I went through a stage of severe mania as my unconscious problems about child abuse were coming to the surface. I got manic to keep running ahead of my problems and not have a chance to think or feel about them. I stayed up for 72 hours sometimes, would keep going until I couldn't put one foot in front of the other. I was silly as a fool at work. Blood pressure was high from being hyper 24-7. Was lso was cruel to my own health...cut my hair one time like a whack job... Didn't drink water. Manic phase is so hard on the body. But I didn't go into depression.

I started taking Lithium and that settled my mind enough to start thinking my way through the abuse reactions and such. I've only had mania very mildly in 15 yrs now, but haven't been on Lithium all that time.

I agree with above post, that it's called Bi-Polar as a category, but can be either way, or both. Probably should be called uni-polar when it's just mania, but I don't make the rules.