Thank you all.

I am a RN also BP nurse.

Makes me feel better to hear from a nurse.

All of my nurse friends have told me to apply for a long time but I kept fighting it, got a new job, and crashed and burned at that so I applied so I can actually heal and not just kind of sort of get better enough to sort of be able to work some days, then another bad episode comes and back to square one. I refuse to put myself through that anymore. I think it injures my brain more each time if there's not adequate time to heal, and I've never given myself that time since things got bad almost two years ago.

I know this is going to take some time. My therapist said it should go quick because of diagnosis but it sounds like quick is at minimum months. The last time I saw doc was during episode and he said bipolar 1 with rapid cycling. They both seem to support me. Anyone I have told has basically seemed relieved to hear that I'm doing it.

BP nurse, I backdated my date of disability to last September. That is when there was another big change and I was really sick. I had a bad episode and barely worked from then till March when I got a new job at a former employer. They basically made new rules for me and I still didn't do well. I never made my numbers, they didn't write me up, I got to go home early almost everyday, or comp hours on the weekend, from home. I barely did any direct care at this last job and that is bothering to me because I used to be so good at direct care, skill-wise and as emotional support. I was told that all the time. I would so much rather be working but I know I can't anymore, at least for a long while and during that I need to have NO major episodes. I read up on things and if you have not worked for awhile, then try to go back, and don't make it six months, they consider that an unsuccessful attempt at work and award benefits during that time. If there's one good thing about this it's that I've done a lot of social services work and know how to advocate for people, now it's me that I'm advocating for. Thanks for listening, it really helps to talk some of this out.