Bipolar

Disorder

by Rebecca Stockton

Bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, is a mental illness that is classified as a mood disorder. People who suffer from bipolar disorder experience elevated moods alternating with episodes of depression. Bipolar disorder has varying levels of severity, and, in really severe cases, there is a risk of suicide and self harm.

Famous people with bipolar disorder are or were: Carrie Fisher (actress, author); Robin Williams (actor); Chris Brown, (singer, rapper, dancer); Patricia Cromwell (crime writer); Richard Dreyfuss (actor); Patty Duke (actress); Larry Flint (publisher); Connie Frances (singer); Mel Gibson (actor, producer); Ernest Hemingway (American journalist); Jesse Jackson, Jr. (politician); Marilyn Monroe (actress); Abraham Lincoln (President); Albert Einstein (scientist); Edgar Allen Poe (poet and writer); Charley Pride (country music singer); Frank Sinatra (singer, actor); Britney Spears (singer); Ludwig Van Beethoven (composer and pianist); Vincent Van Gogh (artist); Brian Wilson (musician with the Beach Boys); Catherine Zeta Jones (actress) and many, many others.

With the right medicine, most bipolar people can lead a normal life.

My mother was bipolar. When I took her to Nashville to the Parthenon Pavilion, her doctor told me ‘I have two things to tell you, one is good, and one is bad. Which one do you want to hear first?’ I said the good, he said there is a treatment for it now, “lithium.” The bad thing is it is inherited.

Lithium was not discovered as a treatment until the early 1970s. My mother had numerous electro shock therapies. She started taking lithium and she was good until she died in 2006.

Not everyone can take lithium though. It is a poison. A patient’s blood has to be monitored monthly to make sure the level of lithium in the blood doesn’t get too high. There are other medicines too that help. Carrie Fisher said she took six medications, three times a day. Wow!

Rebecca Stockton