What Is Bipolar Depression?

In this article I'm going to describe the symptoms of bipolar depression and describe for you exactly what it is. When you better understand this you'll be in a position to cope better or help someone with this disorder.

I'd guess that the reason you're reading this is either you think you may have bipolar depression or you know someone who seems to have it. Read on for some of the answers.

There are many forms of depression and this particular type is especially difficult to cope with.

Let's get down to the symptoms first and try to makes things a bit clearer for you.

So what is bipolar depression exactly?

Bipolar refers to two opposites like the North and the South Pole are at opposite ends of the world. So, too, a sufferer of bipolar depression swings from a good to a bad mood. Constant ups and downs. These mood swings change between extreme happiness (called mania) and depression.

In short it is a mood disorder. Someone suffering from this form of depression will have manic episodes. What are they?

A manic episode is a sudden change of mood to an unusually high state. Some of the symptoms are:

*lots of energy yet little sleep
*restlessness
*inflated sense of self esteem
*talking too much in a stressed way
*increased desire for sex
*spending sprees
*thoughts that don't slow down or stop
*unreasonably exaggerated plans or claims
*irritability and aggressive behavior
*easily distracted by small things

The best thing you can do if you observe these symptoms in yourself or someone you know is see a doctor. We all suffer from some of these symptoms and so it is important to get help if the symptoms are serious enough to affect daily life or relationships.

Depression and Society

Many of the people we know and meet every day have experienced some kind of depression in their lives, it is not always the clinical and sever depression that we understand to be very dangerous and naturally dramatic in life events, a lot of people experience mild and sometimes passing phases of depression.

The understanding of how difficult it is to deal with depression once it hits is usually a part that is played only by those unfortunate enough to experience this mental condition, once a person realizes the effect a depression might have on a person they will immediately show great sympathy to anyone who is suffering any symptoms related to depression.

In our day and age it is very common to refer to medicine in almost any case of discomfort or disease, our society nurtures the feeling that for every physical or mental condition or disorder there is a chemical answer that sets things right, and that the materialism of human nature is once that takes care of itself. The case with depression is different, not saying that depression is not treated by medicine because it has been treated with many different kind of chemical solutions for the last few decades, but there are more ways to fight and beat depression, and many of these ways are not medicine related.

Many of the people who suffer depression in one part of their lives realize that this is a kind of condition that might return and hit them in later stages in life, this understanding makes depression patients seek answers that will have a significant effect throughout a long period of time. This is typical of people who suffered mild depression symptoms and overcame the depression with some psychological help and a lot of self work and efforts. Many want to keep living their life with a feeling that a non medical solution is available to keep depression from hitting again.

Help for depression is widely available in most of the world, the awareness to the dangers and destructive power of depression disorders have increased the efforts to help depression patients fight this condition, from traditional therapy to many new and modern approaches to physical activity and social connections, solutions that have been showing fairly good results in many cases and encourage depression patients to keep working on depression prevention instead of relaying on the easy use of chemicals.

The fact that depression can, in some mild and not clinical severe, be beaten and prevented on a regular basis using therapy and social connections, as well as physical exercise and workout routine, is very comforting for the many people who suffer mild depression around the world and that are not interested in developing any kind of dependency on chemicals and medicines for mental conditions. It is also said that the fact that depression patients are kept on a regular treatment and are aware of the reoccurring nature of depression phases is helping prevent and decrease the level of the depression frequency.

Can A Person With Bipolar Disorder Be Successfully Self-Employed?

If you suffer from a long-term mental illness, like bipolar disorder, it's possible that your level of confidence in your ability to successfully start and manage a business of your own has eroded with time. Your efforts in the past may have left you feeling like a square peg trying to fit into a round hole - both in your business pursuits, and in the path of traditional employment.

If not approached correctly, starting a business can be dangerous for a person with bipolar disorder, adding fuel to the fires of both mania and depression. People with bipolar disorder can be subject to manic delusions of grandeur, pursuing unrealistic business ideas, along with having grandiose and unrealistic expectations of themselves. After the period of mania wears off, the depressive mindset will likely set in, and with it, a realistic view of the unrealistic business they had been so excited about. They may feel foolish, and like a failure, and they may have also hurt and let down many people who believed in them.

This cycle of feelings of grandiosity followed by feelings of failure is harmful to the health and stability of the person with bipolar disorder, and may cause them to give up on themselves altogether. After many such let-downs and disappointments, many people with bipolar disorder who have great potential end up on disability, or otherwise dependent on others for their survival.

