Let me start off by saying I am not trying to discredit anyone's diagnosis (I am not a professional just someone who has spent years trying to understand the human mind and to better educate myself on how to be better balanced) but challenging those of us with mental health concerns to be honest in our process and keep our care providers and ourselves honest and engaged.

When did the diagnosis of bi-polar become the psychiatric communities broad label of "I don't know what you suffer from so it must be bi-polar."? It is not fair to all those people who get the bi-polar diagnosis after 2 visits or a patients initial explanation of what they suffer from. It took me YEARS of hospitalizations, off and on therapy and medication process to come to this diagnosis and so many people get told they suffer from this daunting illness so quickly anymore. How are people to address their concerns if they don't know what their real issues are. Bi-polar disorder gets labeled as hopeless by many and the poor persons who suffer from it and even worse, the people who are told that they do and really just suffer from improperly managed anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder or clinical depression etc, feel overwhelmed and hopeless. Many people who are told they suffer from bi-polar disorder don't know what it really is. Yes dramatic mood swings are a part of bi-polar disorder but everyone struggles with mood swings, memory impairment, stress induced rapid thoughts, depression and a feeling of a lack of need or ability to sleep. Depression can cause most of the above as a result of the psyche trying to wage a subconscious battle of the self trying to stay balanced and depression making it hard to do so, so it results in over compensation. That over compensation can look like this. "I am happy la la la la", but then you start to think about (consciously or even subconsciously) all the weight that life carries so you start to get sad/frustrated, which causes us to get irritable so we get short and angry with people and our work and obligations so we feel guilty which makes us feel depressed. Then you get caught up in a a cycle of under and over compensation and no wonder you can't sleep at night. But is this bi-polar disorder? Not necessarily. Read what it truly is to be b-polar. I KNOW I am. The events in my life leave little doubt in my mind not just from my behavior but to the very close examination and culmination of multiple doctors study and probing and more importantly for me medication response that brought me to a place of confidence in it.

What am I getting at here? Don't let a doctor diagnose you with any illness without extensive treatment and examination. You wouldn't let a doctor give you chemotherapy for a cold after a short and inconclusive physical. Don't let a mental health care provider diagnose you bi-polar or anything else for that matter unless you and your treatment team have done your research. Be educated because that is the one true way to balance and happiness. We can't get better unless we know the truths about ourselves and the doctors can't fix us without the truth. Good luck in finding your balance.