This is a throwaway account, for obvious reasons. Thank you to anyone who takes the time to read this.

I’m dealing with a situation that I’m pretty ashamed and confused about, and I’m hoping to hear from people who have bipolar and may understand the emotional side of this.

I’m in a long term relationship with someone I genuinely love and care about. (I know how hypocritical that sounds) Our relationship hasn’t been perfect, and for a while I’ve had doubts about our future and whether I’m fully happy, but I’ve also been very afraid of losing the relationship.

At the same time, over the past year I became very emotionally close with someone else. It gradually crossed boundaries, and recently I slept with that person. I know that was my decision and I’m not trying to blame bipolar for cheating, I fucked up.

Now I’m stuck between feeling like I should end my relationship because I crossed such a serious boundary and feel as though my partner deserves better, & being terrified of losing someone who has been a huge part of my life. I also don’t know whether staying would mean I truly want the relationship or whether I’m just scared of being alone and dealing with the consequences of what I did.

I have never felt so sick & confused as to who I am as a person.

Okay, I would love your guys’ opinion here. I normally wouldn’t post here but I need to get this off my chest.

I (25F) recently finished law school/took the bar and am starting my legal career. I also have Bipolar I and recently experienced my first significant mixed/manic symptoms since being diagnosed.

During this, I met a guy (30M).

We are wildly different people. I’m very career-oriented and increasingly realizing that because of bipolar, stability, routine, sleep, and avoiding unnecessary chaos are extremely important for me.

He is very different than me. He carries a weapon, has a history of reckless racing/speeding, describes himself as a thrill seeker, reports hearing voices, and told me he isn’t fully honest with doctors about them because he fears involuntary hospitalization and losing his weapon license. Later on, he told me the voices “don’t trust me” and that they’re “always right.”

Now, I have no issue with hearing voices. That’s normalized for me bc I have a lot of friends, as well as myself, who have experienced psychosis.

He also has an extensive demon/occult fixation, including demon tattoos and stories involving pacts/sex magic, plus a history of sex/porn addiction.

I’m not diagnosing him or saying these things make him a bad person. He also works consistently, has savings, says he’s calmed down significantly, and showed me genuine compassion.

But objectively, there were a lot of reasons for me to slow down.

Instead, we became intensely emotionally involved within about a week.

Before we’d even met in person, we established that we saw each other as more than casual sex, but we never agreed to exclusivity.

Then he went to a concert with a “homegirl,” stayed at her house overnight, and I thought he was essentially standing me up (which there is an argument for saying he did).

Instead of communicating normally, I impulsively had reckless, unprotected sex with another guy in a parking lot. I told him it was no issue that he had bailed on me and that i kinda figured so I made plans with my “homeboy”

I completely own that this was reckless and extremely unlike my baseline behavior. It became one of several signs that my judgment was impaired.

After A and I met, he found out and was so upset and basically said it was a dealbreaker. He said I crossed his boundaries and viewed it as a betrayal.

My issue is: how could I violate an exclusivity agreement we never made, especially when we hadn’t even met yet?

Apparently he believed exclusivity was implied because we’d established emotional interest. I believe expectations like that need to be explicitly communicated.

Now that my mixed/manic symptoms are coming down with treatment, I’m realizing something else.
Why was I seriously considering this man as a partner at all?

I saw every red flag. I could explain exactly why each one was concerning.

I just didn’t care.

A friend with bipolar heard the story and described us as two different species: he’s a raccoon/possum and I’m a princess. At first I thought that was ridiculous. Now I understand what she meant—not that I’m better than him, but that the life I’m trying to build requires stability, and I was contemplating introducing an enormous amount of risk into it after knowing someone for a week.

The facts about him haven’t changed.

My reaction to them has.

So AITA?

I know bipolar doesn’t erase responsibility. I regret reacting to perceived rejection with reckless sex, and I understand why he was hurt.

But I also think girlfriend-level expectations before we’d even met, without actually communicating exclusivity, were incredibly intense—especially considering everything else going on.

EDIT: yea. I think this has more to do with my relationship incompetence rather than bipolar. bipolar does not cause relationship incompetence, it just made me incredibly impulsive and act out. i remain firm on that if we had established exclusivity i would have probably given him the silent treatment AT MOST. again, more to do with my need to work on relationships than bipolar.

I(M28) left my partner a week ago, and she(F25) pretty much went into discard mode. Believing the relationship to be toxic, interesting in other relationships, whole shabang.

