Thank you Elsa, you've been a great help.

As for that episode being mania or hypo, I can be impulsive, but not on such a massive level. The only reason I think it might matter is that if it was mania I might be a little more wary of any hypomanic episodes. I had asked my old doc once why I needed lithium, and why I just couldn't be hypo. It did no harm, I got a lot done and I felt great. Sometimes it would get to be too much, but for the most part I was able to re-enter my life after a debilitating depression.

He told me that hypomania can slip into mania and that it's too dangerous to allow hypomania.

@zepchic: If pot works for you that's great. Would it not also work for you when you have your blow-outs? I run and take a sublingual Zyprexa but I'm sure that pot would do much the same thing if you were able to take it early enough... I hope you find something that works well for you.

@Moogieotter: I've done a lot of thinking about this over the years, and a lot of soul searching around this. I don't believe I ever had a problem with addiction. I believe that my BP was overlooked when I was younger and I was "misdiagnosed" and sent into rehab. All of my problems in the mess that was my life were from it. My drug use was for two reasons.

The first was that I was very much a follower. If the people I was around did drugs, I would too. And I would do the drugs they liked, even if I hated them and they made me feel like crap. I gravitated to people who were unhealthy and "dangerous." The second reason was that I'd do drugs while in an episode (either up and wanting danger, or down and wanting death) with the intent to destroy myself. They were more of a Russian Roulette sort of thing than me getting high or enjoying it.

It's been 20 years since any of this and I often forget that was me. It seems a life time ago and it feels like it all happened to a different person. As for drugs.... I have absolutely no desire to use them. None at all. Never. I can have them in the house and I don't care.

I was however, starting to get a little concerned with alcohol. After not drinking for many years I started drinking small amounts. Over time, that increased to a point where I just looked at it one day and thought, this is becoming a problem. Other "normal" people around me were drinking the same amount, but I just had alarm bells and decided that it wasn't worth the risk. So I quit. Just like that and haven't looked back. It wasn't difficult and I don't miss it. What I do miss is feeling like I belong when I'm around people who are drinking socially.

Because of the alcoholism in my family, I know I'm at risk, and I didn't want to take any chances. The main reason I'd wanted to drink was to be social, and to be like everyone else. To be a normal person. But I'm not.

I'm still in touch with a few people from the programs and I've thought about going back, mainly because I miss the companionship and the spirituality. But I don't relate to the addiction, and I don't feel like I belong. That is why I came here instead. Here, I relate to people and I finally feel like I've found a place where I belong.

>Instead of wondering about behavior and patterns as they relate to bipolar states, I look to what I might have been drinking and using at the time.

For the vast majority of the past 20 years, my BP has had no competition for the spotlight. It stands on it's own, running my life with no help from any substances. When I look back, what I've been drinking and using at the time is.... Nothing. For me, it's critical that I DO look at my behaviour and patterns as they relate to bipolar states since that is the absolute crux of the problem.

Lisa