When I looked into my loved one’s eyes during one of her first manic episodes, I did not recognize the eyes staring back at me.  Equally heartbreakingly, I felt that she did not recognize me. And so it began: a cycle of highs and extreme lows, agitation and depression, characteristic of bipolar disorder. While bipolar disorder affects each person differently, in her case, the depression has often lasted longer than the manic state, sometimes lasting years. During these period

Conflict is inevitable in an intimate relationship. Many who study relationships would even say fights can be an important and necessary part of a relationship’s evolution, in which needs are expressed and boundaries are negotiated.  In the best of cases, in the aftermath of a fight you gain a greater understanding of why an issue is so important to your partner and what needs to change for a sense of equity and fairness to be restored. Even if the issue at hand is not necess

When my sister was diagnosed with a neurodegenerative autoimmune disease in her early 30s, with her first major flare-up manifesting as a sudden loss of eyesight (which has since returned thankfully), it shook me to my core. It felt different from finding my father on the floor some years prior, face white as a ghost and writhing in pain due to a heart condition, before he was taken on an ambulance. It also felt different from seeing my mother bed-ridden for a year while I wa