Bipolar and Asperger's

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I was talking to CockneyRebel about the Seasonal Affective Disorder... sorry, I should have quoted her in my response.

Yeah, I suddenly realized that, and deleted that post. Sorry 'bout that.

No worries.

I have flat affect too. I don't realize it though, I experience lots of emotion, but well I even take a picture of me when I think I'm smiling (mouth closed) and I'm not.

Didn't used to, but the more I read and study on my own, the more I'm finding some that acually respect that, though there are some that do not like it My mom had a lot of trouble because of this and once read her own chart during a hospital stay where she found she had been labeled as "difficult." She presumed it was because she asked so many questions, and sometimes even challenged doctors statements. When she questioned why that was on her chart, according to her, she was chastised just for looking at it, and told, "You're not supposed to be reading that! Those are confidential notes for the doctor's eyes only!"

I've never had the kind of difficulties with the medical profession that she had, with the exception of frequently feeling "stonewalled." I think in my own case, it had more to do with either limited medical coverage (HMO's), or no coverage at all.

Most of my contact lately with the pros has been about my kids. They're all on Medicaid, and receive special services through the schools. Though there have been several who have been "politely dismissive" IMHO of our personal research, there have been enough of them over the past several years who are not only respectful of it, but pleasantly surprised by it, that we are now getting a lot less friction over it than we used to, and a lot more helpful advice. Most of the people we work with now listen far better than most we worked with several years ago. Even some who didn't used to listen are beginning to now.

I was hospitalized when I was first diagnosed, and the psychiatrist they assigned to me put me on a ridiculously high amount of a certain medication. It wasn't helping, and I had computer access so naturally I wanted to research this medication. When I found out that she had me on a higher dose than was tested I worried and brought my concerns to the nurse. She relayed my message to the psychiatrist and the psychiatrist got annoyed and refused to speak with me, this was a Friday. So I spent all weekend worrying about what she was going to say.

I'm a big pushover and politeness has been drilled into me. I find it hard to resist authority, but I did refuse my medication that night. The nurses were on my side, even someone bad at reading people could tell. On Monday the doctor told me that she did not like being questioned and that if I didn't like it, I could find another psychiatrist. She also said that she had bent over backwards for me and it still wasn't enough.

I asked the supervisor to switch me to the head psychiatrist, which she did. Things went much better after that, but that history of having a difficult time with that psychiatrist followed me for a few years later while they suspected Borderline personality disorder - until I was evaluated for that and they decided I most definitely didn't match the criteria at all.

I never want to stay in the hospital ever again. It seems like you're expected to just do what the doctors say and if you question them, you're "difficult". It took me a while to be able to assert my opinion with the doctor I have now.

i'm of the opinion that nobody's charts / records should be unavailable to them.

recently i tried to recover psych records from 1991-1993, to see if there were indicators in it that had AS been a diagnosis then, it might have occurred to someone. but they'd shredded them.

"Thanks for the suggestion Doc! You're fired!"



I hear, and cannot say where, because I really don't remember, but I believe it based on some of the stories I've heard, that women tend to have a tougher time with getting any sort of respect from doctors than men, and that it's even worse if the doctor is female. Of course that's all generalization and there are plenty of exceptions out there if you're patient enough to find them.

My own experience has been that both sexes of doctors can be equally disdainful of anyone who dares to study the same materials they did, without going to college and getting the actual degree.

To bad for them, I say. It's my life, my body and my mind, not theirs. If they don't respect my intelligence, I fire them. Wish I'd had this attitude in my twenties though. It might not have taken me so damned long to figure out many of the things I finally have!

I asked the nurse why they thought I was schizoaffective and she said it was because of social difficulties with bipolar. The psychiatrist however said that labels don't mean a thing, and he just gave that to me because I had a mood problem and I have weird beliefs.

Ehh, I dunno still.

Ok, so I am both autistic (asperger's type) and bipolar.

