The nurse practitioner I’m seeing about my ADHD diagnosed me with bipolar disorder
She literally could not have surprised me more if she tried
This makes no sense to me but it’s scaring me a lot :(
I don’t really remember having manic episodes? Depressive maybe but it’s usually after something bad happens to me and not really consistently…
I told her I put off making this appointment cuz I’ve been feeling really bad recently, then she just asked me a few questions like if people say I talk too much sometimes or if I do things impulsively and prescribed me an antipsychotic (aripiprazole) wtf
I asked some family and they haven’t noticed anything like this… idk :(. Has this happened to anyone else? Am I just in denial? I’m afraid to take this drug she gave cuz I really don’t need to be even more tired all the time… or tardive dyskinesia or something (unlikely, worst case)
I have also recently been blind sighted by a bipolar diagnosis when I went in to get an ADHD diagnosis. My first recommendation would be to read The Bipolar Disorder Survival Guide by David J. Miklowitz. It’s available in several formats on libgen. This book has really helped me get a firm grasp on what bipolar is and is not, as well as the similarities and differences between bipolar disorder and ADHD to really find my intersections between these two disorders within myself. My psychiatrist specializes in mood disorders and he recommends it to everyone who gets a bipolar diagnosis at his practice. It’s also helped me really separate bipolar disorder from the highly stigmatized perception that society has imprinted upon me. I’m really struggling with this period of grieving my sense of self and my sense of identity, and this book actually has a lot of exercises and information that has really helped me work through some of the difficult feelings and ruminations that I’m struggling with. Even if you don’t believe you have bipolar disorder, I still think this would help you clarify that understanding to be able to present that to your practitioners.
Based on my experiences, my research, and my (admittedly new) understanding of bipolar disorder, I would assume that your providers are attempting to rule out the cause of your symptoms. So, the initial diagnosis was ADHD, and they gave you treatments for that which seemed to be ineffective. Now, they are starting to treat for conditions that are parallel, comorbid, and/or differential with ADHD. In doing so, they’re sticking with attempting to treat only the primary symptoms you are aiming to address, which are the ADHD-like symptoms. So, they are giving you a second-generation antipsychotic medication which would typically be prescribed to help a person with bipolar stabilize the manic sides of their mood disorder. I think that the thought process is that if you take this medication and you see results, that would confirm the diagnosis, or if you take this medication and it continues to be ineffective like the ADHD medication, then it would negate the diagnosis like the ADHD diagnosis was. I’m not a medical professional, but that is what it seems like to me their course of action is in determining what your overall diagnosis is and/or should be.