If you have bipolar disorder, starting your own business can be one of the best things you can do for yourself and your health - as long as you approach it in the right way. It's important for you to gain perspective and understanding in order to tame the possibility of poor judgment based on manic impulses. You may gain this insight from recognition of your past patterns and mistakes in business, or if you're lucky enough not to have made any, from awareness of the potential pitfalls of both mania and depression in your business.

Ideally you can find a trusted friend and advisor to help support you with your goals of successful self-employment. This person should be a logical, grounded and rational critical thinker who has an understanding of bipolar disorder. He or she can be the sounding board for your plans, and you will need to rely on this person to help you by telling you when your ideas or judgment is poor. Your advisor can also help motivate you when your mood is depressed.

You're going to need to train your mind to approach your business in the right way, rather than in the incredible excitement, creativity and grandiosity that may have fueled your past endeavors. Be realistic, and know your weaknesses. You want to keep your stress levels down, so be careful not to do too much. If you find yourself beginning to work unstoppably 12-16 hours a day, it's time to force yourself to stop. Check in with your advisor to let them know you have to take a break, and do whatever you need to do to take care of your elevating mood, such as calling your psychiatrist and/or therapist.

Have realistic expectations and set small goals. This will prevent you from setting yourself up for disappointment, failure and depression. Don't start with dreams of becoming an overnight millionaire - simply begin with small steps. Be sure to find a good accountant - many small businesses may start out by making only a hundred or a few hundred dollars a month. By maximizing your tax write-offs, you can make up for this.

A good type of business for someone with bipolar disorder is a small home business. A home business is something you can start small and build up slowly, you won't need a lot of money to get started. You can set your own hours and limits, taking on only as much as you are capable of without over-stressing yourself. With a home business, you have the flexibility you need in coping with this disorder. You'll still be able to find the time for all the various tasks you already have throughout the week such as doctor's appointments, support groups, exercise, therapy, filling prescriptions, and so on.

There are an incredible number of benefits for a person with bipolar disorder starting a home business. You will find something that uses your talents and skills, and your confidence will increase dramatically. Having a regular responsibility that you enjoy will help you to be more healthy and stable. Your business will keep your mind active, and if you've been on disability it's likely you'll appreciate having something to do.

As your income increases and you take advantage of your tax deductions, you can get better insurance, more easily pay for your medication, and enjoy your increasing quality of life overall. As you take control of your income, you can begin to be relieved of the major stressor of poverty and financial need. Your self-esteem will rise as you become more independent and less dependent. You'll be able to start paying off your debts. And, being self-employed, you have created your own job security.

There are a great many more benefits to having your own home business if you have a mental illness. Finding a home business that fits and approaching it in the right way is one of the best things a person with bipolar disorder can do for their financial, mental and emotional health.

Caregiving's Costly Burden

Hey - If I had known that official government policy toward caring for elderly parents was that their children would have to do it all, well I would have had 10 kids.

While it's said that those in the developing world have numerous children with the hope that some will survive to care for them when they're old, those in developed counties have about two children.

Somehow I guess I thought our so-called developed world had some type of policies for elderly caregiving, but the United States simply doesn't. While Medicare will take care of hospitalization for a heart attack, those who need chronic care for Parkinson's disease, diabetes, Alzheimer's disease or heart failure just have to depend on family, pure and simple. After that, long term care insurance coverage is the only answer.

Boomers can purchase long term care insurance for their own future care, but this doesn't help the greatest generation that needs care now. With no program to address chronic care, Medicaid, a welfare program for the proven poor, has become the default option for much long term care - nursing homes. So if a person has the $90,000 needed in New York state, he or she can enter a nursing home. But that money will be gone within two years, and Medicaid will then pick up the nursing home expenses. About 2/3 of Medicaid goes to pay nursing home care for those who have outlasted their money. But remember, over 40% of nursing home residents are under age 65.

"Nursing homes are the last resort - where a disabled person will go when a family caregiver can no longer care for the relative at home," said a doctor.

Studies show that a decision to place somebody in a nursing home comes not when the person reaches some type of medical criteria; it's when a caregiver can no longer give the care because of health or financial reasons.

And while most don't have the money to place a relative in a nursing home, many of the 80 percent of U.S. caregivers don't even want to go the nursing home route. Despite being regulated by government, nursing homes, with a very few exceptions, aren't places most people want to go.

