Psychology

Bipolar disorder is actually an emotional disorder, witnessed by the occurrence of many mood swings.  It is actually a serious disorder that involves the brain, and can make ones life a roller coaster ride full of ups and downs, highs and lows.  It is a tumultuous volley of emotional reactions to everyday triggers.  Learning to live with this disorder is possible, but involves drug related treatment to do so.

Attempts at Living a Normal Life with Bipolar Disorder
To live life with a bipolar disorder is a tedious task.  Most are not successful at finding a balance between meeting goal-oriented expectations and dealing with the disorder.  Every minute of each day is a constant barrier faced by bipolar manics, with their perspective outlooks being in a dark and shallow place as compared to those without the disorder.  Coping skills needed by the individual, family, and friends are an effective way to meet each day filled with a positive optimism to counteract the painful effects of the manic-depressive state.  A factor that affects and upsets family ties is that many bipolar manics use drugs and alcohol to self-treat the disorder.  This intensifies the pain and heartache for all involved (Kauer et al, 2008).

Thought the behavior is counter-productive, it tends to stay isolated to the individual.  It affects others in a negative manner that warrants wanting to keep the bipolar manic at arms length with minimal interaction desired.  The love for the individual keeps family and friends steadfast to deal with the impossible mood swings, until they must for their own sanity and keeping of the peace, take a time out, while others take up the mission.

Cognitive effects on behavior
The disorder affects the brain, disrupting cognition, and how the individual views the world, as they do not see things the same as a person without the disorder.  This disruption is like a scale that pivots to the left and to the right, but is incapable of staying in the middle.  A chemical imbalance is occurring that keeps the mind constantly at odds, incapable of finding balance.  The chemical imbalance reflects changes in the brain and neurotransmitters (Simonsen et al, 2008).

Neurotransmitters are chemicals released by the brain to keep the flow of cell traffic gliding smoothly throughout the brain on their journey of gathering and building cognitive substance.  Science does not know what disrupts the release and flow of the chemicals for bipolar manics.  They do however recognize the physical response and have taken measures to control the release by treatment with medication.  This has proven an effective treatment for most.   The drawbacks faced with medications prescribed for the disorder is the fact of the drug and alcohol abuse experienced by many diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

The mixing of alcohol or other drugs can cause a deadly effect.  It can also turn an adverse mood swing into one of extreme violence.  Which could result in the harm of others or to the individual, and the risk factors for suicide increases dramatically, thus it is easy enough to say that one should avoid the use of alcohol and drugs while taking the medication.   This is a problem in itself, as alcoholism or drug abuse makes it very difficult to determine what is causing certain aspects of the behavior.  If it were suspected that the person has bipolar disorder, they would need to be diagnosed as such.  In order for this to happen, one would need to abstain from alcohol long enough for diagnoses to take place (Simonsen et al, 2008).

Refusal to Accept Treatment, or Take Prescribed Medication
Those diagnosed with bipolar disorder want to look forward to a quality life, and to do so they must take the treatment available.  Though the medication does react severely on the brain, it is the lesser of two evils at present time.   Generally, it takes 10 years for diagnoses.  This is due to other factors that impose taking precedence, such as alcoholism, or drug addiction.  Once known that the person is suffering from bipolar disorder the individual starts treatment.  Along with medication, it is good for manics to have talking sessions to slow or enhance their thought process as needed (Gruber, 2010).
Most bipolar manics will deny the diagnoses, which is one factor for the refusal of treatment.  They find an answer to their symptoms that make perfect sense to them even though it is incorrect.  The fact remains that 44 of those diagnosed are not under treatment, which is not good for them or society (Gruber, 2010).  Pharmacological therapy is not the desired way to treat the disorder, but presently, it is the only available.

There are those who refuse to start treatment, and those who stop taking their medication.  Either way conditions ascribed to are representative of non-compliance (Gruber, 2010).  This leads to higher risk of suicide.  One of the symptoms of bipolar disorder is the condition of constant anxiety.  Studies conducted to distinguish if the anxiety is concern for increased suicidal notions, has shown that there was no increase when anxiety was higher or lower in accordance with manic and depressive episodes.  Studies show there is not a set pattern on individuality, which indicates that each individuals triggers differ, and therefore the frequency of episodic value (Nakagawa, 2008).

Prognosis
Dealing with all of the fluctuations of the brain, coupled with the intense behaviors, both negative and at times positive.  The negative behaviors of course outweigh any positive behaviors.  Still and all, the disorder in itself is a most compelling one.  The constant state of anxiety is apparently a strong deterrent in the acceptance or acknowledgment of the need for treatment.  Until an individual is compliantly following a treatment plan, it is hard to make a prognosis.   Another factor is that the anxiety medication clashes with manic-depressive episodes, making it difficult to find a stable ground of which to benchmark (El-Mallakh  Hollifield, 2008).

Recovery from episodes for bipolar manics involves a dual process.  The first is Symptom recovery, followed by functional recovery.   Studies have also shown that dysfunction is high, but not necessarily caused by mood swings.  There are many cumulative issues resulting from the billions of cells that make up the neurotransmitters then released in their tumultuous and unorganized manner.  That is why it is so difficult to understand the causes for bipolar manic disorder, and due to the instability even harder to provide a prognosis.

In Conclusion
The reason may still be unknown in how or why people have bipolar disorder.  The current pharmacological treatment may not be the best way to treat it, but it is the only available recourse at this time.  The factors that preclude correct diagnoses are that with anxiety disorders, posttraumatic stress disorders, and bipolar manic disorders all bearing very similar symptoms.  Along with alcohol and drug addiction, the difficulty to diagnose, may take several years to complete.  Once a diagnosis of bipolar manic is determined, it is hard to get an individual to start treatment, let alone maintain it.  For this reason, there are many individuals in need of family and friends in a supportive measure to remind them that they are not alone, and to keep them up when they are down, and balanced when they are up.  Most of all, support them to stay on their medication in keeping balance mentally overall.