That's rather bizarre. As far as I know bipolar (aka manic depression) is one of the oldest and most well-established diagnoses. I'd be curious to know more about why he feels this way. As others have said, I'd steer clear of him, too. Just because it makes me wonder what other weird ideas he has that will affect my treatment.

I've never encountered a psychiatrist who "doesn't believe" in bipolar, but I have of course encountered other people. Even my wife doesn't really want to believe in the genetic component, that it's a real illness. She tends to dismiss that it's a "real" illness and acknowledge only the environmental factors. If I get depressed and start to have negative thoughts, she'll view it as the negative thoughts being the cause of the depression, even though I can feel the depression starting before the thoughts.

I think it's because she doesn't want to believe it's "incurable." But it feels very invalidating to me, especially when I'm in a depression and she tells me things like I have to smile because that's supposed to provoke some sort of reaction that will make me feel better. It makes me kind of just stop talking about it because I don't want to have that argument again. It feels like you have to face all the decisions about meds and so on by yourself. I think if my psychiatrist held such opinions, it would feel similar to me. Unsupportive, and like it's my own fault somehow.