That's what I was thinking, too. I've been dragging around this BP-NOS label for almost a year, wondering what my eventual dx will be but not wanting to ask "OK, so what number am I gonna get?" My pdoc originally gave me the NOS designation because he wasn't 100% sure I really had bipolar, and he told me he might change it back to depressive disorder depending on what he saw from that point on. In fact, I was only supposed to have 2-3 visits and then go back to my regular doctor....well, we all know how THAT turned out.

It didn't take more than another couple of visits for him to decide that I was very definitely bipolar, and the 'depressive disorder' diagnosis went away completely. I don't even have seasonal-affective disorder listed in my medical history now......I think it all folds into the bipolar dx because there are seasonal patterns to my mood episodes, and my pdoc has been seeing me long enough now to have observed both 'poles'. Should be interesting to find out how it changes when DSM-V comes out.