Family caregivers adding home care for the disabled to their many other responsibilities, suffer physically and mentally. A nes report, "Study of Caregivers in Decline: A Close-up Look at the Health Risks of Caring for a Loved One", details how the stress and worry about caregiving results in millions of caregivers neglecting their own physical and mental health, resulting in depression, fatigue, poor eating and exercise habits and greater use of alcohol, drugs and medications.

When these caregivers' responsibilities and concerns are taken in the context of the responsibilities they also have for their own lives - including work and family - many caregivers are overwhelmed, and the stress can take the physical form of heart-attack scares, high blood pressure, acid reflux, headaches, arthritis flare-ups and other conditions, the report said.

I've articulated the caregivers' predicament to 100s of policymakers and lawmakers, and for the most part, this problem is just not on their radar screen. There are a few expeditions, and ther are a few programs such as the National Family Caregiver Support Program, but an overall strategy of supporting caregivers, who supply more than $257 billion in care each year, simply does not exist. The answer that I keep getting is this: "it's a societal problem."

Meanwhile, where does a caregiver turn? Some of the forty six percent of caregivers who are now employed can turn to professional caregiving assistance via his or her employer, and some employers provide free, but limited, geriatric case managers to assist employees in negotiating thi path of family caregiving, but it can be costly.

For example, the home assessment costs $580, and a case manager earns an hourly rate of $125/hour.

In California, Caregiver Resource Centers provide some services free or at low cost, including social workers to assess the caregiving situation for current and future needs.

Those with access to a free home assessment should take advantage of it, especially before a health crisis occurs, and folks without long term care insurance coverage can get personal advice and free comparative rate quotes online.

Biology and Depression

When it comes to depression, the schism between psychology and psychiatry is basically this: therapists influenced by Freud's psychology see depression as a product of the mind and talk about it in terms of drives, defenses, regressions, and problems of identification and self-esteem. Those influenced by biological psychiatry see depression as a product of the brain, caused by shifts that take place among hormones and neurotransmitters. Shephard Kantor, a psychiatrist on the faculty of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, looks for ways of bringing the two approaches together. Kantor believes the mental "productions" of depressed patients--negative thoughts and, in the case of psychotics, hallucinations--come from chemical changes in the central nervous system and are not psychologically caused. He no longer believes that the crazy thinking that accompanies depression is triggered by external events or is the residue--for example--of childhood interactions with parents. He believes the crazy thinking that accompanies depression is caused by the chemical state itself.

But what is the effect of childhood trauma? we may ask. Surely it can't be totally unrelated to depression. Kantor suggests that the mental changes of depression may be due to certain sensations and memory traces that go back to "the calamities of childhood". Such calamities produce changes in neurotransmitter levels or receptor sites, he theorizes. And it isn't just childhood trauma that does this. Emotional wounds at any point along the way might produce similar chemical alterations in the brain.

Studies with primates show that circuitry linking structures in the central nervous system is responsible for perception, memory, and emotion. With this in mind, Kantor says, it isn't such a big jump to imagine how the tiniest of biochemical disturbances at any of these sites might evoke memories and moods whose origins lie in childhood.

Kantor has another idea. One of the breakthroughs of modern neurology was Wilder Penfield's discovery that stimulating certain areas of the brain with electrical impulses produces visual and auditory images and memories. Kantor asks this provocative question: Isn't it possible that the signals generated by neurotransmitters might function as "the internal equivalents" of Penfield's externally applied stimulating electrodes? If so, he says, it "would cause patients to report feelings, recollections and ideas generated not by conflict, fantasy, or drive derivatives, but by chemical stimuli."

Kantor's ideas have not yet been substantiated by research but his thinking is far from wild, for much that has already been learned points in the same direction. In the meantime, Kantor stands firm in his conviction that psychiatrists should learn to understand--and accept--the chemical nature of mood disorders.

Clearly, childhood events produce inner experience--feelings and attitudes that stay with us, affecting our lives immensely. The question psychiatry wrestles with is how these powerfully resonant events interact with neurotransmitter deficits to produce shifts in mood state that are sometimes volatile, sometimes subtle. There are differences, after all, among all of us--differences in the amount of trauma or stress we experience and in the degree of chemical vulnerability we inherit. No one exists in a perfect state of chemical balance. Where, then, should the line be drawn with respect to neurotransmitter deficits? Do they exist in all who become mood disordered or only in those suffering from severe forms of these illnesses?

