DBSAlliance

Flipswitch interviews Elizabeth, someone living with bipolar disorder that has experienced all there is and more to bipolar disorder. She talks about living with bipolar disorder and her recent hospitalization due to lithium toxicity.

We talk about the pernicious mind-zapper that is denial. We feature two scenarios in which our love-lorn protagonist Nick pines for the affection of Anne. Anne turns him down over concerns about his behavior and his clearly sinking mood, In the first scenario, Anne expresses her concern for Nick's predicament while offering suggestions for how he could possibly turn things around. Nick remains open to ideas, even the ideas that suggest his behavior may be leading him down the wrong path. In the second scenario, Anne again expresses her concern, but this time, she gets nothing but a hard time from Nick who uses every excuse in the book to deny that his choices may be having much of an effect at all on his bad situation.

It's sort of comical, but it's also very real in that these are some of the exact excuses all of the co-hosts have heard from at least one person in their lives at one time or another. The mind boggles at just how people are able to build such elaborate ways to defend against the scary prospect of change. Check out some of Aime Lynn's Erasing Negative Thoughts segments to see just some of the many ways that people lie to themselves constantly.

Aime Lynn responds to last week's episode in which she revealed her decision to stay up very late two nights in a row. She reaffirms that while her decision to stay up that late was, in fact, unhealthy, she took responsibility for putting her sleep hygiene (and health) at risk in order to maintain a good relationship with a positive friend (also a part of wellness). It is notable that in this episode, Aime Lynn almost completely abandons the various justifications she had previously used; instead, she begin talking in terms of how her decisions affect her life.

Aime Lynn goes out on the town two nights in a row and Chris is NOT happy about it. Listen in as Chris takes Aime Lynn to task for a number of her justifications for her bad behavior. It's comical, but it's also very real. It's all too common for people trying to get and keep a good healthy lifestyle to make elaborate excuses up that seem very real, but in fact, are not.

Also, a quick discussion of the rough draft of the DSM-V. You can leave your own input about the DSM at http://www.dsm5.org.

Aime Lynn and Chris continue their discussion of two recent high profile suicides (Andrew Koenig and Marie Osmond's Son) and their powerful reminder on the very real threat of suicide with depression.

Clips from Ohio State researcher of mood disorders and suicide Dr. Paul Granello appear at the beginning of the show.

The show opens with the passionate plea of Walter Koenig, father of Andrew Koenig, a former television star that took his own life recently. In addition, Marie Osmond's 18-year-old son also committed suicide very recently, leaving a devastated family and set of friends. Aime Lynn and Chris talk about the very real impact that suicide has on everyone in this 1st part of our discussion series on suicide.

In this edition of Mood Disorders In the Media, Ryan talks about how the promises of medication commercials, though amazingly well scripted, are never the sole answer. Behavior has to be a big part of getting better as well.

Chris and Aime Lynn debate the merits of being super firm about one's rules to living well with bipolar disorder or depression. Aime Lynn thinks one should shoot for ideals, but not be so rigid as it may set one up for failure. Chris argues that what is good for health is true regardless if you choose to do them or not and therefore should be considered hard and fast rules. Let the games begin.

Today, we're rolling out the first in our series of 2010 Teen Round Tables. This round table is of college students ranging in age from 18 to 20. These seven college-goers will talk about their thoughts and experiences on topics related to depression and bipolar disorder. In this episode, the round table talks about what they think depression is and where it comes from.

We continue our teen round table, college edition. In this episode, our round table talks about where depression comes from and who they would be likely to tell if they had a problem. Ryan and Chris stick around for analysis.