mental illness in the poly community

AnnabelMore

Active member
Hey, all. I'm poly and proud, so please don't take this as an attack against the community in any way (I would also never disparage someone for having a mental illness, so it's doubly not an attack :))! But I've been wondering... are there any mental illnesses that are more or less common in the poly versus the mono community?

Specifically, I'll thinking about bipolar. My gf and her hubby used to date a girl who had bipolar. No biggie. But then my roommate mentioned that his brother, who has bipolar, happens to be poly. And I noticed that the woman who writes the excellent blog The Polyamorous Misanthrope had a post about her bipolar. When I saw another member here mention that the new person she's seeing has bipolar, I really started to wonder! Is it just a relatively common thing which I had failed to notice before, is it a coincidence, or could there be a correlation?

I don't want to offend anyone and I'm hardly an expert, so if you know more than I do please speak up! It did occur to me though, that if there was a correlation maybe it was because people with bipolar, seeing as they are in very different states at different times, could be better served by having multiple partners for support/connection.

What do you think? Am I entirely out there with this, have you noticed any positive or negative relationships between poly and various mental issues?
 
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Bipolar Disorder is a more recent name for Manic Depression, I've been told, and that has been around a long time, and is prevalent in modern society. My mother had it. I don't think it's mostly in poly circles. Poly attracts a wide cross-section of people, with all types of personalities, predilections, and afflictions.

There was a similar thread about this a few months ago, but I can't recall the title.
 
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I suspect there are a lot of people with Borderline Personality Disorder who might say they "are poly" as a way to try to justify some of their pathological behaviour patterns.

This could cause the results of such a demographic survey to become skewed.
 
Bipolar Disorder is a more recent name for Manic Depression, I've been told, and that has been around a long time, and is prevalent in modern society. My mother had it. I don't think it's mostly in poly circles.

For the record, I definitely wouldn't theorize that it's "mostly" in poly circles, just that it could possibly be more common in our crowd. I have an inlaw who was bipolar/manic-depressive (you're right that they're the same thing) so I know it's in no way confined to our crowd, it's just that I seem to see it come up in a poly context more often than not lately... heh, maybe it's just that my contexts have changed. :)
 
I suspect there are a lot of people with Borderline Personality Disorder who might say they "are poly" as a way to try to justify some of their pathological behaviour patterns.

This could cause the results of such a demographic survey to become skewed.

Very possibly.
 
Short Answer : Yes.

I was curious about this too, and did research on it last year. It seems that people diagnosed with Borderline PD / bi-polar / depression / anxiety / OCD and those with histrionic tendencies, tend to be drawn to polyamory. Also a high number of people who are alcohol, or drug dependent.

Where it gets interesting, is figuring out, if they are drawn to poly for the 'wrong' reasons, or that their issues stem from denying themself of living authentically for x-number of years. Jury still seems to be out on that one, as there is very little study into people knowingly living poly lives. One research team, was aiming to track poly couples for up to 5 years. Unfortunately, most poly relationships end long before then.

I don`t have time to find, or leave links, but you can do your own searching.
:)


Ahhh... back to work.
 
I'm not scientist, but I learned in school that whenever there's a correlation, it helps me to stop and question: chicken or egg?
Maybe some people have become depressed because they have been trying to mold themselves into a mono life.
Maybe some people are lonely, and that leads to depression, and poly brings more people around them to love.
I've also heard that many people with bi-polar disorder are very creative, and poly is another creative way of looking at life and love.

I posted this quickly because I have to run, but I just had to throw something in there to subscribe to the thread, haha! Looking forward to further discussion on this topic.
 
One probably has little to do with the other. People live their lives and define their sexuality as they do based on a lot of factors. Mental illness and personality disorders most likely play a part, but are far from the whole story. Just speaking for myself, there are dozens, if not hundreds, of factors that played a part in me choosing polyamory. I'd imagine for most people, there are at least a few, and no one thing was the deciding factor.

If there is any correlation here at all, it's most likely to do with openness. Polyamory is seen as negative by society in general, as are mental disorders. If one is polyamorous and open about it, they are probably more likely to be open about other things society sees as negative as well. Pretty much any group of people that is considered non-mainstream seems to show a higher percentage of mental disorders than do mainstream groups.
 
