Coming to Terms with Bipolar Disorder

I sit in my office, the pause in conversation becoming brittle. My client, settling into the silence, is a study in frustration. Sitting next to him, his young wife stares pensively. “The diagnosis isn’t an end; it’s a beginning,” I hear myself say. The words, Bipolar Disorder, hang languidly over the room.

I recall my own diagnosis and manic episodes. Education comes to mind. I must help this couple understand this illness. A label means little without explanation. These young people have just received the diagnosis of bipolar disorder by a psychiatrist whose perspective is to somehow rebalance this young father’s biochemistry.

Defenses have been moved into place. As much as this patient wants relief, he doesn’t feel ready and is ambivalent when venturing further into the treatment of mental illness, a dreaded explanation of his bizarre thoughts and strange behavior. To educate is to enlighten this family. Yet, there is resistance. Later, this couple will go home to try to pick up the pieces of what had been an idyllic life: family, children, and connection to others. What I have to say is splintered by denial and fear, or just plain unfocused thoughts that will inhibit taking in what I am trying to present to them. How you educate people about mental illness is stymied by shock and ignorance as much as fatigue, anger, and the desire by some to be anywhere but in this room at this time.

I proceed with explanations, recognizing the limitations I am up against. No doubt, this couple will not remember what I have said. “Why didn’t you tell me?” they will say. “What is this thing called bipolar disorder? I was never told.” And so, we’ll begin again, the clients’ defenses lowered by painful acceptance this mind disorder is not going to go away.

Patience, I think, be patient. It took me 12 years to understand my mental illness. Can it be any different for my clients? Can my presence make a difference? Patience, my mantra; “So, let me tell you about my experience,” I hear myself say. And so, on it goes.