plan, pull out those reminders and show them to them.
There are things that can be done to prevent your loved one from becoming homeless. They will need your help with it, because there will be times when they just don’t feel like it. And, since bipolar disorder is a disorder that affects a person’s moods, when they don’t feel like something they are likely to not do it.
But you can be there as their reminder that they need to follow their treatment plan. If you feel you need to, remind them that many in their situation have ended up homeless, dead, or alone. Let them know that you don’t want them to end up like that, but you need their help to make sure that they don’t.
The aim is always for recovery, but it can be easy to look up so high that we don’t see the rock below that we are about to trip on. What I mean by this is, it can be easy to be so focused on what it will be like when they are in recovery that we forget to take the time to prevent them from getting worse. But it is something that needs to happen.
What can you do today to make sure that this doesn’t happen to your loved one?
Well, I have to go!
Your Friend,
Dave
Post responses below
Sounds a lot like me. I’m bipolar, quit taking my meds many months ago, find myself lost in a whirlpool where I don’t know if I’m up or down from one day to the next. I know I can right myself by getting back on my meds, but that seems to take more effort than I feel I’m worth.
Is it normal for a manic depressed person to become physically violent? I’m having a problem with conflicting information. He takes his medicine faithfully but when we have an argument or if he becomes displeased with something I say, he attacks me. The last time he punched me repeatedly and I don’t want him to get into trouble, but don’t know what to do. He’s not like that all the time, but every few months will lash out. He doesn’t hit co-workers but he does get angry with them sometimes.
“And, since bipolar disorder is a disorder that affects a person’s moods, when they don’t feel like something they are likely to not do it. But you can be there as their reminder that they need to follow their treatment plan.”
This sounds all nice and lovely David. I have tried doing this numerous times with my wife (diagnosed bipolar at 14). She ACTIVELY fights me left and right in such situations. She yells, gives me attitude, turns everything around so I’m the bad guy…or she just simply will not do things regardless of what is ay. I am under enough stress with everything going on in our lives right now (her bipolar is only part of it). How does one keep their composure and continue to be supportive when their loved one REFUSEs outwardly to do anything to help him or herself (except take medication in my case)?
day 5 or 6? and i still fight back memories and tears of school and weeks at a time in a broom closet. I made a chessboard in wood shop class. My neighbor made a fraternity pledge paddle. I don’t know why. There was nothing wrong with our principal’s other one. I remember it being swung like a baseball bat on a 12 year old boy. Lifting him off the ground. Being yelled at as he cried in pain on the floor. I remember the stuff thrown out of the closet as angry adults.Just before they shut me inside. Over and over i fight to hold back an ever weakening dam .Still medless and fighting because i can’t get anywhere or anything done. Meanwhile, all I can do is cry out asking strangers to help me carry my pain because, thats all I know how to do. I can’t ask my friends and family. They have carried all they are willing to or can. Fuck. I hate this. I tried so hard to start today good. i gtg
this sounds like one of my children. She is 21 and is wonderfull person when on meds and a nightmare to help when not.
I am at my wit’s end. My 19 year old son is burning the bridge with me and my husband. He steals from us regularly, screams at us, has temper tantrums regularly and has destroyed our house. He is on intense probation and the police are at our house regularly. I have MS and my husband is disabled. I have decided we are just as important as he is and we can’t live like this anymore. He can’t get a job because of his legal problems and he refuses to see a counselor or take his medication. He also has ADHD which makes things worse. We have done everything we could to help him over the years but once he turned 18 we lost all control. If he refuses to help himself there is nothing else we can do and we have told him he needs to move out. It breaks my heart but we have no choice. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink.
Hey Dave, My daughter Karen has bipolar and I control her Med’s, thank God she take’s them. Right now everything is fine for now.
The points you made were food for thought. My printer is broken and there fore I cannot print it out.. any way is it possible that it could be sent to me via USMail ? BJ Hughes 7117 Wood Hollow Dr.. Austin, TEXAS 78731
Please help!!!!!!!!!!! My dad is bi-polar,has been since he was around 14 years old, Another bad episode has peaked. Dad is yelling, making a scene to who ever is around, blowing off the handle and this is just the beginning again!!! Yes he is on meds and sees a doctor. They say there is nothing more they can do. The last episode was about 6 months ago, it got so violent dad had to move out or the cops were taking him to the hospital. Then he came depressed, he cried for days. Now mom is trying to get out before he gets violent on her again. What can we do? He does not even try to control has anger.
