So, I’ve talked about what antipsychiatry is and the history of antipsychiatry a little, and in this third and final part in the series I look at why people are antipsychiatry.
Now, I understand that this is a theory and will only be true for a percentage of people. And I understand that no matter what I say, I will have a deluge of people disagreeing with me.
Nevertheless, I write:
Cyclothymia is neither bipolar depression nor unipolar depression but instead it is an illness that lies somewhere in the middle.
When psychiatric illnesses first started being recognized, some doctors felt that unipolar and bipolar depressions weren’t really the binary options for an illness but really just opposite ends of a spectrum. So then, one would have a spectrum where one could be a 100% bipolar depressive, or 100% unipolar depressive or they could lay somewhere in the middle. However, as illnesses need names and diagnostic criteria and not really vague percentages, bipolar and unipolar depression were defined separately.
Bipolar 2 though, is recognition of this false dichotomy. Bipolar 2 really sits in between unipolar and bipolar depression as more depressed than bipolar 1 but more hypomanic (emotionally dysregulatory) than unipolar depression. (See the difference between bipolar 1 and bipolar 2 disorders.)
And that’s fine as far as it goes. But there is also recognition from a lot of doctors that other states lie even more in the middle, and cyclothymia is one such disorder.
Read MoreHi all. I have a couple of announcements to make and a piece of schizophrenia research to share. Today’s post is about:
I, as a good little webmistress, keep an eye on my web analytics. So yes, I know some things about my audience, and one of the things I know is what people are searching for when they find me. This sometimes influences what I write about, like today: What is the worst mental illness?
That depends on how you judge it. You could judge it by suicide rate, in which case:
You could judge the worst mental illness based on disability rates in which case you would probably get:
Perhaps schizophrenia is the worst as it’s associated with more psychosis (delusions and hallucination). Perhaps major depression is worst because of the number of treatment-resistant cases.
Or perhaps the answer is simply this: The worst mental illness is the one you have.
Read MoreLast week I discussed the antipsychiatry movement in general, including some of their critiques of psychiatry – in this piece I will look at why antipsychiatry exists at all. After all, there doesn’t seem to be an anti-cardiology or anti-oncology group – what makes psychiatry so special?
Again, Henry A. Nasrallah, MD’s article: The antipsychiatry movement: Who and why nicely encapsulates this topic, but for those of you wondering about the history of antipsychiatry, here goes.
Read MoreAntipsychiatry. Yes, I’m against it. I’m what you might call anti-antipsychiatry; if that didn’t sound just so darn silly.
But in saying that, perhaps we should take a greater look at antipsychiatry and what the possible benefits are of such a group (other than giving me writing fodder, naturally).
Read MoreI started the Bipolar Burble eight years ago anonymously. And for the vast majority of that time, no one read my blog. Oh, sure, I had a few avid readers and a person would stumble on it now and then, but even after I started producing decent content, no one read it.
Which initially was OK by me. I didn’t write for others, I wrote for myself, so if I had one, lonely reader, then that was fine, I still felt the urge to push pixels around.
Until, of course, it wasn’t fine. Then I had to figure out why no one read me and figure out how to actually get people out there to know about me. And so people ask me all the time: How do I get people to read my blog? How do I find an audience?
Read More
Last year was a great one here at the Bipolar Burble and saw a dramatic rise in audience numbers, so welcome readers, new and old. This means that debates were fast and sometimes fierce here on the Burble, and mostly, that’s OK with me. Although it did require the invocation of commenting rules, it also meant that more people had their say on mental illness topics.
So, without further ago, here is the top 10 list of articles people read in 2011:
As I’ve said, I consider 2011 to have been a break-out year for the Bipolar Burble and I thank you all for being a part of it.
And don’t forget, if you have questions or if there are subjects you would like addressed here at the Burble, you are welcome to contact me anytime or leave a comment. I am at your service.
Read MoreRecently I announced there are great things happening for me personally and for me at the Bipolar Burble. Well, there was so much good news I couldn’t announce it all at once. I was waiting for contracts to be signed and confirmations to come through. These things have now happened, so I have two pieces of news:
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