I totally agree, and feel much the same way as you do Amelie.

It hasn't always been this way, in fact, it's only been in the past couple of months that I've finally pulled things together and gotten a look at the big picture. For the longest time, I couldn't tell the difference between being "in a mood" and an honest-to-goodness mood episode.....now I know that not everything has to do with BP.

We are allowed to have legitimate emotions, and we shouldn't let anyone take that away with dismissive statements like "Oh, you're just acting that way because of your bipolar" and "Go take some meds". But we also don't get to blame all of our bad days on the illness either.....it works both ways.

It helps a lot to have good care and the right combination of meds in the right doses. It took me a year-and-a-half to get here, but I'm so thankful that I have a great pdoc and amazing support from family and friends; they're the main reason that I'm alive and (reasonably) well today.

Great to see a post about gratitude. This reminds one of how lucky we are to live in a time when we at least have a chance to get better---a hundred years ago we'd all have been locked up in an institution, or stashed away in the family's attic like a dirty secret.