[rovers95]

Anyone tried sleep deprivation as a therapy? Apparently lithium (and other agents) can improve response and prevent relapse after recovery sleep.

[~Christina]

Sleep deprivation is very seldom recommended for someone with Bipolar as it can easily put someone at risk for hypo( sure its great) but it often escalated to a Full manic episode that often gets even worse by turning mixed.

What’s the actual goal of this?

[rovers95]

Thanks, the goal is to recover from bipolar depression.

[yellow_fleurs]

When I was depressed a couple of years ago I had read it could help depression and was up late all the time working on grad school papers anyway so sort of informally tried it, staying up all night to see what happened. That was a terrible idea for me as it made me a lot more mentally unstable I think. I have since learned sleep is one of the top things that affects my mental health. Although, I will say that I personally question if I have bipolar disorder as I was diagnosed by my psychiatrist, but my therapist says she does not see it. Has this been studied for bipolar depression or just depression? Seems like a good thing to ask your psychiatrist as I could see that being risky with bipolar disorder. Have you tried light therapy? I found that helped with my depression pretty quickly but I had to be careful not to use it too much or I got agitated.

[rovers95]

I struggle with light therapy

I think it makes me mixed. Maybe I do okay with 10 minutes, but anything longer makes me irritable and causes insomnia. When you say longer use makes you agitated, how long are you talking? I seem to be super sensitive.