Teaching Caregivers How to Help You Through Mood Episodes

Last Updated: 25 Mar 2024
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Your loved ones can be an invaluable source of support when it comes to achieving bipolar stability. Here’s how you can work together to get the best results for your mental health.

bipolar caregivers loved ones help mood episodes stability
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My family has really had a tough time because of my bipolar disorder. A few years after I was diagnosed in 1995, my mom said to me, “I don’t know how to help you, Julie.” I didn’t know how to help myself at the time, so it wasn’t really surprising to hear her say this. Seeing someone struggle with bipolar disorder is like watching a train wreck about to happen and feeling helpless to do anything about it. I know this was my family’s reality for years.

Finally, in 1998, when I became extremely sick, I decided to do something about the way bipolar disorder was viewed in my family. I just knew there had to be a better way for the people in my life to help me — and I was going to find out what it was. Then, I was going to teach them.

The Most Common Mistakes 

My family used to walk blindly into every situation caused by bipolar. They’d say, “Julie’s depressed, what can we do? Let’s try this!” I’d get better and then I’d get sick again and they would say, “Julie’s manic, what do we do? What we did last time didn’t work, so let’s do this!”

There was no plan — it really did seem as if bipolar was just one big mess that was impossible to understand. By this time, I had lost most of my friends and my family was literally worn out by how sick I was. I called my mother, crying, almost every night.

Understanding My Own Bipolar Patterns and Sharing Them With My Family

In 1999, I had the idea to write down all my bipolar disorder symptoms. I’m not sure how or why I thought this would help, but I just kept going until the list was in the hundreds. Suddenly, as I was looking at the list, the whole thing broke itself into obvious patterns: When I was depressed, my symptoms were always the same. This was true for my mania, psychosis, and all other mood swings — they all had distinct symptoms that never varied.

This meant it wasn’t a random, impossible-to-address illness. Rather, if I could understand my own patterns, then teach these patterns to my family, they would better know what to do when I became ill. I write about this plan in my books, Loving Someone with Bipolar Disorder and Take Charge of Bipolar Disorder, both co-written with John Preston, PsyD. It took my family and me a few years to have a real system in place. But now that we do, all our lives are much easier.

When Your Loved One Denies Having Bipolar Disorder

My family is lucky and we all know it — I accept the diagnosis of bipolar and do everything I can to get better. Unfortunately, according to psychologist Xavier Amador, PhD, author of I Am Not Sick I Don’t Need Help!, this isn’t the case for the estimated 50 percent of individuals who have bipolar disorder and who can’t — or won’t — see the effects of bipolar on their lives. Other people’s family members ask me all the time, “What can I do if my sister won’t get help?” or, “My mother refuses to believe she has bipolar disorder and she’s ruining our family. What can we do?”

Of course, not seeing the havoc caused by bipolar is a common symptom of the disorder itself, Dr. Amador once pointed out to me. In other words, the person you love is not trying to wreck your life on purpose. Certainly, there are those who know they have bipolar disorder but don’t wish to change. After all, they would have to stop drinking and getting into terrible relationships, and, eventually, let go of that lovely high of mania! Indeed, it’s common to hear such comments as “Forget medications! They will dull my mind and make me into a walking zombie! You’re the one with the problem!” Such attitudes can cause a lot of chaos in a family.

Setting Boundaries and Taking Care of Yourself

To help, you can learn the patterns of the person who has bipolar disorder and understand what you’re up against. As painful as it may be, you may have to set strong limits on what you will accept. For instance, if you’re letting your depressed son live in your basement and he’s smoking pot all day, or if you keep bailing out your father every time he spends all his money, you have to look at what this does to your life.

Saying no and taking care of yourself may be one of the hardest things you will ever do. While it can feel like you’re abandoning the person you love, for some people this may be the only option. Doing this isn’t easy, and I’m not making light of the matter, but when someone is not getting better, you must make some tough decisions.

What My Family and I Have Learned

When I asked my mom what’s different now compared to when I first got sick, she says, “Since we started your plan (the one described in my book), it’s like being on watch all the time. I look for signs of how you use rapid speech, express excessive worries about money, or try to do too much. I then call your brother and we work together to make sure you’re okay. He calls you, or we make sure to get you out somewhere. I don’t think you notice what we’re doing when you’re sick.”

