- Suzanne Leighton
- Cape Town
- South Africa
Complementary Therapist, special interest in bipolar disorder, Allied Health Professions Council, South Africa
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Is there a cure for bipolar disorder? Will we ever overcome the stigma?
I, like you John, have chosen to help others by admitting and talking about the problems of my past and how I overcame them. Mine is the other extreme of bipolar mania. Bipolar disorder is not a curse if you can learn how to manage it. If you can constructively channel the energy previously trapped in the illness it can become your greatest asset. I believe I have done this and, to give hope to others, I speak about in my DVD called 'ON THE EDGE OF MADNESS - Living well with bipolar." Ask for order form at integratingpolarites@gmail.com. I was told I had to be on medicaton for the rest of my life and now, years later, when I tell people I manage my life without medication they say I must have been wrongly diagnosed or that I will relapse. It wasn't easy and I had some wise help but with detremination and focus I have retrained myself into a stable and balanced life style which takes a lot of discipline and self honouring. Maybe it's not a cure but it's certainly management and maybe that's what we all need. As for stigma, talking and understanding helps to overcome the fear of what people don't know how to handle. The people I know who have been mentally unstable are also very sensitivity, creativity and have great intellegence - that's not something to be embarrased about, rather proud of unusual assets.
James Kindler 20+
Thank you for taking the time to look at the website, if we all work together we can overcome stigma.
James
James Kindler 20+
i have schizophrenia and have also overcome it. I find the best way to overcome stigma is by showing people how normal we are after recovery by self-disclosing to large audiences. I do it for a living and I'm on a website if you ever want to here me speak go to www.choicesinrecovery.com and then to video treatment and there I will be.
Suzanne Leighton
Silvia Bianchi
Because of the accident I was taking medicines that probably were not good for my sleep, especially when I decide to go back to work even if I was not well yet. So I start to don’t sleep well, then to don’t sleep at all and to don’t eat well (almost nothing) and finally I was in a total crisis. I went out in the street one morning in pyjama like in a dream or nightmare and ask for help so finally I got in the hospital. During the crisis I had moments of maniac (so euphoria) and moments of total anxiety, fear (depression).
Silvia Bianchi
This is my experience so you should know that bipolar have many different aspects and change a bit between each subject.
Bipolar disorder it is a kind of deep mood oscillation and in my case has appeared since I was 24 years old.
In that year I took a medicine “Lariam” (against malaria) to make a trip in the forest. This medicine has secondary effects in some people like insomnia and hallucination. I didn’t know I was included in that “some people”. Any way doctors now, says to me that it might help my illness to appear but that was probably not the causing, and they are probably right, but I’m not totally convinced.
I had periodical crisis (only when doctors took me off my medicine) so it happen 4 times in 9 years.
Usually without medicine, in a good moment of life so having good sleep and having a good alimentation I can keep going very well. Only when I start a stressfully moment, it can be hard to control my sleep and so to eat well and finally even if understanding that I’m starting the crisis …it’s like a little child taking the power of my decisions and emotions. So fears appear and maybe I can’t choose the right, like to take the medicine to sleep because I’m afraid of something. It’s like to be sleepwalking for some days. In my last crisis a lot of stressful things came together like:
Moving to Italy (because I was living in Spain but I’m Italian) +
So leaving my job +
Motorbike accident (so radical change of my routine) +
Boss calling me to get back even if I was not totally well +
Thinking of beginning a new “life” in Italy (coming back in Italy, after 6 years it means live with my parents & search for a new job) +
Planning to get married with my boyfriend once finding a job in Italy
TOTAL=Anxiety
Because of the accident I was taking medicines that probably were not good for my sleep, especially when I decide to go back to work
Suzanne Leighton
That is why I also run awareness workshops with a short presentation of my complementary approach to shift the thinking and then I use facilitated conversation to get the audience to connect with each other. My DVD also helps share my thinking.
In the workshops, I bring together my two areas of interest that most people think of with horror – public speaking and mental illness. The results are very rewarding, as people finally feel understood and not so alone. Although it’s difficult (and I get told it won’t work!!) I do it with mixed audiences which is far more beneficial. e.g. with students, teachers and parents; doctors, patients, staff and families and in corporate all employees together (these w/s include stress management). I’ve been trained in big group dynamics but I still find it hard to get people to invite me do it because they can’t envisage it working. Anyway I’ve been doing it on a voluntary basis at the hospitals, schools and in the community a lot, so many important people have seen it work - to their amazement.
I’m doing some training of this method at a nurses’ conference soon and feel pleased that that proposal was accepted. Slowly, slowly, if it works, people do eventually realize. I’ve been doing this for 22 years!
I have spoken at many conferences and once did a presentation at the brain science department at the University of Cape Town.
