[stan0212]

If you are not afraid to say, that is.

I've been through a lot, as I believe all of you have been. bp is a
super-exciting roller coaster ride.

Apart from things like giving $7K to a supposed friend who asked for
money and then disappeared suddenly and losing more than $10K
from spending sprees, having sex with strangers etc etc, full-blown
mania with nearly every symptom on the list, the worst thing that
ever happened was the first time I landed in hospital with severe
mania.

I was tied down to the bed for the whole night even though I wasn't
violent I was just shouting nonsense. In my country, it is standard
practice to tie patients down for the slightest thing, like when the
nurses get fedup of behaviors that patients cannot control.

In the morning, when it was time for shower, because I was so
heavily drugged that I couldn't stand straight, I was stripped bare
*in front of the whole ward* (I'm female, btw) and led to the bathroom.

It was the worst and most humiliating experience in my life.
Before this happened, I was terribly shy of having to strip in front
of females (no problems with males though - hypersexuality) for
stuff like medical checkups, giving birth etc, but after that experience,
I lost all sense of shame about my body. Now if I were to get stripped
in front of the whole world it wouldn't faze me anymore.

I don't know if I lost something else because of that experience, and
if I did, I don't know what that is.

I weigh my other negative experiences so far (eg, what happened
at work after I was diagnosed, the discrimination I experienced)
and they are minor by comparison.

Now I feel almost invincible (of course I know I'm not) in the sense
that nothing else can crush me anymore, although I don't know if
something worse will happen and that becomes my new benchmark.

[hamster-bamster]

My mother, who had BP I, reported being horribly humiliated when she was in a hospital (also non-US) and was led to a bathroom with open stalls (no doors) and I believe she was even watched when she went to the bathroom. I never had that experience, and if I did, I probably would have been left unfazed because I am used to communal swimming pools' showers and the like, and I went to school with bathrooms that had no doors on the stalls, for 10 years, but I wanted to tell you of someone who would have totally gotten your experience had she been still alive.

[Detach]

Suicide attempt....took all my pills (full bottles). In a coma on a ventilator in ICU for 5 days, then woke up and found out I had aspiration pneumonia and plural effusion. Took over a month to heal while being on oxygen and antibiotics.... Family hurt and mad at me, they didn't understand- Diagnosed soon after with Bipolar. That was in 2009.

[manicminer]

Drank soo much to kill tha pain before being dx'd. One night I took it too far and went ballistic at my fraternity house, causing the brothers to tie me down for my safety and there's.
Ended up in the pER the next day and was dx'd bp. the kicker was being told I didnt just have a drinking problem, I had developed full blown alcoholism.
This was 2009 at age 20 (not even legally able to drink and with 2 underage drinking violations already under my belt)

[stan0212]

Originally Posted by Natalya

My mother, who had BP I, reported being horribly humiliated when she was in a hospital (also non-US) and was led to a bathroom with open stalls (no doors) and I believe she was even watched when she went to the bathroom. I never had that experience, and if I did, I probably would have been left unfazed because I am used to communal swimming pools' showers and the like, and I went to school with bathrooms that had no doors on the stalls, for 10 years, but I wanted to tell you of someone who would have totally gotten your experience had she been still alive.

I am in an Asian society which very conservative where if you go around stark naked you will be charged for indecency unless it is proven that you are mentaly-ill. So it's a very shameful thing to do. I saw a man doing it twice in public and felt very sorry for him, he was probably not under treatment.