The BBC are showing a season of documentaries of how how various mental health issues affect young people. The Bipolar one is about Frank Bruno. If this disorder affects 1 in 100 people, what's it king being shown on BBC three. Surely these issues should be on BBC One, not hidden away?

Psst. BBC Three is a channel aimed at young people.

Bi polar is not an illness, it's an excuse for people feeling sorry for themselves. Same as under active thyroid gland for fat people, that's just an over active jawbone for fatties who eat too much.

Cut out all this pc bull and say things as they really are.

Ok. You are a word that rhymes with hunt that starts with c.

Jeez another tree hugger

So what is the current excuse for semi-literates?

Evening Katie Hopkins

wow.

As someone in a relationship with someone diagnosed with Bi-polar one, (look it up, assuming your ignorance allows you to use the internet and books) I cannot tell you how wrong you are. She has 5-6 episodes a year, and they are incredibly testing times. I consider her lucky in that its very rare for her mania to be followed by depression. Im trying to think of a suitable insult for you, but to be honest, you just aren't worth it. My partner is worth ten of you.

We know a family where one partner is bi-polar (I'm afraid I don't know any further definition). That means episodes as you describe, which have included suicide attempts. They're incredibly lucky to have a remarkably tolerant partner and employer. But as you rightly stress, it's far from some sort of self-indulgent behaviour.

An underactive thyroid gland is objectively diagnosed, though. TSH (a hormone) stimulates the thyroid into making thyroxine. If the level of thyroxine in the blood is low, then the pituitary releases more TSH to try to stimulate the thyroid gland to make more thyroxine. So, if blood tests show a raised level of TSH, this proves, medically, beyond doubt, that the thyroid gland is underactive and is not making enough thyroxine.

Blood tests can also directly measure the level of T4 thyroxine, and again, a low level of T4 confirms an underactive thyroid ("hypothyroidism"icon_wink.gif.

These hormones are extremely important for the regulation of the body's metabolism, and hence the very direct (and bleedin obvious) link to weight gain (or loss).

Hyperthyroidism is the opposite. Again, the same blood tests confirm the diagnosis, objectively.

Treatments aim to change the thyroxine level to normal. The level isn't a matter of opinion, but measurable fact.

Someone else has already shown you up re bi-polar so I won't add to your shame.


I just did, but OK, here goes. Far from being a "myth", these are extremely well-known disorders, one autoimmune , one psychiatric, and only an utter plank, or a troll, would make such an idiotic post. Of course, you have no personal experience of someone who is bi-polar, whereas many on here have. You ought to try to learn a little humility and accept that actually, you know feck all about these subjects, which wouldn't be so bad, if you weren't also being such a rude and aggressive toilet on top of your ignorance, but sadly you are.

Its such a complex illness which is part of the problem. Partly psychological, partly physical and as such its so hard to pin down. Like I said, she (and I) are very lucky that her mania episodes rarely fall into depression. Infact, when she is having an epsiode (apart from being a major pain

) shes the most incredibly driven person. So driven and productive. Its a part of her personality that thrills as much as it hurts. Im trying to think of a way to say this that doesn't sound strange, but in a way, her episodes and how she deals with them, make me want to be better and do more than I would otherwise do. One of the many many things I love her for.

For that idiot to say that its an excuse for people to feel sorry for themselves should come and live with us for a month!!

I'd laugh if he took you up on the offer.

That's an absolutely top post and pretty much echoes the kind of sentiments that the non-bi-polar partner in the couple we know would say.

You are quite right about that

Aww, looks like toast has been burnt.

A colleague of mine has a wife who is bi-polar. he came back one day to find her basically hanging and he says he was fortunate because she was small and not heavy he was able to hold her up and get the noose off.

No great loss.

Nope, still here and scratching my head.

When was bi polar first discovered?

The ancient Greeks knew of the disorder, French psychiatrists did a lot of research in the early 1800s. medical papers were published in 1850 describing and cataloging the symptoms - the French actually did a lot of research into mental illnesses during the latter part of the 19th century at a time when we British were paying a halfpenny to go and laugh at the lunatics in the asylum every sunday as a bit of a change from visiting the zoo.

You may have heard of the phrase "manic depressive", same thing.

Bipolar includes both mania and depression, unipolar has the depression element only - phrases used in America since the 1950s

Satisfied now ?

The treatment of mental health in general & recognition by others that people are afflicted by these imbalances is extremely poor in the UK IMO.

I have had episodes of biPolar all my adult life (& looking back my childhood to a degree), it's quite scary at times how I behave & the subsequent affect on those around me including those that I hold most dear...
It's impossible to explain to someone why you feel the way you do & virtually as impossible from stopping doing/saying/feeling the things you do..
Stuff that can be so extreme it is frightening/beyond reason to others & yet when you are in the pit of despair nothing can pull you out except the continued support/love from those around you until it lessens.
God bless to all those affected by this..

It was discovered in 1926 when Norwegian eplorer Roald Admussen determined that the closer he got to the North Pole, the more likely the Innuit were to swing both ways

Why is this relevent?

None of his posts are relevant.

What amazes me is that he's either trolling and purposely trying to upset people effected by Bi Polar or he's uneducated on the subject.

Either way he's a ing idiot.