Ever since I've been diagnosed with BP, my over-bearing, over-protective mother has never treated me the same. It's always: "do you realize you're talking really fast" or "that picture you posted online is really weird" or "have you been sleeping OK?" and of course the classic "Are you doing OK?" which pops into EVERY conversation...always assuming that it's some type of bipolar symptom when 1) I naturally speak fast reminding her that when I was a child she used to have to remind me to speak slower when giving presentations or speeches and that I like off-kilter things and that everybody wakes up throughout the night and very few people have the ability to sleep for 7-8 hours straight...I feel that ever since I have been given this diagnosis, I'm constantly put under a microscope and picked apart for every little action that I make. And if I express any joy over anything, then I must be going into hypo-mania...I feel like sometimes people want to keep bipolar people like zombies and over-medicated and any fluctuation in mood must be an indicator that you're not stable (oh, she's having a bad day, must be her bipolar!!) Does anybody else also feel this way? Ugh.