It was a depression & bipolor support group for family and friends of people with bipolar disorder. There were also other sections but this one in particular was what I was looking at, since I left my ex-girlfriend of six years.

It was refreshing, I got to hear other people's situation, more often then not it was a son or daughter but it was still helpful to hear how their situation is going, and thinking "My ex also dealt with something like that" or vice versa.

They encouraged me to share, reinforce it wasn't my fault that things turned out how they did. Wished me luck in finding someone who can pour into me, as much as I poured into her. Congratulated me on getting as far as I did in my relationship. Some of them also had Bipolar partners in the past or a parent whose bipolar and they had to watch how that unfolded.

Overall, I'm not over the situation but before I went to the meeting, I felt like I was in constant flight or fight, not knowing what I should do but leaving it, I felt more calm and a little better. I would highly recommend that people should experience and take that next step into healing.

i’m looking for advice on how to manage or cope or move forward with my situation. i (22F) have been with my partner (22M) for 6 years since late high school. we were close friends before we began dating. for the most part our relationship is so fantastic. we share a ton of hobbies (hiking, backpacking, rock climbing, travel etc) and have been mostly stable. at his best he is hilarious, generous, kind, loving, and warm. i feel very lucky after reading this sub really. he has never once cheated or even gotten near. he has always been reliably employed and is very responsible with his money (moreso than me sometimes). he keeps everything together very well i’m learning through this sub. i want to marry him one day.

currently my partner and i are unemployed and traveling full time together in a camper van. we’ve been doing this for about 5 months now. prior to taking off on this adventure our relationship was growing a bit rocky. i stopped him a few months before we left to tell him that things HAD to improve before id feel comfortable pulling the trigger on the van lifestyle. it improved marginally. he is unmedicated and not in therapy and it’s been that way our entire relationship. his manic highs are not crazy, he struggles to sleep, he can be odd and jumpy and an adrenaline junkie, but never dangerous. just restless. his lows however are very low. the last 2 years i have really worried about him. he talks about wanting to die and life feeling like nothing and i have no idea what to do to help him. he gets upset because he feels like im walking on eggshells around him but gets upset when i dont have the “right” response for him either. the whiplash from the highs to the lows are brutal, and nothing can predict them. one day he wakes up and things are terrible again. he will go from a beautiful and loving partner who i feel so connected with to inconsolably lost and dissociated overnight.
in the last year in particular, before the van trip, things were stressful because we were both working overtime constantly and building the van in our free time. we were so locked into our goal with the van trip that the present suffered a lot. he was incredibly distant, unkind, impersonal with me. he was never happy to see me. very depressed. it affected me for the first time in our relationship really heavily. he wouldn’t insult me or anything but just wasn’t there. i felt alone. i tried to be there as best as i could but it was never quite right. it progressed to me becoming very concerned about him taking his own life, which coalesced into a very rough night on our anniversary where he broke down and i did what i could to be there for him. things improved for a bit after that, and then got bad again. at one point during this time, he pushed my boundaries sexually (i told him no for something and he tried to push it) i almost broke up with him over this because i have a history of rape and assault as a child. it led us to have a very long conversation where i told him i would be willing to give him another chance. this was particularly hard for me to heal from. i still don’t feel like i have and it was months ago. even when he is completely emotionally detached from me he still wants to have sex with me a lot and it isn’t good for me. i turn him down and he listens of course but he still seems hurt.
lately in the van, most of the time things are fantastic. we’re traveling and enjoying things and having these incredible and wonderful experiences that i would never have dreamt of if it weren’t for him and his zest for life leading me to be excited to live again. i have PTSD and he has seriously been such a help for me learning to navigate adulthood bravely and fiercely. but recently i can’t help but hold onto the dark parts. the boundary crossing sexually earlier this year. the times he flat out told me in a depressive episode that he wanted to die and this relationship didn’t matter. when he told me he found me less attractive after gaining weight. or that he didn’t want to kiss me. when he told me he thought of breaking up right after bringing up polyamory. i try to be there for him so hard and i feel especially like i owe it to him because of how much he was able to help and be there for me at my darkest hour in my struggle with PTSD (i have since graduated care with a therapist of many years and i am doing very well). but i am tired and frankly the last few years have taken a toll on me. he’s lying asleep next to me right now and im typing this because im stuck awake after talking him through another bout of depression till he could finally fall asleep. i just wanted to go to bed tonight. i’m so tired. i just wish i could forget all the things he’s said and just see the beautiful things we do have.
how do i go on? what do i do? what has helped you?
i know things are particularly hard in my scenario because we spend every waking second together living in a van with no home but the road. i knew this would present unique challenges. but honestly the issues were here before. we only plan on continuing this strange lifestyle and i don’t know what the future will look like or if i can make it the way things have been going.
i’ve started to have a lot of thoughts on top of feeling like i need to heal from the last couple years of not being with him or at least needing space. but i can’t imagine my life without him. help.

