A lot of great points and realizations here.

shattered sanity, your response to your own question clearly indicates that there is more to certain times than just bipolar illness. It also made me think of a slightly different, but related question that either you or I should ask on the forum sometime. What do we all think our life would/could have been like if we had never developed bipolar disorder? Of course we'd never know, and plenty of other challenges could have taken its place, but what if they didn't until much later in our lives?