My mother adds that she and other family members try to help me before things get out of hand, and this approach works. “You taught us what you need and we take over when you can’t help yourself,” she says. “We now know all your patterns. We’re no longer totally surprised by your behavior — we expect it and aren’t as scared as before.”

I guess I knew how she was going to answer my question, but it still made me cry. I hate being such a burden to my family. This illness has taken so much from us. But that is just how it is, isn’t it? It would be the same if I had a physical disability or illness. My mom says that if I had cancer, we would all, of course, learn what we could to help me stay alive.

So we have had to face facts: I have a chronic illness that will never go away. What has changed, though, is how I manage my bipolar and how I ask for their help. By working together, we have more normal and fun times than sick times. It wouldn’t be this way if I hadn’t taught them what I need — and if they hadn’t been willing to listen and do all they could to help.

I’m very thankful for my family.

UPDATED: Originally printed as “Teaching Your Loved Ones to Help You,” Spring 2007

About the author
Julie A. Fast is the author of the bestselling mental health books Take Charge of Bipolar Disorder, Loving Someone with Bipolar Disorder: Understanding and Helping Your Partner, Getting It Done When You’re Depressed, OMG, That’s Me! (vol. 2), and The Health Cards Treatment System for Bipolar Disorder. She is a longtime bp Magazine writer and the top blog contributor, with over 5 million blog views. Julie is also a researcher and educator who focuses on bipolar disorder prevention and ways to recognize mood swings from the beginning—before they go too far and take over a person’s life. She works as a parent and partner coach and regularly trains health care professionals, including psychiatric residents, pharmacists, general practitioners, therapists, and social workers, on bipolar disorder and psychotic disorder management. She has a Facebook group for parents, The Stable Table, and for partners, The Stable Bed. Julie is the recipient of the Mental Health America excellence in journalism award and was the original consultant for Claire Danes’s character on the TV show Homeland. Julie had the first bipolar disorder blog and was instrumental in teaching the world about bipolar disorder triggers, the importance of circadian rhythm sleep, and the physical signs of bipolar disorder, such as recognizing mania in the eyes. Julie lives with bipolar disorder, a psychotic disorder, anxiety, and ADD.
25 Comments
  1. Hi Julie,
    I read your article “Teaching Caregivers How to Help You Through Mood Episodes”. The approach of identifying the symptoms of an impending episode, either manic or depressive, is interesting. However, even if we could identify an impending episode, I do not know what could be done to manage it, if anything.

    1. Could you send I fo on how to help someone with bipolar manic

  2. I like this! My spouse is learning how to read my moods. Sometimes she will use “you’re meds aren’t working.” Sometimes arguments are all my fault. Sometimes partly my fault. But every conflict is not my bipolar surfacing. She really tries but bipolar can cause me to be a scapegoat because it’s easier to blame bipolar. Anyone else have that issue? I have a pretty good grip on mine. I’m 55 and was diagnosed in 1990. Your article has me looking for your books. We need more advocates like you. Thanks@

  3. Hi Julie. Thanks so much for your articles, books and webinars. I am a mother of a 29 year old son with Bipolar. Last year when he got out of a mental hospital, my son was in a bad shape. We just watched your videos in the Bipolar Organization site. We did learn a lot and also discuss together the best ways to deal with his illness. It is definitely very important for caregivers to educate themselves about Bipolar Disorder and its ups and downs. Your videos are very fun to watch, very clear and very educative. Bipolar organization is a great place to find all kind of information. I love it! Regards
    Blanche

  4. As the parent of a now 25 year-old, who has dealt with type 1 bi-polar everyday of his life for the past 6 years, I always find hope in your articles. My son is currently doing well, seems to have figured out some of his symptoms and how to mitigate them before he ends up in ER or worse. He’s ready to move away from home and it terrifies me, just thining of not being able to see him and talk with him every day and know first hand how he’s doing, and what I might do to help. But, of course it’s also my biggest hope, that he can live on his own and have a happy, productive life. Thanks so much for sharing your stories.

  5. Thank you, Julie! You help me AND my family immensely!❤️

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