These are some of the important questions being addressed, currently, in the fields of psychaitry and psychology.

* * *

This article is excerpted from Colette Dowling's book, You Mean I Don't Have to Feel this Way?: New Help for Depression, Anxiety and Addiction.

Quotes:

"Beautifully documented... Dowling backs up her theories with facts."

Working Woman

"This really excellent book deals sensitively and directly with culturally imbued fears of biological therapies for emotional disorders."

Donald F. Klein, Professor of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons

"A down-to-eaerth, hopeful, useful--and,from the point of view of this "recovered" depressive--accurate account of how to treat depression.

Mike Wallace, 60 Minutes

Incredible Rare Bible Verses - Could God Have Made a Mistake?

If God wrote the Bible or inspired the Bible, could God be responsible for making any mistakes that need to be corrected inside of the Bible? If I was the most intelligent entity ever (God) and had the ability to create something out of nothing like our planet, I should be able to write a flawless instruction manual like the Bible.

Here's to Bible verses that I would like you to take a look at, but read them with an open mind. If these weren't Bible verses and just sentences in another book, could these actually be considered literal contradictions?

Genesis 32:30 (King James Version) And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.

John 1:18 (King James Version) No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.

The first statement says that Jacob seen God face-to-face, while the second Bible verse says that no man has seen God. It just doesn't stop there. The second Bible verse says that no man has seen God at any time.

Let's just say that God put these Bible verses in there too irritate people like myself, atheists, agnostics and even some doubting Christians. What's the meaning behind it and why would the Christian God deliberately try to confuse any Christians who are trying to understand the true meaning of Christianity.

I would love to hear some of your comments about these Bible verses and why or why not you would think that they were or weren't a contradiction.

Depression and Depression Medication Side Effects

Depression is a runaway condition that impacts the lives of an estimated 150 million people worldwide on any given day with women being somewhat more susceptible to the condition than their male counterparts. That said, it is estimated that 8 percent of the world's male population will suffer an episode of depression over the course of any given year according to World Health Organization. So with numbers like these it is easy to see why the pharmaceutical industry is racing to find a suitable treatment for depression. But thus far the side effects associated with depression medications make taking them an exercise in unpredictability and some might argue bravery.

Depression itself is a feeling of melancholy and intense sadness that lasts far longer than what would be considered normal. It has a direct impact on normal functioning, disrupts life, and substantially lowers quality of life. Treatments that claim to rein in this beast of a mental illness include antidepressants, mood elevators, and mood stabilizers. Other less risky options include natural and/or complementary treatments such as diet management, aromatherapy, light therapy, herbal supplements, and homeopathic remedies.

The vast majority of medications prescribed to treat depression attempt to re-balance neurotransmitter chemicals in the brain. In many cases the brain chemical targeted is serotonin.

The dosage of the medication that is prescribed is arrived upon through a trial and error approach making the risk of over correction or under rectification a real risk. Another hidden danger of depression medications is that additional drugs may be needed to counter the side effects which may materialize. This group of additional treatments can include, but will not be limited to, sleep aids.

While the current group of depression drugs leaves a lot to be desired they have come a long ways from the days when taking them in moderate dosage could prove lethal. These old school medications are rarely prescribed these days as the newer depression medications have more manageable side effects.

In some cases the side effects start to be felt before the medication has had a chance to take effect. If you find yourself in this situation you should not give up on the medication before contacting your doctor about managing the side effects or adjusting the dosage. For example depression medications may cause constipation which can be managed by increasing fiber intake. Dry mouth is another example that can be safely and easily managed.

Additional side effects associated with depression medications are fatigue, drowsiness, difficulty with urination, blurred vision, and sexual dysfunction.

As briefly mentioned above the newer drugs come with fewer side effect risks but still include some very unsettling possibilities. This list would include headaches, insomnia, nervousness, upset stomach, and suicidal thoughts.

Certainly natural remedies are not for everyone with depression but they are considered to be very safe and in some cases may even reduce the side effects caused by conventional medication.

If you do start to notice any unwanted symptoms associated with taking prescription depression medications they should be brought to the attention of your doctor.

Additionally, you medical professional will likely want to talk to you in advance about what to expect as you implement his treatment plan along with information about the possibility of behavioral changes and how best to cope.

On last point that is often left out of the depression medication discussion and that is withdrawal. You should know that on occasion the withdrawal symptoms associated with depression treatment drugs can be as challenging as the side effects themselves.