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It seems that people diagnosed with Borderline PD / bi-polar / depression / anxiety / OCD and those with histrionic tendencies, tend to be drawn to polyamory. Also a high number of people who are alcohol, or drug dependent.

. . . One research team, was aiming to track poly couples for up to 5 years. Unfortunately, most poly relationships end long before then.
The problem is that there are likely many more folks out there living polyamorously who have never even heard of the word, would not identify themselves that way, and are not stepping into the spotlight about it. The studies are only dealing with a small subset of people.
 
If one is polyamorous and open about it, they are probably more likely to be open about other things society sees as negative as well.

Excellent point! In order to run a blog about your alternative personal lifestyle choices, like The Polyamorous Misanthrope does, you've got to be pretty darn open and unconcerned about society's judgements to begin with, so it does stand to reason that the woman who runs it would be more willing to mention a mental illness than she might be if she ran a blog about, say, knitting or auto repair. Heck, the poly lifestyle is practically based on talking about things that most people would choose to sweep under the rug rather than acknowledge.
 
I almost feel obligated to put in my two cents here, as both someone living poly and as someone with bipolar disorder.

Now, among our friends I am both openly poly (I don't really advertise, but I don't hide anything either)' and openly bipolar. That said, of all the people I know, I have a handful of both diagnosed bipolar and poly people. As far as I know I'm the only one that's both poly and bipolar. I will make a note and say That when I refer to someone as bipolar, I'm talking people with a diagnosis, not people who assume or heard that they might be and call themselves it (something I take offense to, for my own reasons).

I'd also like to note that bipolar is very different then depression. Depression can often be treated by some medication and a change in situation, bipolar never, ever goes away. It can be treated, handled, and and dealt with, but it never, ever is cured. It doesn't just come on because you ate depressed, there is more to it. I think part of why it's everywhere is that it's often used as an easy diagnosis, and far too many people are over medicated, kind of like depression. I'm betting that there are a lot of depressed people diagnosed as bipolar and vise versa.
 
Excellent point! In order to run a blog about your alternative personal lifestyle choices, like The Polyamorous Misanthrope does, you've got to be pretty darn open and unconcerned about society's judgements to begin with, so it does stand to reason that the woman who runs it would be more willing to mention a mental illness than she might be if she ran a blog about, say, knitting or auto repair. Heck, the poly lifestyle is practically based on talking about things that most people would choose to sweep under the rug rather than acknowledge.

That is a great point, except I am not sure if it really rings true.

Every person who I have known in a 'dating' setting regarding poly, has been openly poly, but hid their condition/issue/diagnosis until the last possible moment. Usually only when I have seen signs, and outright asked them, have I then been told the truth.

Someone identifying as polyamorous, is not going to have a problem talking about polyamory with other polyamorous people. As it is seen as a positive by both parties.
Take the same two people who identify as poly, but only one has a mental illness, and that party will then be hesitant to express their condition.

******************

As for studies,... Well, any study/poll is subject to variables and differences that don`t hold to the conditions of the study. The point is, to see if you find those particular circumstances applicable to your own experience.
If not, you use it as food for thought, and carry forward.
If so, it tends to stay a bit more ingrained into your life management.



..and..back to work again.
 
Every person who I have known in a 'dating' setting regarding poly, has been openly poly, but hid their condition/issue/diagnosis until the last possible moment. Usually only when I have seen signs, and outright asked them, have I then been told the truth.

And this is why I'm open about being bi-polar. I dislike lying and a lie by ommision is one. If you are going to get involved with someone, you should always be up front about situations that might arise during it, and trust me, it will come up.
 
Not all people who want to be poly have the courage to make the step. People who have bipolar may be more disinhibited during a period of mania which happens to be not so severe to make them dysfunctional. During such times a person is more likely to act and it takes only once to cross the "border" and act in a way that person would not act when "normal." It is likely that bipolar people who want to be poly happen to make the decisive step than people who always have their guard on.
 
You also have to look at the statistical anomaly of the increase of BP diagnosis in the last 20 years. If you look at the incidence of bipolar diagnosis over the last 40 years the incidence has increased dramatically. Along with the increase of diagnosis has also increased the number of medications out there used to treat bipolar disorder. I am not saying that everyone who is diagnosed "bipolar" is misdiagnosed/over-diagnosed, but having been diagnosed at age 13 with Bipolar in 1989, spent 15 years in and out of psychiatric hospitals 4-6 times a year and was 6 years ago on 11 different psych meds at the same time (I am no longer on any psych meds and haven't had a hospitalization in the last 6 years) but that took WORK, and lots of it.

