[Ocean Swimmer]

I was mainly sulky and depressed in high school. I did have boyfriends.
My favorite wanted to do it. I wasn't ready. He had sex with the school tramp. She got pregnant and he had to quit school and go into army. And get married to her.

I was sulky in school as well. Very "moody". Although my parents attributed my moodiness to being a teenager, so they never actually got me the help I needed.

That's good you didn't have sex with that guy. Sounds like a lucky escape!

[Wander]

Another moody teenager here. I had periods of deep depression with SI and other times where I was very social and energetic. Did see the school guidance counsellor. He was useless. Back then there was no talk of mental illness so everyone was clueless. I did have friends and a boyfriend but my relationships were stormy due to my moods. At a school reunion one friend said she was amazed I hadn't ended my life. Apparently it was quite obvious I was a bit 'crazy'.

In hindsite, I realize I have always been sick. I had extreme difficulty with Depression. My first manic episode was at 17 when I left home for university.

[Ocean Swimmer]

Ron. The highschool sweetheart was the tallest coolest looking guy in school. He lived in my neighborhood and I knew him and his friends since 8 th grade.
I know. I graduated when I was 16 and then moved out of my house.
I was obviously BP by then too. My family Dr. Said he thought I had an overactive adrenaline gland.
I was nervous. My hands shook. They say I have tremor syndrome. So much sweat I had special inserts in my clothes.

[Wild Coyote]

Lots of adolescent depression here, too. Unsure if related to PTSD or BP, maybe both.


WC

[wildflowerchild25]

High school was the worst. I got depressed at the end of eighth grade. I started cutting myself. I cut myself on my wrist (just a scratch) and my mom freaked and I ended up hospitalized. It all went downhill from there. I was hospitalized six times between 14-16, I stayed in the state hospital for three months, I went to residential treatment for six months, and I ended up in a special school for emotionally disturbed kids. It was the worst.

My freshman year of high school was the absolute worst though. I was very sick. I was severely depressed, had panic attacks every day, cut myself multiple times a day. I even brought a razor blade to school so I could cut myself in the bathroom at lunch time. And I was hallucinating for months. It ended in suicide attempt and that's when I ended up in the state hospital.

I would NEVER go back to high school.

[LadyShadow]

I acted and rebelled like crazy! I was totally manic. Slept with tons of men, cut class, partied and drank all night. Eventually I dropped out in Senior Year with three classes left to graduate!!!!! WHAT A *&^&* SCREW UP!!!

But eventually I got my GED but missed out on graduation with my friends and prom. I was a HUGE disappointment to my parents after that, but I did manage to hold down a job since I was 15. I actually dropped out to work so I could have money to party. Funny how that job in retail helped my career.

Just amazing how life works out sometimes.... especially when you're bipolar.

[HALLIEBETH87]

I was still in an abusive home I'm high school so I was very depressed and started self-harming. I was expected to do great things because I was very successful in school but I dropped out of college after a year and a half because my depression and anxiety was so bad I want functioning. I hid it from my family well. I did go back a few years ago and get my child development associate.

My first psychotic episode was during high school, first depression during high school (after the first psychotic episode), first mania during college.

[JustJace2u]

I was only diagnosed with BP a few months ago. That being said, now that I think about it and look back at my younger years, I am certain there was something that was affecting my school progress. I was diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder in my late teens, but I had struggle all throughout my school years.

[Ocean Swimmer]

My mom married a bad tempered alcoholic.
I was BP but managed to start university at 16 and have my own apartment and job.
I hated living with my family.
I found my dad thru a private eye. He lived in Las Vegas. He was an alcoholic in recovery.
I often wonder if like that thing they call alcoholic fetal syndrome, could cause BP. ?

[Shazerac]

When I was in school I got in trouble for being really hyper but that was 50 years ago. Then I got pregnant at 16. that ended high school because back then you couldn't got to school pregnant. That's when the depression hit. I self medicated with alcohol for the next 15 years. I finally went into a hospital for a month for severe depression.

[Icare dixit]

Textbook hebephrenic depression lasting a few years. I've once truly recovered (so far). Then what one might call hypomania. Still recovering from a few years of mania, depression and mixed states, just an extreme chaos, that followed.

I'm grateful I've experienced all that. No regrets.

