Diagnosis of Mental Illness

[Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (www.dbsalliance.org) has an online screening to generally test the possibility of a mood disorder.]

I read an article about the over-diagnosing and mis-diagnosing of mental illnesses, bipolar in particular, and it got me thinking about the issues.  The article was posted on Oprah's site, yet has quite a bit of merit, including references from the author of the memoir "An Unquiet Mind".  It discussed the issue of misdiagnosing people with bipolar disorder when really they suffer from major depression and borderline personality disorder.  The reasoning is that bipolar is easier to treat, and there's incentive from drug companies to prescribe their medication.  I've always had a problem with drug companies and that is a whole other can of worms; a can I realize I need to explore through my art. 

I need to begin planting seeds for ideas concerning the corrupt practices of pharmaceutical companies and how dramatically they effect the lives of people in a negative way.  In my personal opinion, they are no better than bank robbers and murderers.  Their clear objective is for personal monetary gain at the expense of thousands, perhaps millions, of others. 

Going back to the article, though, it is really interesting to think about how many people are misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder.  The article states that nearly half of people diagnosed have a completely different disorder.  This is just one more unsettling fact that makes a person question their own diagnosis.  It is very difficult to accept and understand the diagnosis of a mental illness when you are the one being diagnosed.  For me personally, I had to fully understand my disorder, so I read several books and articles about bipolar I and II disorder.  For probably a year or so, I never fully accepted that I had the disorder.  I think the straw that broke the camel's back was when my lousy excuse for a psychiatrist decided to prescribe me an antidepressant.  Even I knew that rule number 1 about treating bipolar disorder is to NOT give the patient an antidepressant...  I found out first hand exactly why.  My mood swings were so dramatic that within anywhere from an hour to even just 10 minutes I would go from wanting to commit suicide to having a pounding heart-rate and euphoria that made me think I was completely invincible.  I feared I would walk across the busy street I lived by because I would want to just run across on a whim.  I also feared that I would follow through with my suicidal thoughts, because they reached a depth that they tend to only reach after several days of a worsening depression.  I was absolutely terrified and would not let my friends leave my side, not even for a minute.  I quickly stopped taking the medication.  I knew that the reaction I had was not a "normal" reaction to an antidepressant.

But even now that I've accepted the diagnosis, I still struggle with managing it, as do many others.  The medication will work, and it feels like maybe I really don't have anything wrong with me.  Perhaps it was merely stress, lifestyle, and the situations I was in that made my feel the way I did before.  I know better, but still I will find myself wondering.

That is why it's a problem that doctors misdiagnose so quickly.  To give the diagnosis of bipolar disorder to twice as many people than who actually have it only creates a greater doubt in the minds of those truly suffering the disorder.  Then it becomes easier for someone like me to justify the possibility of a misdiagnosis, and stop taking the medication.  From there, the problems return and we are given two choices;  start taking the medication again, or don't, and let the problems worsen with the high risk of ending up hospitalized.  Or dead.  Naive doctors are then held more responsible for the heightened risk of death and personal harm to people truly suffering from bipolar disorder.  And it is all funded by the highly influential drug companies. 

It makes you wonder if anyone out there truly has a conscience.  Or do all of them have an alterior motive of making more money so that they can live a more "comfortable" life...  or more lavished life?  I am lucky to have found a psychiatrist whom I truly trust, who takes care of his clients.  I also have a therapist who feels the same.  It takes a lot of faith, and just as much searching to find them, but God-willing, enough of the selfish and naive doctors will lose patients because of the good doctors, and they will all learn to grow a pair.  Or they'll just go out of business.  However, that is very unlikely, because if psychiatrists are good at one thing, that's making you believe that you really are crazy, and that the barrage of medications is the only way you will ever have any hope of a "normal" life.  The drug companies make money, the doctor makes money, and you are left psychologically scarred, broke, and sometimes worse off than you were before.