Alternative Bipolar Medications

Bipolar is considered as a major disorder that can greatly affect an individual and his family. There are many definitions of this illness.

One definition states that a person with bipolar disorder experiences extreme elations that alternates with deep depression. Bipolar disorder is also called manic depression. Generally, it is characterized by depressive episodes and accompanied by a manic episode.

To put it simply, bipolar disorder affects feelings, thoughts, behavior, and perceptions. Experts say that it is brought about by the chemical and electrical elements found in the brain that are not functioning properly. Some say that it runs in the family, so families having a history of bipolar disorder or other mental illnesses are more prone to having the disorder.

There are certain medications given for bipolar patients, and not all of them are quite comfortable in taking daily doses of different medications. Most of them are interested to secure supplemental or alternative therapies rather than taking prescription medications.

Omega 3

There are many researches showing that omega 3 found in fish oils and in certain fishes are excellent for bipolar patients, as well as those having mental illnesses. There was a significant research done in 30 bipolar patients for four months. It was a placebo-controlled and double-blind study. It aims to compare omega 3's efficacy versus olive oil or placebo for the treatment of bipolar disorder.

According to researchers, bipolar disorder is a neuropsychiatic illness that has a high mortality and morbidity. In their preliminary study, it was proven that omega 3 performed better and resulted to longer remissions based on the four scales of symptom-severity.

Further studies are still underway, and researchers are hoping that they can come up with new classes of psychotropic compounds that can be used as mood stabilizers.

Herbal

Most people resolve to the use of herbal supplements instead of taking prescribed drug medications. But not all herbs are good for the treatment of bipolar disorder. In fact, there are certain herbs that can worsen the condition of a bipolar patient. Some herbal supplements actually have a harmful reaction when used together with certain drugs. Consult your doctor first before taking any herbal medication in conjunction with other drugs.

Nutrition and Your Diet

You have to adjust your diet, and this means checking your meal menus everyday. The nutrients which the body receives are very important. Holistic physicians use b-complex, magnesium, and thiamin for episodes of depression.

Pastoral Counseling

If you're suffering from bipolar disorder, you can also talk to your pastor, priest, or rabbi instead of talking to therapists. The religious community may be of great help during these times. In fact, the community is now recognizing the role of spirituality and prayers. In can even be included in psychotherapies and medication.

Art Therapies

If you're always staying at home, then perhaps you might want to join expressive therapies. Through the arts, you can express freely your feelings and do so without inhibitions. You can enroll in a drawing class, sculpting, painting, and many others. Find an appropriate therapist in your locality who specializes in art therapies or expressive therapies.

If you want movement, enroll in a dance therapy. Let your feet fly and your spirit soar while incorporating your physical, cognitive, and emotional facets to the dance.

Soothing music can make a person relax. So why not enroll in sound or music therapy? Your body chemicals can be stimulated to improve blood pressure and flow, breathing, pulse rate, and changes in posture.

Traditional Medicine

Traditional medicines or the culturally based ones like shiatsu, reiki, acupuncture, yoga, Ayurveda, talking circles, and sweat lodge are only typical examples. All these healing arts are based on balancing the states of the physical, spiritual, and emotional for the wellness of an individual. If the forces in your body are imbalanced, you will likely get an illness.

If all these things are combined: omega 3, herbal, right diet, pastoral counseling, art therapies, and traditional healing arts, perhaps the forces of the body can be balanced and a bipolar patient can be treated effectively.

But remember to consult your doctor for any problems that you may encounter, and don’t just stop your prescribed medication if you have one. Continue using it, and ask your doctor if you can also use other alternative medication.

Sugar and Salt: My Life with Bipolar Disorder an Overview

Sugar and Salt: My Life with Bipolar Disorder is a book about a middle aged woman who had and managed to survive bipolar disorder also known as Manic-depression, but along the way experiences the bitter and sweet moments of life in a not so normal way. She only knew of her illness when she turned 32.

In the book, it is vividly detailed what it is like to live in a family threatened by such an illness, how to fit in school or do work while dealing with the undiagnosed illness. She also describes her ordeal of facing the failure of her marriage and other relationships, how she tries to understand that, however she tries to live a normal life it just bounce back and still she lives a very different and more complicated life than the persons she knew.

Until she admits that there is something wrong about her and that she needs professional help.

After the acceptance of the strange malady within her comes the long journey to get treatment as she tries one medication after the other after being mistaken for a psychotic. For more or less five years her life was devoted in seeking the proper knowledge and ways to approach the said disorder that she has been putting up for such a long time until the part came where she realizes that for her to get the proper treatment she needs she had to enter a mental hospital.

She illustrates the life she had lived in a locked ward and how fortunate she was when her attending physician finally finds a certain medication that her disorder responds to. She feels that she had the key to break free from her long ordeal and finally she gets the normal feeling she always wanted.

As she makes progress in the medication her disorder responds to she reaches the point where she can now get out of the mental hospital and live like a normal person. Jane had to face the world on her own again and start a brand new life. She was able to get the private life she wanted and the dream job that she had been always dreaming of without her bosses and co-employees knowing her deep, dark secret.

But, after ten long years, unfortunately she develops an allergy to the one and only medication that has been of very good service to her and must start the treatment all over again.

At some point in the process, she loses the job she had dreamt about and falls back into the deep ditches of depression. It is a very touching story about a woman's triumph over her bipolar disorder that for the second time has threatened her and once again she survived it. Find out how she managed to surpass it and how you too can mange the disorder through medication and therapy should you find out that you have such illness or maybe a family member experiences such a scary disease.

The author, Jane Thompson has worked as a paralegal, a teacher, as a social worker not to mention as a writer. It's been several years now since she wrote for the publisher of a certain political encyclopedia and has also served as one of the medical writer for a training corporation.

It was such experiences that she came to learn how to express herself with great conciseness and accuracy. When the author decided to write her very own story which is the Sugar and Salt: My Life with Bipolar Disorder, her experience aided her in getting her work printed on paper. And so with her experience, as a medical writer and her stock knowledge about mental health issues, those made it a bit easier for her to write the said story.

When the author just started, she had twenty short stories printed already and Sugar and Salt: My Life with Bipolar Disorder is her first book. Currently Jane Thompson is the author of Mosby's Clinical Nursing, a comprehensive reference in clinical nursing to be included as a reference in the educational program materials of the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.

She is also the co-author of Secrets Volume 15: The Best in Erotic Romance, Jane Thompson was also the editor of American Express Presents Top Chefs of the Triangle and a lot more.