My therapist uses BP as the "insurance DX" because it is consistent with the previous DX and he has no real way to explain why it is that I have a committee of 8 people in my head that I talk to and who comment on and have kinda equal decision making status in relation to that they have discussions (with me of course) about things. (I am not in any way other then the auditory and visual hallucinations symptomatic of Schizophrenic so that DX was quickly ruled out) They are there more often then they aren't and sometimes I see them manifest themselves as hallucinations who show up in my presence. Not specifically BP, but well I hadn't told them about "the committee" when I was 13 and in my first psych hospital.

The psychiatric field is relatively new compared to that of other scholastic studies. Freud, considered the father of Psychology only passed away in the 1940's,having created Psychology as we know it. There is much that they dont know about the brain, and they know even less about the mind. How is it that I am able to be a functioning normal (ok fairly normal) student who is successful in school as well as other ventures yet still have a collection of "friends" that she often has to be reminded by the SluttyUnicorn as well as DaJoshy that they are in the room and that I can talk to them instead. Often I still choose to talk to the committee but that is usually because we are talking about them.
 
ClariceK: Being on 11 meds sounds scary and sad. Did your docs even check the labels for drug-drug interactions? You may even have been taking the medication that would work for you (to quiet the voices), but in the company of other 10 its effect could have been nullified.

I guess there are two main reasons for increased bipolar diagnosis: 1) there was too much stigma in the past and more people chose to not seek treatment, and 2) as you say, it is a fall back diagnosis, especially when one has to be very careful before stamping one as schizophrenic or schizoaffective, which sounds still quite scary.
 
I have considered that, but after taking 40MG of Haldol at a pop, and the voices still being there and my doctor saying "40 MG of haldol would down a horse, what are you doing calling me about being manic" I kinda decided that I needed to either come to decide that they are there to stay (they do get more persistent and loud depending on my mental state, in a big way they are kinda an alarm to me and my therapist that something is really amiss in my world.) As long as they are at a conversational volume and not screaming I allow them to have their say within boundaries, they are not allowed to bother me while I am doing school work or in school, as well as other "rules". Recently it has kinda become a interesting thought about their existence being a "polyamourous" relationship I am carrying ut within myself with others who reside within myself. I know this sounds like totally off the wall, especially coming from someone at the level of education I have, but it is the best interpretation of them I have come to yet.
 
It seems that people diagnosed with Borderline PD / bi-polar / depression / anxiety / OCD and those with histrionic tendencies, tend to be drawn to polyamory. Also a high number of people who are alcohol, or drug dependent.

Where it gets interesting, is figuring out, if they are drawn to poly for the 'wrong' reasons, or that their issues stem from denying themself of living authentically for x-number of years.

NRE looks like mania, and break ups look like depression... BP may be a therapist labeling standard poly behaviors.
 
Borderline Personality Disorder can seem very similar to bipolar as well, especially if the therapist isn't seeing the "relational issues" portion of their client's life, as that's where the tendencies become much more clear.

And with BPD there can be a tendency to be very open sexually, and flirtatious with many people. So I could see how a person might seem more poly inclined in that sense, though a person with BPD can have a tendency to have trouble really connecting with anybody on a deep level.

Bipolar seems to be the diagnosis du jour nowadays. And diagnosing is a tough proposition anyway as so many things overlap and people can have some traits of a type of disorder, but not necessarily have the disorder. Interesting...
 
My son's second psychiatrist (his first went to work in a school district) for ADHD decided, after spending a total of 15 minutes with him over 2 visits, that he was bipolar. This was only after finding out that Runic Wolf was bipolar. He said that kids with ADHD are most likely misdiagnosed because new research suggests that bipolar disorder in kids manifests differently than as adults. He wanted us to try antipsychotics on our 5 year old when he was having trouble sitting still in school and concentrating on his work with no other symptoms at all. We got a new doctor, who confirmed the original diagnosis of ADHD. We refused to medicate him for the ADHD until he was six and went with a low dose until he actually started needing it to pass his classes. Now he's going into middle school and is meeting his potential (he's above average intelligence) as long as he keeps taking his meds.
 
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