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Bipolar Disorder
Ray Bradbury once said, “insanity is relative. It depends on who has who locked in what cage.” That statement could very well have been penned specifically for sufferers of bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder is known as a manic-depressive disorder and is a psychiatric diagnosis that covers a plethora of mood disorders. Bipolar is defined by the presence of one or more episodes of abnormally elevated moods, clinically referred to as mania or (if milder) hypomanias. Bipolar disorder affects both men and women. Research has shown that the first episode of bipolar disorder is occurring during adolescence. It must be understood that bipolar disorder is not just a sign of weakness; it is a serious medical condition that requires treatment.
History
The current term “bipolar disorder” is of a recent origin and refers to the cycling between high and low episodes or poles. A relationship between mania and melancholia has been observed and although the basis of the current conceptualization can be traced back to a French psychiatrist in the 1850’s the term “manic depressive illness” was coined by the German psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin in the late nineteenth century. Originally, the term referred to all kinds of mood disorders. German psychiatrist Karl Leonhard finally split the classification again in 1957 using the terms unipolar disorder and bipolar disorder (Dziegielewski, 2002).
Bipolar disorder is one of the oldest known illnesses. Bipolar symptoms have been mentioned in the earliest medical records as far back as the second century. In fact, Aretaeus of Cappadocia, Turkey, first recognized the symptoms of mania and depression and discovered the link between them. His findings were unnoticed and unsubstantiated until discussed in “The Anatomy of Melancholia” by Richard Burton in 1650. Burton focused specifically on depression and his findings

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