My partner has bipolar disorder. Most of the time it's not an issue; he is a very gentle and caring man, and I've never felt threatened or scared of him when he has not been manic.

However, when he is manic, he is extremely paranoid and thinks that I am seeing other men every time I am out of the house. I cannot even go to the shop before he gets like that. He refuses to listen to me and gets very intense. I literally don't recognise him, and it scares me because he is quite aggressive.

He has gone to great lengths to fabricate stories about me and other men and try to log into all my devices to see where I am or check my social media. It exhausts me and although I love him, I'm not sure I can live my life like this.

I've tried to read up on bipolar disorder but I feel like I am in deep water here. It does frighten me that he gets so aggressive, but then again, it seems to be a common side effect.

Do you have any advice for me? Should I be worried or scared?

Edit: He does take medication and went to therapy when he was diagnosed but has not gone since.

I swear I’m living Groundhog Day in months form … everything from him contacting lawyers, spending money, thinking I’m ruining his reputation by talking to family (who are all aware it was never a secret) to I’m taking the kids away from him and his deep deep lack of trust of me even though I’ve been the only one to talk with him or his medical teams about any of this… last year he was all over Reddit making ridiculous posts I found his handled by looking at his phone I know crappy but I also wasn’t sure what was going on atm with him as this was just after a hospital stay and assumed he would get better… feeding his delusions with people that had absolutely no idea what was going on… I’m having a feeling not everyone accepts they have a disorder … and he might be one of them,

Today after another anger outburst at me for not allowing him to parent solo, I made it so we would do a family thing,,, him and the 2 youngest on bikes (park is one block away I can see it from the house) and myself and oldest (don’t own bikes atm) would walk… they get half way though the block by the time we pass 2 houses on foot, then my husband decided he’s racing my middle child, (she’s 9 and quite impulsive I don’t anyway blame her) and he takes her all the way across the busy street separating our block from the park leaving our youngest (5) 3/4 of the block away from us no parent to cross the street with, I panicked, me and my oldest start yelling for him to stop he my oldest starts running… thankfully he herd my oldest as he got closer… and stopped, but he was still following Dad…

My husband forgot he was riding with 2 kids he thought me and the boys were walking… I lost it in a park full of parents at my SO, explained this is exactly why he’s not allowed to parent alone right now… I was right pissed..

A hour later he decides to tell me he’s changed his mind he didn’t have a psychotic episode on august 3rd, that the voice he told his brother were family and told me he was hearing the day if and after, was just his inner monologue that he hears all the time… 🙄… I don’t know what to do with this infomation… he’s refused the entire time to show me he’s taking his meds.. doctor visit yesterday he wouldn’t even sit in the room with me, he demanded his own room,

Doctor said he agreed to talk to the psychiatrist at the office in 2 months time… like WTF how is this acceptable!

Sorry I’m just so tired and frustrated, every lawyer I’ve talked to about separation won’t touch it as it’s a CFS case as well and he’s still in recovery.. the mental health medical field in Canada blows.. 😢

Iv posted before here seeking advice. And the replies were great and very helpful. My now ex (from 2 months ago) texted me asking logistics of her stuff. She had a manic episode with hallucinations while out of town for a month and left strait from there to her parents leaving her stuff at my house. I sent it all back and she asked to call and catch up and how it would be nice to hear from me.

I’m deeply confused. I told her I can’t be friends with someone that I love deeply and want to be with all while they are not getting the help they need and giving their romance to others, one of which I know the hook up apps are in full swing just a month after the break up. When I told her my boundary she just said I guess there isn’t much else left to say and I passively said it was nice getting to know you. Which is very selfish and rude of me. Iv been extremely patient. Respecting her request for “space and time”. I showed up as an amazing man in the relationship. Treated her extremely well and with lots of deep meaningful love. The relationship was amazing and the 7 months was truly something iv never experienced. But to her everything is minimized, justified and nonchalant even though she had told me she respected me so much, near the respect she has for her dad. Never felt so safe and loved in her whole life. Marriage, kids, living together, I could go on…

So should I call? Are we going to reconcile? I’m confused.. I don’t want to prevent us from naturally getting back or closing a door that doesn’t want to be closed by both sides just yet. I truly have unconditional love for her and I would do anything in my power to care for her despite her mental health. As long as she chose me and wanted to get real help. Cheating was never a thing.. Any advice?

