bipolar love experiencing mental illness from the other side: a love story

Isn’t love supposed to conquer all?

That was not the case for Tina. It was years into her marriage before she found out the man, she cared for suffered from Bipolar Disorder and no amount of love could keep the demons away. Bipolar is a mental illness that brings on emotional highs and lows, suicidal thoughts and more.

This is Tina’s story and the challenges she faced loving a man with mental illness. It is a story of love and compassion, guilt and pain and all the emotions, all the fears, that come with being a caregiver to someone who has Bipolar. A disorder that not only affects the person going through the symptoms but can take its toll on the entire family and rob them of their own zest for life and good health.

As caregivers, many of us never think twice about how our situation affects us. But if we want to be there for our loved ones, we need to pay attention to our health too. We need to get to a place where we can reach out for help if we need it. We have to stay strong and know that any difficult decisions we make were the best choices at the time.
Caregivers are a special breed. Give yourself some love for sticking through the tough times when there were days you may have wanted to give up. But you persevered. Live for you and your loved ones. Stay positive and find the happy times. Live to love life and thrive.