From my archives … Aside from my own psychiatrist, Dr. Smith, there are few doctors that can explain a confusing and complex condition like Bipolar Disorder with such clarity as the medical director of NAMI, Dr. Ken Duckworth. Three years ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing him when I was the Patient Advocate for...

The average patient with bipolar disorder takes approximately 10 years to get a proper diagnosis. About 56 percent are first diagnosed with unipolar depression. I imagine the stats for depression and other diagnoses aren’t pretty either. Working with a good doctor can save you 15 years of pain and misery. Trust me, I know. I...

My friend, Priscilla, just lost her best friend (okay, after her husband, Jimmy). On her blog, she writes: Our beloved golden retriever died this morning, peacefully, after spending a wonderful week by our side on Martha’s Vineyard, at the beach, where she ran into the ocean, and in the woods, where she took a long...

Some sobering statistics: Depression has a much greater impact on marital life than rheumatoid arthritis or cardiac disease. Ninety percent of marriages where one person is bipolar ends in divorce. Person diagnosed with bipolar disorder have three times the rate of divorce as the general public, which is about 50 percent. This is all to...

When you feel like strangling the guy in front of you at Target, read these “7 Quick Ways to Calm Down,” or as the Huffington Post renamed them,  “7 Quick Ways to Avoid a Meltdown,” I laughed at the art that went with it because, well, I sort of looked like that yesterday. I needed a reminder of...