Poor man, I know how he feels & did in somethings. I hope he has gotten help, & back on his meds. What do you do when you have no supporters? I’ve tried to tell people they just don’t know how terrifying Bipolar. They don’t care, learn about it. So I have to do it myself. I keep having to have me med’s changed everytime I turn around, trying to stay out of the hospitals, I am just now learning to get into some online help sites for all my problems. It’s just so hard when you have to go at it alone, I need someone to help me with this mess, but too bad.
To LORI – You should never, EVER, allow ANYONE to abuse you physically, whether they are bipolar, alcoholic, or just plain ornery. Putting up with this kind of behavior makes you complicit in his “crime.” Get OUT before he hurts you so badly, you have no other choice. And, to answer your question, YES, it CAN be “normal” for a manic depressive person to become “physically violent.” I am “normally” a calm and rational bipolar. But, given the right provocation, have been known to become “physically abusive.” I have gotten into at least 2 physical, knock-down-drag-out fights with other people (NOT in my “normal” behavior realm), so do NOT, and I repeat, DO NOT stick around for more “violence.” If he hit you once, he’ll continue to lash out whenever the “mood” strikes (pun intended). You sound like a rational person; do NOT let your boyfriend/husband abuse you this way. Make sure he sees a doctor/psychiatrist, and get HELP by way of medication and/or therapy – and then…and ONLY then…return to your home. I’m telling you this from experience…you will continue to be a battered woman if you don’t…
BIG HUGS to all bipolar survivors and those who love us. May God bless you real good. I continue to pray for my country.
Thanks for your continued support.
My husband is bipolar. when he becomes hyper he does not take his drugs regularly as its required, he keeps on skipping and recovery takes too long. After one or two months it strikes again becomes violet and refuses to have his drugs. till now he has not understood why hes on drugs and he says he’s well despite his intolerable behavior.i try to explain to him but its so hard for him to understand. we are always arguing and this upsets me. please help me. what do i do?? i dont want to loose him
beleave me I truely understand his delima my husband is paranoid skitzoprenic and my son has seveare autism and my daughter is manic depresant and our family has been scattered for a year my one daughter and I are home but it dont feel like home now and the court wants to terminate my rights to my children and take my husbands rights. screwed in ky
We tried everything. We tried letting chaos back into our lives and giving him a chance to stay at home for 6 months (he had been living in a group home shelter) but the abuse intensified each month and the spinning of our reality just got to be too much. His psychiatrist is pathetic too for not getting him on the right meds, he colludes with him in being psychotic at night and delusional by day. He was reported to DHS for abuse. And then finally we had to call the police after being terrorized and threatened and repeatedly intimidated. The police took him to jail b/c he was not acting out in their presence even though we asked that he go to crises center. Then instead of agreeing to the mental health court treatment he wanteed a trial. And now, it turns out, after 19 years of trying to help this person, that is all there is, no more. No remorse, nothing. All we can do is protect ourselves. The Mental Health court wouldn’t even mandate anger management and yet anger issues and being on an antipsychotic (which he is not) are the two main issues. Frustrated with the broken system and one very broken mind. .
My 14 year old daughter is bipolar, she refuses to take her medications. She has attacked me physically to the point that I had to call 911. She sees a therapist every week, she also has a psychologist, psychiatrist and a prventive worker. Nothing is helping because she is getting worse and I can’t take it emotionally. Does anyone have advise, what can I do?
