The illness first tends to appear in adulthood but may occur earlier. Bipolar disorder does occur in children, but they're often misdiagnosed. Affected people fluctuate between periods of intense depression or mania interspersed by periods of relative calm.
Symptoms:
2. People in mania are often described as being like a tornado. They experience elevated moods or euphoria, increased activity, pressured fast speech, self-important ideas or grandiose delusions, hallucinations, reduced sleep, increased appetite for food and sex, overspending on a wild scale and all-night excesses.
3. These sets of symptoms occur in cycles, which comes in several varieties:
Cycles Symptoms of mania can be followed by symptoms of depression in an almost regular pattern. These swings in mood can occur over a period of anything from days to months. Less commonly, some people may experience only depression or mania, but within a regular recurring pattern.
Who's affected?
About one per cent of people develop bipolar disorder in their lifetime. The risk is higher if you've relatives with the disorder. About 12 per cent of people with a brother or sister with bipolar disorder develop the condition.
There's no cure for bipolar disorder, but many people find that an understanding of their disease and what triggers episodes - as well as treatments, including medicines such as antidepressants and lithium - can help them to live a relatively normal life. Prenatal screening isn't possible.
Helping yourself:
The Manic Depression Fellowship runs local support groups in most parts of the UK on a monthly basis.
If you live in Scotland, visit the Bipolar Fellowship Scotland.
Rethink
This is a national charity which helps those with severe mental illness and their supporters. Rethink provides a range of services, including helplines and respite centres. It has a useful section on bipolar disorder on its website.
Professional help:
People on lithium need to be seen regularly by their mental health team.
Too much can be poisonous, but too little will have no effect. For this reason, people on lithium need to be seen regularly by their mental health team and have their blood levels checked.
Working with your mental health team, it's possible to draw up a plan detailing the type of care you want (or don't want) in a crisis. The Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London has more information on how to develop joint crisis plans.
This article was last medically reviewed by Dr Rob Hicks in July 2006.
It's important to distinguish between the three elements of this condition:
1. depressive symptoms
2. manic symptoms
3. the cycle of these moods
1. The symptoms of depression, which are covered in depth in our depression section, include low mood, sleep disturbance, loss of appetite, a sense of pessimism, hopelessness, reduced sexual drive, loss of interest or pleasure in life, reduced ability to concentrate, and recurrent thoughts of death and suicide.
Mixed It's possible for a person to have many of the symptoms of mania, and also suffer from severely depressive thoughts. This is especially the case if the person has insight into what's happening to them. Although the symptoms of mania can sound quite pleasant, it can also feel as though you're losing control.
Ask someone you trust to monitor your mood.
With any condition that goes in a cycle, half the battle of managing it is monitoring where you are in the cycle at any time. To cope with bipolar disorder, you can monitor your mood and your thoughts or ask someone you trust to monitor your mood. Whenever they spot a relapse coming, they can warn you, and you can both take certain pre-agreed steps. For example, taking a couple of days' rest, reviewing whether you've taken on too much lately and shedding some of it, or seeing a community mental health team member.
What support is available?
Contact details:
The Manic Depression Fellowship
Tel: 020 7793 2600
Website: www.mdf.org.uk
Pendulum has information for people with bipolar disorder.
Website: www.pendulum.org
The Institute of Psychiatry, South London and Maudsley NHS Trust and charity Rethink have a website www.mentalhealthcare.org.uk with a comprehensive section on bipolar disorder.
Some people with bipolar disorder have extreme mood swings that can't be managed by mood monitoring alone. Among other drugs, psychiatrists can prescribe lithium, which seems to stabilise mood swings. It's important that exactly the correct level is maintained in the blood.
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THE ABOVE INFO FROM THE B.B.C.
As you can see the symptoms are very close to B.P.D. and as such it is not uncommon for mistakes to be made during diagnosis. It is also very possible to have BOTH illnesses!