Lately, it seems that people are taking my symptoms too seriously. My therapist in Rome sending me home, my mom telling me that I shouldn't drink wine and should stay close to home...it's really annoying to have everyone look at me like I'm "sick" and "fragile".

But at least I feel like they care enough to notice that something is wrong.

I was talking to my grandma on the phone tonight, and she mentioned that she thought that I was "too normal" to have bipolar. She thought that I sought out this dx because I read about it and overidentified with the symptoms.

As annoying as it is to be taken too seriously, not being taken seriously at all hurts worse, in my opinion. I spent the next forty minutes wondering if I'm making all my symptoms up, if I could be a "normal" healthy person if only I'd put forth the effort...

It took me years to get diagnosed because no one understood that I was in pain. My parents didn't get it, the social worker at my school said I wasn't depressed because my sleep was normal (she even chided me for coming to see her with such "mild" problems. "Some people who come to see me need to go to the hospital!" Well, isn't it generally a good idea to catch things before they get to that point?!). No one got that I was hurting; no one could see through my mask.

So as annoying as all of this coddling and concern over my current mental health is, I'll take it. To me, it's better than the opposite.

Have you guys experienced this phenomenon of either being taken way to seriously or not seriously at all? Which extreme do you hate more?