Dear Monique – My daughter is Bipolar 1, she turned 17 today, I am grateful we are seeing 17! and we have been there and back. This is actually the first time I have commented on anything but I have been there, in the place you are now – do I have the stories to tell. The best advise I can offer is that you probably need to do some looking around at different doctors. We had been going to different doctors for years until one night we ended up sending her in an ambulance to the emergency room. Our pediatrician referred us to a new psychiatrist who somehow had the ability to create a trust with her. She is taking her meds, and doing better, not perfect, but life is better. If you lived near us I would refer you as I consider him a miracle worker – do any of the doctors specialize in adolescents? One thing I noticed about our Doc is he knows the “language” of teens while still able to communicate with me. This may not be helpful but he did tell me to give her the medication (Abilify) in pudding? I have also told my daughter that if she does not take her medication then she will go in the hospital and be forced to take her medication, which is true, I would have to put her in the hospital if not for her own safety but the safety of others. I wish you all the love in the universe and all my prayers – this is the life unexpected. xoxo Leslie
I went through this very thing through my mid teens all the way through my mid 20’s. I was diagnosed bipolar at 15 years old. I was a very angry, very depressed , very sick person at that time. I burned all my bridges with my family,friends and anyone who tried to help me. this eventually landed me on the streets at 18 with nowhere to go,and no one to count on. My mom had to make the hardest decision of her life to ask me go. Knowing full well that she may never see me again. I ended up in a homeless shelter at nights, my days were filled with nothing to do but wounder around and self loath, trying to figure out a way to kill myself.
I somehow managed to keep alive through 2 years of living like this.To this day, I’m not sure how i survived, but somewhere deep inside I had the will to live. Somewhere along the way, something clicked inside me, I finally realized that I should have to tried to be more accepting of the help that others wanted to give me. I should have tried to do it their way, and not be so stubborn….this was my epiphany, my moment of change.Even though I have a mental illness, I was able to think clearly for at least one moment. Just long enough to realize that I needed to make an effort for myself, because nobody else could do it for me. It took 2 years of living as low as a person can get, just barely surviving for me to have this point of realization for myself. I also realize that not everyone will ever get to this point, some will die before they reach this point of self awareness. Some will wounder around for the rest of their lives mad at the world and hating themselves. i dont think you can tell who will be able to do this and who cant. I will say this, after talking to my mom over the last few years, she told me that she had to accept the fact that she may be sending me out in the harsh world to die. But that she was comfortable with the fact that she had done all she could for me, and it was time for me to sink or swim. She had to live with that decision through the 2 years that she did not know if i was dead or alive, and I’m sure that she second guessed herself many times, but in the end, It was the right decision. I never would have changed if not for the experiences I had. Now i am still bipolar, and I still have my moments where I really dont care about much, but usually somewhere along the way. I will have that clear moment where I remember why I am where I am. I can usually calm down from there.
I also realize that this mental illness affects everyone a little different. Not everyone will be able to self contain. So it would be easy to say that i am dead wrong. I’m not confessing to be a doctor,or someone who has been trained to deal with bipolar disorder. I can only share my experiences with you, and tell you what happened to me.
I guess my point is this. I feel very strongly that not everyone can be helped in a traditional way. I believe that sometimes the best way to help someone is to let them go. I believe this is especially true for younger people who have no idea what real life is like. Take for instance the story of Diane up above me. That story is not so much different from my own, and I feel for her. And I believe with all my heart that she is making the right choice for her and her son. Stay strong Diane.
I lost my job to China. My insurance ended when my unemployement ended. I am 59, bipolar, and have had a 4 way bypass heart surgery. No one is willing to hire me. I lost my psychiatrist and meds as a result of losing insurance coverage and my job. The job loss…heck, none of it….is not my fault. I did nothing wrong yet society is casting a bipolar into their midst without a care. I don’t think i am dangerous. But apprently, from what i read, I may be. To myself and others without my meds. I can’t afford them. I won’t qualify for medicare for another few months and I am collecting dissability. You know a bipolars bad spending habits. Can’t quality for medicaid either. So what am I to do. I have exhausted my resources, been off my meds now for a month. I can’t get anymore and I really dont want to loss it. Heck, maybe i’m not really bipolar. I feel fine.
***warning very long post, you can skip down to the other stars to get to the point of the post***
Long story short my dad was abused very badly as kid, his father was worse than your stereotypical alcoholic abusive parent, he died when my dad was like 12, but his mother was horrible to him too, he had a terrible childhood, then had a messed up first marriage, but then after getting out of that he met my mom, they’ve been married for 20 years.
my dad is bipolar, and he takes lots of medication, he’s so happy and wonderful, but when something is bad he just loses it MORE THAN NORMAL lately it seems! Everytime he has to deal with an irritating coworker, when he’s driving his road rage is nuts, he so easily gets mad at waiters, his side of the family is just sick and abusive to him, they manipulate him (but he’s very passive and gets walked all over until he explodes you know?)
