I’m currently trying to track down a Social Security disability attorney who has experience filing for people who have bipolar disorder. (They’re like cops - there’s never one around when you need one.) I plan on interviewing the attorney and posting a Q&A here on strategies and tips. Here are some of the questions I plan on asking: Read the rest of this entry »
An intense period of mania or depression can make you feel like you’ve been hit by a truck. You may feel exhausted. You may be unable to concentrate or remember certain details. You may become intolerant of colleagues and others you must deal with on the job. Your family life is also very likely to be chaotic and stressful.
Unfortunately, if you can walk into your local Social Security office, talk to the receptionist, and complete the paperwork, the Social Security Administration is likely to conclude that you don’t qualify for Social Security disability benefits. (In a previous post, “Are You Disabled?” Joe, my co-author, points out just how difficult the Social Security Administration makes it to qualify for disability.) Read the rest of this entry »
My wife feels disabled. She used to teach junior high school Spanish full time for over $60,000 per year. She can no longer work as a full-time teacher, because the stress triggers mania. Believe me, she tried several times to return to teaching, and each time she experienced a serious breakdown. Read the rest of this entry »
I grew up in a household with mental illness in a parent. The illness was never fully identified or named, yet it decimated our family life. I was enormously relieved to realize, over time, what was going on in my family when I was growing up. It helped me understand my parent more and to tell my family story in a way that is less judgmental and critical and more compassionate—toward my parent with mental illness and toward me and my siblings and my other parent. As a professional and as someone who lived with this, I feel strongly about the need for honest, open communication in families when a parent is struggling with mental illness.
The battle to fight stigma in the outside world is important but can’t be done without first facing it at home. Read the rest of this entry »
Book Review
I was recently in the market for a book to help my daughter gain a better understanding and acquire some coping skills for living with a parent who has bipolar disorder. I searched Amazon and couldn’t find anything very promising, so I broadened my search through Google and found a book called I’m Not Alone: A Teen’s Guide to Living with a Parent Who Has Mental Illness by Dr. Michelle D. Sherman, PhD and DeAnne Sherman, Michelle’s mother. Michelle sent me a copy of the book to review.
Admittedly, I have a tough time reviewing books written for teenagers. For one, I’m not a teenager and I don’t work with teenagers on a daily basis. I also have two grown children – a son who’s 21 and a daughter who is 18. Even when they were little, I sort of treated them as adults, so I’m a little out of touch with the teen scene. Read the rest of this entry »
Cecie and I watched Canvas last night - a movie about a family struggling with schizophrenia. We had high expectations that the movie was going to be phenomenal. Cecie had read about it in People magazine, and I had checked out the movie on the Canvas website. We like actors Joe Pantoliano and Marcia Gay Harden. Devon Gearhart, who played their son, did an outstanding job. Read the rest of this entry »
I recently became aware of a new (at least I think it’s new) magazine called bp Magazine that focuses specifically on bipolar disorder. Although the magazine carries some information on the diagnosis and treatment of bipolar disorder, its primary mission is “to convey the personal stories of challenge and success that each person who lives with bipolar disorder faces. In doing so, our goal is to promote hope and harmony for bipolar individuals and the ones who love them.”
To learn more about bp Magazine, subscribe to it, and become part of the bp hope community, visit www.bphope.com.
Has anyone seen the film Canvas? I was poking around on NAMI’s Web site yesterday and saw mention of it, so I headed to the Canvas The Film Web site to check it out. The film is about a family dealing with schizophrenia. It stars Marcia Gay Harden as the mother with schizophrenia, Joe Pantoliano as the dad, and Devon Gearhart as their ten-year-old son.
If the trailer is any indication, this is a magnificent film. If anyone has seen it, please post a comment to let us know what you think of it. Once I see it, I’ll post a short review of my own.
The Sunday edition of the New York Times, January 13, 2008, carried a story entitled “Take Me as I Am, Whoever I Am” by Terri Cheney, author of Manic: A Memoir, due to hit the bookstores on February 5, 2008. Terri has given us permission to include her article, in its entirety, in our Bipolar Stories section. We invite you to check out Terri’s Article along with stories from our other readers, offer your insights, and share your own story.
Jill Ravitz recently posted her bipolar story, which caused me to think about my own situation with my wife and our family. Back in 1999 my wife was diagnosed as having bipolar disorder. Within about two years, we were discussing divorce.
Bipolar disorder was tearing us and our family apart. We argued all the time, even in front of our children, which all parents know is a big no-no. Our two teenage children were a wreck and were probably hoping we would get divorced so they could get a break from us. Well, maybe they weren’t so secret about it… I can’t recall.
We stayed together. I don’t know whether we were just too lazy to take on the burden of a divorce, too cheap to hire an attorney, too stubborn to let our 20 years + marriage go down the tubes, too afraid to break the news to our families, or too afraid of what divorce would do to our children. I have no idea why we stayed together, but I’m happy we did.
I always admired my wife. She enjoys life more than I do. She lights up a room and engages people. She is sincerely interested in other people. She is intelligent, sensitive, and funny. Her joy is contagious. I married her because of all that and more. Perhaps her energy and joy for life flows from that manic side of bipolar disorder. She is rarely depressed. It’s the mania that causes the most problems for us.
Jill’s story made me think about why Cecie and I got married in the first place. It made me realize what attracted me to her. It made me happy that we decided to stay together and try to keep the bipolar disorder from driving us and our family apart.
I don’t fault anyone for leaving someone who has bipolar disorder. I was very near that point myself. Who knows, maybe someday the disorder could drive my wife to do something I could not tolerate. I don’t know, but I wonder how many people split up prematurely, before they even have a chance to understand what is going on and help their loved one through it. And I wonder how much they lose out by leaving.
People with bipolar disorder are still people. They are still just as wonderful as they were before contracting the illness. What’s so tragic is that the illness can mislead us into thinking that our loved ones are no longer worth loving.