Bipolar Disorder and Positive Mood

         

 Apparently it’s not an easy thing for people to admit and state that they have any mental disorder. Most people of different ages and cultural  backgrounds always tend to hid or not even admit the fact they have a mental disorder such depression or hypo-mania. They always try to deny the fact that they are in need of a treatment for their mental disorder. Fallon even experienced the same thing “I saw depression as a form of weakness and didn't want to admit that I was a victim.”  At the same time the denial of the mental disorder accompanies an intense episodes  of positive moods. They always try to show that they are having a good time which is way for them to reject the fact that they are in need of a treatment because of their mental illness.

People with Hypo-mania experience episodes of  positive mood thought out the day or even for a longer period of time that could be weeks. Sometimes they decide to do nothing but have fun all day long and forgetting about all the other priorities that they have such as family and work. They would do all sort of things that would seem fun for them. They will go party all day, and buy all sort of luxury stuff that complement the good mood that they are having. Fallon explained his hypo-mania “my days- to weeks long bouts of hypo-mania were associated with little sleep bursts of productivity, and a desire to party hard” 

A study that was done in Indiana University that used functional magnetic resonance imaging (FMRI) to look for the areas in the brain that shows the abnormal activities of the patients with bipolar disorder with changing mood phases trying while they are trying to control their response to emotional and non emotional materials that they come across.

“They found that bipolar depressed patients abnormally activated brain areas when they had to withhold responses to sad faces. Manic patients, on the other hand, had abnormal activation regardless of whether they were trying to withhold response to sad faces, happy faces or non-emotional material” The article agrees with what Fallon said describing the phases that he goes through, such as parting and gambling. This is because of the activation of those areas in the brain.

 It’s unfortunate that people with mental disorders have to deny their illnesses and try to fight that with a positive happy response that probably show that they are fine. 

References: 

The Psychopath Inside: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain. New York: Penguin.

Elsevier. (2013, January 14). How do happiness and sadness circuits contribute to bipolar disorder?. ScienceDaily. Retrieved February 27, 2015 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130114092525.htm

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