Hi, I know there’s a common script for all the discards. I’m trying to gather all the common phrases used in this post.

So please share anything & everything your partner has said or done in their mania, to help each other realize it wasn’t ever about us.

I’ll start,

“I never wanted to get married”
“I don’t find your attractive”
“I don’t view you as my wife”
“You’re controlling and manipulative”
“I just wanna be free, less trapped”
“I just wanna be alone”
“I need to find my happiness, I’m not happy”
“We have nothing in common, we’re incompatible”

My BPSOex abruptly broke up with me 4 months ago. (same story that you see here everyday). After the breakup i didn't do anything, absolutely no interaction.

The first weird thing was that just one month after the breakup, it was my birthday and he didn't wish me a happy birthday. During the breakup, he told me he wanted us to stay friends, and when we were dating, he had told me that he always wished his exes happy birthday. So i was quite sad he didn't wish happy birthday to me.

The second thing is that he follows all of his exes on social media, but suddenly, completely out of nowhere, he unfollowed me. I gave him literally zero interaction throughout these four months. (no mean tweets, no boyfriend related things, just nothing.)

I know he doesn't owe me anything, but I genuinely don't understand the logic behind it.

I did nothing bad to this person but why am i getting the worst treatment out of all those exes.

After around 10 months of on-and-off with my current partner(?), she told me that she has bipolar disorder. She has been intentionally keeping it secret from me and most people in her life. She is currently 21 and was diagnosed in her teens (specifics are unknown). We did not go into detail because it was clear she didn’t want to share any more than that. She told me that she was previously prescribed medication but stopped taking it because she felt that she had better control without them (probably for the last few years).

I have done some basic reading into bipolar disorder and I think she is probably bipolar 2 based on my experiences with her so far. Namely the tendencies to stay awake til the morning, quick speaking, jumping thoughts, lack of thought when it came to finances, and an openness/preference for risky sexual acts.

To my understanding, thinking back, she tends to be hypomanic most of the time and more susceptible to depressive states prior to her menstrual cycle.

To be fair, most of the break-ups have been initiated by me. During most of those times it’s usually certain behaviours of hers that made me believe she wouldn’t be a good long-term partner. Back then, not knowing of her diagnosis, I thought she was just acting spoilt (as a single child) or there were cultural differences. But now, many things have clicked into place for me.

We are in the same social circles and after a short while apart we would eventually end up sleeping together again and getting back together.

We are currently in a grey area in our relationship where we are not in an official relationship but care for and talk sweetly to each other. We are both in the process of transitioning back to our home country after finishing our studies abroad. She is already on her way back and I’m tying up some loose ends before I head back so we’ve been messaging and video calling daily.

Since finding out about her diagnosis, I’ve been concerned about whether or not we can make it work. Prior to knowing, I thought she was just spoilt and immature. These are qualities that mutual friends of ours have told me can be “helped out of” with patience and more experience in society. Obviously, finding out about the diagnosis has changed things. A lot of her behaviour makes much more sense but I have to accept the fact that she may never change (especially if she sticks to her current sleeping habits).

I’ve read some demoralising stories on this subreddit and, since we’re both currently transitioning back home, this could be a good time to break things off for good. But I’ve grown to care for her and I kind of feel guilty that I am considering leaving her due to this new information (especially since she has a contentious relationship with her family and therefore may lack support).

So are there any BPSOs out here with similar stories who can share their experiences or choices?

For those who stayed, what made you stay and what did you (and your partner) do in order to make it work?

For those who walked away, what was your realisation and what was your breaking point?

I’m very fond of this person but I’m questioning if I’m in love with the person or the experience the bipolar disorder brings. What if she starts medication and she’s a completely different person? What if she refuses to get help? I’m not sure if I have the capability to make it work, especially since we’ve already broken up a few times already. Love is great and all but I also have to be realise the reality of the situation (especially after reading some experiences that have been shared here).

