What Helps Taylor, 27, With Bipolar Disorder

With our ongoing “What Helps Me” series, The Mighty is leaning into what sets us apart from other health sites: We aim to provide real health advice from real people who live it.

• What is Bipolar disorder?

In this spirit, we asked our community for the best insights and tips they’ve developed for managing their conditions. As always, they responded with their unique health stories and we are happy to pass along their well-tested resources to you.

Today, we meet Mighty member Taylor. She is 27 years old and lives with bipolar disorder.

Taylor, what helps you?

THE MIGHTY: What helps you most when your condition affects your physical health?

TAYLOR: Even though bipolar disorder is a mental health condition, it can still have huge impacts on my physical health. When I’m in a depressive episode and any type of movement seems hard, I try to take things slowly and rest more than usual to build up my strength and stamina. In a hypomanic episode, when I feel like I have so much restless energy I might burst, I try to choose healthy, non-dangerous outlets to get myself moving without putting me in harm’s way.

What helps you most when your condition affects your mental health?

Reframing has worked wonders in my periods of depression and suicidality. Allowing myself to feel my feelings without judgment has been a difficult but rewarding skill. Then if all else fails, distracting with books or TV can give me a moment of peace.

How do you cope when your normal self-care isn’t working?

If I’ve run out of self-care options, I will turn to my support network or family and friends. Sometimes just talking to someone else can help, even if it’s not about the particulars of what I’m going through. Sometimes they have ideas of what can help me that I may not have thought of yet.

Thank you to Taylor for her contributions to our community. Did you find this helpful? Add your gratitude in the comments.

If you want to tell us what helps you, you can complete our survey here.