so his mother, his sister and brother and daughter (from the previous marriage) are just… terrible to him beyond worse. Like, his daughter is completely detached from our family because of all the stress and money she has cost us (she’s 32 now and still without a job, she realized she cant ask my dad for more money like she always had cause my dad finally had a lightbulb go off with money, you know)
but anyways EVERY time he has any kind of interaction with those people he just… goes ballistic. He would act out, lash out at my mother or my brother (never at me? I mean, sometimes he starts to but for some reason I am always able to calm him down… i don’t know why this is!) and being emotionally and verbally abusive, it’s like he’s having some crazy episode…
I can tell everytime he is having an episode like this if it’s either for a small period of time (like impatience with the “outside world”) or if its for a long period of time and even WORSE (when he brings that frustration into the house and onto us) that it’s literally like he is “not there” mentally if that makes sense?
he speaks to a counselor, the same one for many years… but that never seems to help on a permanent level…
*****
The reason I’m posting this and asking for help was this recent episode:****
the other night was the worst, I dont know if my dad forgot his medication or what, but he hasnt acted out this badly in 20 years, and the thing is, he’s had a combination of being stressed out at work and having to interact with his mom, sister, and other daughter.
he was picking my brother up from the airport, with my mom, I wasn’t with them, to cut a very long story short he basically got randomly furious and stopped the car at a light, got out with his keys, left my mom/bro in the car, acted like he was going to throw the keys in the grass/street, and then when my mom/bro got out of the car, he ran back to the car and yelled that they could walk home, they got back in the car quick enough and driving the rest of the way home he was driving like a maniac, speeding like crazy, you get the idea…
I feel like this is tearing my family apart. he is a good person, he is such a good person with a good heart, he’s a wonderful father, but when he’s bad… it’s like he never learned how to behave! I don’t know what to do or say, my mom is losing her grip on everything, my brother is not only imitating his behavior but also blaming himself for everytime my dad lashes out at him, i dont know what to do or think!
extra info; my dad is also 57 years old, needs to lose a little less than 100 lbs, and his whole life he seems to just love watching tv, he comes home and loves his entertainment center you know? but… when he watches things like the news and if it irritates him he’ll start talking to himself/the tv and get really mad/start yelling :C he used to have a hobby, he had a boat, but it was rear ended and totaled.
he does not deserve this rage or stress or guilt, and neither does me or my brother or mother… but I’m so upset.
***I just don’t know what to say, my family is expecting me to talk to him tonight or tomorrow, but i feel like… this behavior isn’t something that can be changed, only managed, but how can we all manage it if its literally EVERY OTHER THING setting him off?
please please advice…
Hello my gf has stoped taking her meds because she was on a bad dose but has given up on the whole dr thing because she thinks she fine ie manic she happy thats she getting more things done going out but she is still raging shouting and thinks that no one will listen to her and we are all agenst her she been very snappy and ranting abusivly at me telling me to fuck off why do you think you can help you dont know anything just because you been reading up on bi poler dosent mean you have all the anwsers go off and fucking salk you any me on purpers then the next second she talking how mutch she loves me but she wont take my advices to go back to the dr i’m worried about when she hits a low and i know it’s going to come but i think she lost trust in me and i know her with out being bp is a very stubben persone who will leve it to it gets very bad befor she dose anything about it i think we have lost the comunation during this and i dont know what to do to help her i’m lost i dont want to leave her because i know she not like this when she not manic but i’m scard it’s going to get wores for her and the ppl she loves around her befor she relases she dose need the help
My dad was recently diagnosed with severe bipolar disorder. After years of abuse my mom left my dad. Now with no job, and no place to go my dad is about to become homeless. He doesn’t have any insurance so he does not get the medication that he needs. Does any one know what I can do to help my father???? I feel he is at the end and am scared that he might just give up and possibly even take his own life since he has threatened it before. Does anyone have any advice or know any one or place I can call for help or answers. please…
I am at the end of my rope in 06 my husband was diagnosed with bipolar disorder he was taking meds his doctor lost her liscense to practice not sure why after that he never found another doctor he does go to a pain doctor for other issues. so he hasn’t been taking meds now he lost his job (which he has a hard time keeping one) so now know medical insurance its hard to believe there is no health insurance for his situation. I dont know what to do.