I’d love to travel with my workshops if there’s ever an opportunity for that. I haven’t heard of many other people doing it this way. It sometimes feels very slow but over the many years I notice that chage is increasing which is good news. Suzanne
Suzanne Leighton
erica liebman
I spent 10 years on medications and never had lasting relief. I finally made the decision to stop taking medication and follow a diet, exercise and life strategy that took me a year to plan before I titrated myself off medications. I researched which foods had which effects on neurotransmitters, read stories from others who did it, emailed prominent bipolar experts, etc. I experimented with the foods, types of exercise and different ways to slightly structure my time to prevent mood switches. It worked. Just recently I went back to see the research/psychiatrist clinical director at an Ivy League medical center where I once received my psychiatric treatment. He evaluated me and then told me that he considered me in "remission". He also told me that medications only work for 50% of the population, that often times those not on medication still have mood switches, but they are much slower and sometimes less intense. Medications change the cycling pattern, but do not cure it, he said.
I am now going back to this same school for Neuroscience and perhaps medical school so I can study alternative treatments on the brain. I have also been helping to coach people SAFELY get off of their medicines, listen to themselves and guidance in designing exercise and nutrition programs. I am still learning, but have gone from a chronic mental patient to a happy and fulfilled human being.
James Kindler 20+
I have schizophrenia and have no symptoms, I do take medication however. If we are to break down stigma we must be very public about our illness and show people that we are just regular people with an extra obsicle to overcome. I self disclose to large groups of people as I speak publicly on the matter, I'm glad you do also.
Allan Macdougall 30+
It seems very strange to me that there is a current pandemic of neurochemical deficit in westernised societies. Why not in other more traditional societies?
My own take on this, for what it's worth, is that neurochemical deficit is a symptom of mental disorder rather than a cause. yet the medical profession treat it as though it were a cause. Cynics might argue that it is in the medical profession's best interests to treat a symptom rather than address a cause, because one guarantees a constant income stream and the other does not.
I speculate that depressive illnesses are normal reactions to something externally dysfunctional, rather than dysfunctional reactions to something we regard as normal.
James Kindler 20+
I have schizophrenia and the percentage of people who have this illness is equal in every country, around 1% of the population worldwide. Fact is that people do much worse without western treatment of medication and recovery. In Africa they are abused and chained and other countries are much the same. The statistics you read are skewed and other people around the world suffer far more than we do in the west. Thank you for listening and your comment. By the way, I have had a fortunate and fine upbringing by a loving family and friends, no external factors here.
James
Paddy O doors
I think that attitudes have thankfully changed and most reasonable people don’t take the standpoint of ignorance as a default view on mental health anymore. This is possibly due to greater awareness through education and of course the brave individuals who declared their condition in the early days pre the Stephen Fry episode that brought the condition into the mainstream.
I think that the fact that a highly educated individual that seemed to function “normally” such as Stephen Fry and others admitting their illness did much to dispel the blanket view of people with mental illness as the unstable, unpredictable and often dangerous sub-society menace that they simply are not.
Thank heavens education and understanding has increased also thanks to the strength and fortitude of those that didn’t deny their illness when stigma was at its most pernicious.
Neil Greco
Neil Greco
Brian Godfrey
Katrina Musick
Linda Bullock
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Katrina Musick
Susan Talancon
Ed Schulte 50+
for two years
before she elected to terminate her connection with mortal body -ness the first part of your ......
" The people I know who have been mentally unstable are also very sensitivity, creativity and have great intelligence - that's not something to be embarrased about,"
is accurate ...BUT .....then .....
so are ALL BEings on the developing journey called "consciousness"...there is only ones “degrees of Awareness” at any given time which differentiate / define “intelligence”
this ending however
" rather proud of unusual assets." ///// would best be considered .....Carefully
Ann Nunnally
I think part of the stigma is perpetuated by doctors who try to make money by peddling their cure or theory. My own sister, an MD, was reading one of this books and was arguing with me because I use medication.
Another stigma is perpetuated by the media who use dramatic stories about mental illness to sell books, movies, and TV shows.
I usually don't bring it up unless someone knows me well enough to know I am stable. Also, it is just one facet of my life. I also struggle with sleep apnea. My son died at the age of 16 seven years ago. I am going through menopause. All of those issues affect my mental health. My son's death is just as taboo a subject as my bipolar disorder. It's a fine line between being authentic and being "just" the one thing.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Thank you. I am glad that you have found a way to manage your bi-polar dosorder..not easy..and a huge event like the death of your son, is much harder for some with bi-polar disrder to navigate...more risks. and the isolation of having two such important aspects of you "taboo"unbearable..don't let itbe taboo..beak the ice..talk about..teach the people you care about how to talk about it.
Safe Passage to you
Daniel Lilienthal
Holly Landau 50+
The condition is a real pain-in-the-ass sometimes and has to be constantly managed. I think we need more people who are willing to "come out" and share their stories about what life is like when you're BiPolar.
Thoughts?
Ryan Friedrich
There is a real disconnection between public perception of mental illness and the reality of mental illness; that reality being that mental illness is simply physical illness. This all helps beg the question of "Why do we treat people with mental illnesses different?"
Best of luck,
Ryan
Amily shaw 10+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Mark Meijer 100+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Will join you here as well.
erica liebman
If there are any conversations on bipolar and especially remission on treatment, I would love to know about them. Thanks!