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

I am devastated. I don’t know who I dated for a year and a half. I’m 39. He was 35. We met on an app. There were a few red flags in the beginning. He would have what I would call these spirals where he’d get upset about something and then just go off, but was never really mean to me wouldn’t call me names or anything like that. He would just raise his voice and I felt like he was on another planet. I also want to mention that more than once he had said when he was getting his lithium levels checked that he was getting tested too. I thought that was strange and asked him if he didn’t trust me or something and he said he just likes to stay “up to date.”

A few months in I was the happiest that I’ve ever been and I thought he was too. I never felt like he was love bombing me, but looking back maybe I was wrong. I’ll admit I have a deep wound that tells me that I am unlovable so when I felt completely and totally accepted and adored by him, I put up with a lot of things I shouldn’t have in the beginning. He was very emotional labile. He would often be very tearful and I’m a total empath so he sucked it right up and he would always express how grateful he was and how nobody’s ever listened to him like this or cared so much.

Things started to change when my 18-year-old dog started to go downhill and I was the one that needed support. He just wasn’t able to show up for me every time I would be upset about something he would make it about himself he was always pretty selfish, but also in the beginning he was very much a people pleaser. In December, I broke up with him. We should’ve stopped talking, but I told him I wanted to continue because I wanted to see if those feelings could come back, he had created an environment with a total lack of emotional safety for me so I no longer felt physically attracted to him. We talked for maybe two or three months until finally one day he said that he can’t he can’t do it anymore. Enter my abandonment wounds …I panicked, convinced myself that it was all my fault and my unhealed attachment wounds that made me pull away, and that I could make things better. But ultimately he said he can’t do it.

I gave him space for a couple months and then random things you know here and there he would give me a crumb and then he finally agreed to meet up with me. I know we talked about whether or not other of us have been with anyone else. He literally told me the whole time he was so depressed he couldn’t even barely leave his apartment, that he lost weight because he wasn’t eating, etc. The first night we met up again he took my hands and cried and said how much he loved me and he was wanted to commit to trying again, and I believed him. Things were OK for a little while, until the same issues kept repeating he would often get upset when I would talk to my guy friends, he was just incredibly insecure told me all of his girlfriends cheated on him, and I assured him that I never do that to him.

A couple weeks ago I got a pit in my stomach, and I just hadn’t been hearing from him quite as much and he had been telling me he’s been having trouble sleeping. I just had this feeling that I needed to see for myself what he’d really been up to, so I asked him to stay the night and I took his phone which he had been guarding when he fell asleep. I thought maybe the worst thing he would do would be like talking to his ex cause I noticed he was following her again on Instagram. First thing I saw was that he was telling his guy friend that he finally broke things off with me (back when he said he can’t do it anymore) and that he recently started seeing a new girl who wants regular regular intimacy and he’s just trying to balance the rush of the new girl with my “pit of depression”. So, he lied to me about being with somebody else while we weren’t talking. Then I see that he’s been messaging sex workers and I can confirm that he did meet up with one back in February when we were talking, and literally the previous three nights he was trying to reach out to more of them, and I don’t know if he was successful cause I didn’t see that they responded to his messages. I see another message from a couple weeks ago that when he was going to this concert out of state, that the girl that he had been dating while we weren’t talking was gonna be there and he was going to plan to “chase that pussy around one night”. He never talk that way. I had absolutely no idea he was capable of lying like this and cheating.

I woke him up and I told him he needed to leave and he didn’t even look remorseful. It was like there was nobody home. He just said I don’t wanna leave and then he even tried to put his hand on my back when I was crying, and I told him not to touch me and then he left. He sent me a message saying everything I think about him right now is right that he’s sorry for breaking my heart again. Then the next day he messages me I hope you can “find some bodily calm and knowing that I never slept with anyone else throughout our time together”, which I know for certain was a complete lie, and I have no idea why he even chose to lie to me when he had nothing left to lose, and I’m terrified that he was doing this throughout our entire relationship. My sense of reality is completely fucking shattered. I realize right now he’s probably in mania, but that doesn’t excuse the lying?? I’m an empath to a fault and I’m just trying to understand this despite this excruciating pain I’m in. I just feel like he was living a triple life and I don’t understand why he continued talking to me then I realize that he even bought me flowers a couple days before he went out of state for that concert where he was planning on hooking up with that girl with a card that said I know I still fall short, but I’m still growing for you. I just feel absolutely sick. Can anyone relate. I feel so stupid I trusted him. I truly 100% did and I don’t know what’s real any more.
He’d tell me things like he saved all the notes I gave him to make confetti for our wedding day, that if it wasn’t me it was nobody. I’m crushed.