Description and Symptoms of Bipolar Disorder Essay

Introduction

Bipolar disorder is a mental health condition displays some symptoms with the affected individual. The condition makes an individual have a mood swing that is either hyperactive or depressive. Where the individual is hyperactive, he/she displaces high emotional tempers (commonly regarded as mania or hypomania). If the individual is depressed, he/she becomes withdrawn and of low spirits. A depressed person is observed being sad, hopeless and of little or no interest to the activities taking place. These symptoms of mood swing can affect person's sleeping patterns, critical thinking, judgment and general behavior.

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Although the bipolar condition is a lifelong condition, the episodes of mood swings described occurred quite often with some individuals and rarely on others. This depended on how one managed the condition following the treatment plan.

Treatment of Bipolar disorder

The bipolar condition can be treated medication through doctor's review or by psychological counseling by the therapists. There are some bipolar and related disorders, for instance, bipolar I disorder and bipolar II disorder. However, their symptoms (irrespective of the type) can cause unpredictable mood changes resulting in irreparable damages and difficulties in life.

Respond to Bipolar disorder by family and friends

The effects of bipolar disorders are widely felt beyond the individuals with the disorder to the family, friends, colleagues, and people living and interacting with them. It is tough for the affected members to handle the bipolar disorder individuals. Irrespective of how well the disorder is managed or how well the condition is known, the effects to the members of the society surrounding him/her are affected in many ways. The people around a bipolar individual have to learn to live with the demands of the mentally ill person.

Meeting the demands of someone with severe symptoms can be very stressful and exhausting especially if self-harming thoughts such as suicide are ringing in the mind of the ill person. The members around such person have to always worry of having to deal with unprecedented dangerous behavior that may arise from the disorder. Regular routines of the surrounding people are often disrupted to attend to the actions of the mentally ill person. Members of the family and friends are often worried because of their disorderly loved ones since they know any episode which brings subjective distress can severely damage them. The family and close family members to the bipolar disorder person, from time to time, they wrestle with conflicting stresses. The family's focus is more often shifted entirely onto the patients at the expense of the members of the family. Families and friends have to foot the bills and handles responsibilities of their bipolar loved ones throwing the families into crisis.

Characteristics of Bipolar Disorder

According to the current bipolar disorder trends, a syndrome characterized by dysfunctional psychological disturbances increases the prevalence of bipolar abnormality. Three traits are commonly considered in defining bipolar disorder as abnormal behavior. These are cultural inappropriateness, subjective distress, and psychological impairments. In understanding the diagnostic procedures, the writer of the book identified the process through the healer is eventually healed. The writer identified mental disorders and behavior of interests as factors that have led to the quick behavioral change among the bipolar patients. In her research and findings, she makes a view that bipolar abnormality is a continuum through which if no appropriate measure is taken to cure, it can result in extreme damages. She notes that each person may identify as a bipolar patient only that the extremes vary. Since most people fall in the mid-point of the extreme ends; where the mild inhibitions do not seriously handicap the prevailing activities.

Treatments given to the bipolar patients were both medicinal and psychological. However, the administration was a balance of the two (Geddes & Miklowitz, 2013). The treatment entailed a combination of at least one mood-stabilizer and antipsychotic and psychotherapy. They were both effective as the administration was scientific. The treatment was also administered under the guidance of familiar concepts and generalizations which met the reliability and validity measurements.

How it feels to be in the writer's shoes

The writer being a bipolar patient was emotive writing about this manic-depressive illness (Jamison, 2015). Coming out and writing a descriptive plight about herself was not quite an easy task. It was a landmark venture in the world of writing for her to publicly describe a 'disease' she was suffering from. It is no wonder she has publicly been recognized as the professor of the psychiatric. Naturally, it would be expected that the writer suffering from the condition would be reluctant to share how they feel. However, she broke the odds and wrote about a disorder she was suffering from inside. In her words, she described how it feels like to live with bipolar disorder. Through her quest, the inner understanding was developed, and many souls healed.

The best of her writing was that she was very optimistic about everything related to the disorder. What she feels for other bipolar patients is inexplicable through suffering and thrill. Her writing work reflects her own and that of peers suffering from the disorder. The exploration in her writing could not be expressed any better by any other writer.

References

Jamison, K. R. (2015). An unquiet mind (Vol. 4). Pan Macmillan.

Geddes, J. R., & Miklowitz, D. J. (2013). Treatment of bipolar disorder. The Lancet, 381(9878), 1672-1682.