Bipolar disorders lead to extreme mood swings – involving episodes of emotional highs and emotional lows. Extreme mood swings affect all aspects of life, from work to relationships. Such unpredictable shifts in mood can create challenges in daily life.
This mood disorder can cause relationship concerns, interfering with the overall quality of life if remains untreated. You might seek expert care for bipolar disorder treatment in Siliguri from Dr. Arunava Datta, a top psychiatrist in town.
Understanding the condition’s impact and the importance of seeking effective treatment will help foster supportive and stable relationships. In this blog, we'll see how bipolar disorder can affect various relationships and how treatment can help manage its symptoms and effects.
How Bipolar Disorder Affects Relationships – Here’s What You Need to Know
Emotional Challenges
It’s a mood disorder defined by its intense mood swings, and these fluctuations can definitely strain relationships, whether romantic, social, or family. People with bipolar disorder during manic episodes feel euphoric, abnormally energetic, and impulsive. These emotions cause actions that may appear careless or uncharacteristic.
On the other hand, the same person may undergo depressive episodes. These can bring ongoing sadness, low mood, hopelessness, fatigue, irritability, worthlessness, and withdrawal. For romantic partners, friends, and family members it might be challenging to navigate. Such emotional instability can be perplexing or upsetting.
Communication Challenges
While clear communication is vital for any relationship, bipolar disorder can make this more difficult to maintain the ease of clear communication. During manic phases, patients might speak rapidly, try to dominate conversations or become overly optimistic.
Conversely, during depressive episodes, they start to struggle to express their thoughts or withdraw themselves entirely from communication. All these are nothing surprising to affect a relationship.
Affecting Intimacy
Bipolar disorder can cause trouble in romantic relationships and intimacy as well. Individuals during manic periods may show hypersexuality, leading to impulsive actions or risky behaviors.
However, during depressive episodes, the same individuals may lose interest in intimacy or have extremely low sex drive. So, these mood shifts can make it difficult for partners to maintain closeness, physical communication, and connection.
Financial Concerns
When having manic episodes, patients can sometimes enjoy impulsive spending or risky financial decisions. This may cause financial stress and strain in relationships, especially with partners and loved ones in the family.
How Treatment Can Help Manage the Impact
There are several effective ways to recover and manage bipolar disorder. These are:
Medication such as mood stabilizers, antipsychotics, and antidepressants can play a great role in managing bipolar symptoms and further complications. These medications (mood stabilizers) can help people maintain more consistent emotional states. Plus, these improve mood and energy levels, lowering the intensity and frequency of manic and depressive episodes of bipolar disorders.
Psychotherapy, also called talk therapy, is a powerful treatment for psychiatric conditions, including those with bipolar disorder. Psychiatrists personalized therapy for the best possible treatment outcomes.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) can help people how to challenge negative thought patterns, cope with everyday stress, fight triggers, regulate emotions, and develop better communication skills.
Couples or family therapy can be of great help, offering a safe space for loved ones to express their concerns. Such therapies help people with bipolar disorder and their loved ones learn about the disorder and develop strategies to fight that together. Get personalized bipolar disorder treatment in Siliguri from the top psychiatrist.
Support groups are there to provide people with bipolar disorder and their loved ones a space and structured environment to connect and restore the charm of relationships.
Come forward and get expert care and recover from bipolar disorder and its effects on relationships. Doctors are there to help you overcome mental health challahs and give you a quality of life again. Meet your psychiatrist in Siliguri who specializes in mood disorders.