I was diagnosed bipolar at age 16 and with AS at 37. Somewhere in the middle (of my twenties) I got the horrible label of borderline personality disorder. I found out later that there is a lot of overlap between BPD and ASD. For example, black-and-white thinking, emotional regression, intense meltdowns, relationship problems (which were based on socialization problems, although no one picked that up!!)

So, about 10 years later, it was apparant to professionals that I had not shown enough traits of BPD to actually be borderline.. in the past 10 years!! There had to be another answer. I read a lot about autism and it felt very much like me.

When I am manic, I am hyper-social. I will actually go to parties every night and wear sexy clothing. I am a nutjob, trying to socially fit in and failing. When I am depressed, I am sitting all alone and rocking, afraid to leave my house. When I am "normal" like now, I am a bookworm, play games non-stop on the computer and research news, and despise social situations, unable to tolerate them well except for an hour or two, usually.

I was diagnosed with ASD because I went to vocational rehabilitation and they spent a day assessing me. They gave me an IQ test. I scored everywhere from genius level to borderline ret*d on the sub-tests. I was told this is a common profile for ASD. I didn't quite believe them, so I took my baby book to an expert in ASD and had my dad write a letter about my childhood. The diagnosis was correct.

So, that's my story I can take my meds and stay pretty stable, except when the meds are off. But, I cannot change my ASD, only learn to compensate and cope with it.

I have both Bipolar Disorder and AS.

I was diagnosed at 16 with major depression and was prescribed antidepressants. These meds only made me worse, however, and after a year I quit cold turkey (which I would not recommend). At 18, I couldn't take my symptoms anymore. I went to another psychiatrist who diagnosed me with bipolar. The meds he prescribed helped tremendously, but in therapy I was told I exhibited more borderline traits. Then...as of two weeks ago... that same psychiatrist has come to the conclusion that I am aspie. The profile does seem to fit better than the others. I just hope this is the end of it so I can get on with my life. They're just labels anyways, it really doesn't change anything.

I dont know if im bipolar or not. Ive been diagnosed with bipolar schizoaffective but the bipolar symptoms dont seem to fit me well. I have shifts in energy levels sometimes. I dont feel depressed much and my manic symptoms could just be adhd. mania and adhd have similar symptoms and adhd is a common co-morbid of aspergers in probablly %80 of cases.

For a long time I wondered if I had bipolar. I used to read a lot about it and I recognised the depression but I don't recognise the mania. I do not hear voices either and apparently bipolar people can hear voices like scizophrenics. I was prescribed tryciclics and SSRI's but they made me really out of it. Then I was given anti-psycotics and these were simply horrible drugs. I somehow went through a range of drugs in just a couple of months. None worked so I stopped and became interested in computing. I think the AS took over.

My thoughts on your original post are that your mother was unfortunate to have to see pshyciatrists that didn't seem to understand AS or were not familiar at that time with AS. I do think that diagnosing someone with AS with another disorder will affect them. And that I think the medications should not be given to AS sufferers. This is because we don't have anything clinically wrong with us. Our brains just work differently and so those drugs may have unexpected affects. I know that anti-depressants can cause me a lot of head problems that never existed before. So for us they are more a hindrance than a help. They were designed for clinical depression not minor depression or anxiety. Now doctors give them out to people who just have trouble sleeping or are a bit stressed at work.

The anti-psycotics are another thing altogether. They appear designed to numb the brain. When I had them I felt the weirdest I have ever felt in my life. Thankfully I never took them for longer than a week or so and all this happened 17 years ago.

Hearing voices is not usually associated with bipolar--psychosis is sometimes there but seems like it's usually the no-sleep, pressured speech, speeded up, overly happy or irritable moods, grandiosity etc. that get cited as typical symptoms of mania

Well I think that Aspergers has only officially been around as a diagnosis since 1994 and AS is notoriously underdiagnosed in women so I'm sure there are a lot of people with other diagnosis that would have best fit in with AS. Doctors are not trained well in autism to begin with. Just finished a book on history of psychiatry saying it's hard to post-diagnose someone from another historical timeframe with our current understanding of diagnosis just because these definitions shift so much.