[Nammu]

I was very very depressed when I was 9. But it might have been situational, I was being molested. It was the first time I thought about suicide. I had lots of physical side effects and was dragged to the mayo clinic for that, the clinic wanted me to see a psychiatrist but my father said no. I've often wondered if seeing someone back then would have helped avoid the traumas or if it would have been worse. Back then it was a very shameful thing, even just depression. In HS I was a Daria type. Very aloof and cynical. I had acquaintances but no real friends, I wouldn't let anyone get close to me.

[StewieGG]

I had my first psychotic episode when I was 11. I used to hear voices laughing at me, but I genuinely believed it was other kids and had no idea it was a hallucination until years later. I had a lot of anxiety, I used to overshare very personal details about my life and family to people I hardly knew and I was a goth in high school. People used to pick on me for it.

[Theresa1991]

I have been depressed long since, I can remember real depression setting in at about seven, but I believe I might have been depressed even way earlier, around three. Anyway, my family situation was never easy, so it was also contextual. At 15 I became anorexic and started self-harm. I don't really remember ever being manic as a child, but I had times in adolescence when I was just SO ANGRY that I always wanted to destroy things and times when I became very productive in contrast to the depression that I usually dwelled in.

[Moose72]

I was moody. I would get so upset at times that I'd scream at the top of my lungs and lose my voice. I felt something was wrong with me so my parents sent me to a Pdoc. I remember he was very Freudian and had argyle socks. After our appointment was finished he pronounced that I was a "normal teenager"! I hallucinated voices as a teen too but thought they were my sister even though I'd go to ask her what she wanted and she'd be asleep.

[Unrigged64072835]

I was off the rails during high school. I even went in to see a doc for exhaustion, and he said I was depressed, but since I heard him laughing with another doc about me I had no trust in him. I definitely don't want to go back to that.

[CarriB]

I had a pretty normal high school experience until my senior year when I became severely depressed and thought about suicide. Luckily my parents sent me to a pdoc and a therapist, but that was just the beginning of my issues. It wasn't until I was 20 or 21 that I was disagnosed with major depression disorder and GAD and now I'm 38 and newly disagnosed with BP2. I'm not sure there was such a thing 20 years ago or if I was just misdiagnosed. Or maybe it didn't present until later?

[franz kafka]

I was diagnosed my senior year of high school. I missed a lot of class and got into a lot of fights with teachers. Thankfully I had done well in school previously and I was able to get into a good college. I guess I'm lucky that my onset wasn't earlier.

[xRavenx]

I had a pretty severe break at age 15 where I went through the cycle of hypomania, mania, a terrible long lasting mixed episode, and then depression, followed by rapid cycling since I was unmedicated (parents did not consent to medication, nobody knew what to do with me, my mother tried to keep everything from the family and was embarrassed by my mental health issues). My school mandated that I at least went to therapy, or my parents would get in trouble. I pretty much needed hospitalization from having psychosis and agitated mania, but I tried my best to hide certain things. However, I had absolutely no concentration during my Sophomore year of HS. I paced up and down the hallways, was hypersensitive to sounds, had terrible racing thoughts, and spent the majority of my time talking to School Psychologists and social workers that year since I was desperate for help. It was so scary.

Along the way, I was a "sulky" moody child, even before my manic/psychotic break as a teen. I actually do remember around age 9 was when I first experienced depression that I could just not figure out (no contributing facts)...I cried and cried for about a month straight. Nobody understood me. I felt like an outcast, but started hanging out with others eventually who on some level could relate, although I did not know of anyone else who had experienced psychosis (or was open to talking about it). I do remember early signs of hypomania though, where I felt I was on the top of the world, took risks, felt super confident, but my decisions caught up with me when I would crash and feel extreme guilt and would beat myself up pretty badly.

[fishin fool]

Bipolar has been an issue for me my entire life including school.
The biggest problem was I never knew I had it and my home life
was such that my parents never paid any attention to us kids unless
I was getting a beating from my mom.
So yeah looking back I now see how Bipolar played hell with my entire life.

[Victoria'smom]

I was a bad kid. ED at 8, drinking young sex and drugs at 12. Moved out at 16, quite school at 17. Then got my GED and cycled through college until I met DH and had a family. Tried college a bunch of times but it never worked out.

[Moose72]

I've just never been able to learn subjects like chemistry and mathematics. Failed in high school and college. Anatomy was a mystery to me too- too much to memorize too fast. I blame these on my bipolar brain not being wired quite right.