Bipolar Disease Description: What is unipolar illness? When the mood is just depressed. This is far more common than bipolar illness. What is bipolar disease? Bipolar disorders (manic-depressive illness) are marked by periods of manic, greatly elated moods or excited states as well as by periods of depression. Although the manic-depressive psychosis may alternate from one of its phases to the other, one or the other phase is usually dominant for a while. Depression is more often dominant than mania. Manic-depressive patients often recover spontaneously for periods of time, but relapses are fairly common. Most often this disease is genetic. Bipolar is a severe mental disorder. There are 2 types of the bipolar diseases: Bipolar 1 & bipolar 2. Bipolar 1- person experiences at least one, and usually many more, manic episodes, alternating with episodes of major depression Bipolar 2- the individual experiences periods of hypomania alternating with episodes of major depression. What is cyclothymia? Similar to bipolar disorder since it is characterized by mood swings from mania to depression. However, there are several important differences between the two. A person with cyclothymia experiences symptoms of hypomania but never a full-blown hypomanic episode. A person with cyclothymia is never symptom-free for longer than two months. The Affective Spectrum- Some people who have bipolar disorder (manic depression) or unipolar disorder (depression-only) have co-existing conditions such as migraines, attention deficit disorder, fibromyalgia, eating disorders, etc The following have been identified (so far) as part of the medical spectrum, which may accompany affective disorders: · attention deficit disorder (ADD & ADHD) · body dysmorphic disorder · cataplexy · eating disorders (bulimia, anorexia, binging) · fibromyalgia (includes chronic fatigue) · impulse-control disorders · irritable bowel syndrome · kleptomania · migraine/severe headache · narcolepsy · intermittent explosive disorder · pathological gambling · pyromania · personality...