What Is Bipolar Disorder?
Bipolar disorder, formerly called manic depression, is classified as a psychological mood disorder. Those afflicted have an impaired ability to regulate their mood and are prone to episodes of both major depression and mania.
What Is Major Depression?
There are many types of depression. Many people experience some depression when they encounter significant disappointments or grief. Those with manic depression experience what is called major depression (a diagnostic contrast to the minor depression that everyone encounters at some point in life). Mental health professionals call the major depression of manic depressive patients bipolar depression.
Signs of major depression may include the presence of some of the following symptoms for a prolonged period of time, occurring every day or nearly every day:
- Depressed mood
- Diminished interest or pleasure in all or most activities
- Persistent change in weight or appetite
- Insomnia or hyposomnia
- Psychomotor agitation or retardation
- Fatigue or loss of energy
- Feelings of worthlessness or excessive/inappropriate guilt
- Difficulty thinking or concentrating
- Recurrent thoughts of death or suicide
What Is Mania?
In order to be diagnosed as bipolar, the DSM (the main diagnostic manual used by mental heath professionals) says that a person must have at least one manic episode not involving drug or alcohol abuse, medications or other medical disorder that may have caused the symptoms.
Being manic does not equate with just being in an especially great mood. Mania is an abnormally elevated mood that can include racing thoughts, fast or pressured speech, and irritability.
The following are possible symptoms of mania that are used in clinical diagnosis:
- Distinct period of abnormally and persistently elevated, expansive or irritable mood
- Inflated self-esteem, grandiosity
- Decreased need for sleep
- More talkative than usual or pressure to keep talking
- Racing thoughts and distractability
- An increase in goal-directed behavior or psychomotor agitation
- Excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have a high potential for negative consequences
Each of the items on these lists, individually, are things that most people may commonly experience from time to time, even if they don’t have manic depression. To be diagnosed as bipolar, a patient must have several of these symptoms at the same time.
How Do Bipolar Patients Experience this Mood Disorder?
Some people with this disorder have substantial separate episodes of mania and depression throughout their lives. Some struggle more with bouts of depression. Some are more prone to manic episodes. And, although these moods may seem like diametric opposites, bipolar patients may also experience mania and depression at the same time. This is called a mixed episode.
Bipolar Information
For more information on manic depression see the psychology website Psychology Prof Online and the Manic Depressive Blog, written by a psychologist who has bipolar disorder.
This article is only meant to provide information on the symptoms associated with bipolar disorder. It is not intended to be used for self-diagnosis. Only a trained mental-health professional can diagnose mental illnesses.
Additional Sources
Ramirez Basco, Monica (2006). The Bipolar Workbook: Tools for Controlling Your Mood Swings. Guilford Press.
Mondimore, Francis Mark (1999). Bipolar Disorder: A Guide for Patients & Families. Johns Hopkins Press.
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