I've had severe bouts of depression for a long time. Then 3 years ago I was way overmedicated and had a brief manic episode that went away when the meds did. My shrink changed the diagnosis to Bipolar I and changed his attitude as well. I don't believe I am bipolar because it was med induced and I've had no other episodes, even when using anti-depressants, nor has any family member had any pattern that looks like bipolar which is 80% genetic.

Now that my shrink thinks of bipolar he pays even less attention to the depression since he seems unduly fixated on the possibility of a manic episode. That to me is the real problem. The depressive symptoms cause so much suffering and disability and yet they aren't being treated as serious. In fact until recently they were under treated because of his fear of using certain meds.

Finally it got bad enough that he was willing to give me meds that have worked to relieve the depressive symptoms. But it had to get very bad and I had to argue for it before that happened.

I don't think people really get how painful depression can be and how much it can affect functioning. When you lose hope and feel no interest and pleasure from anything, life is barely tolerable. And if you add extreme fatigue, you just stay in bed feeling tortured. I also have PTSD and having anxiety and flashbacks is actually easier to deal with than depression.