Hello,

Ever since I was little my mom would go from being the sweetest person in the world to someone who is really mean and selfish in a blink of an eye. She has periods where she’s up doing every single chore in the house and going to work and energized and then periods where she can’t get out of bed or talk to anyone for days. She’s recently started drinking a lot and not going to work every now and then. When I look at the classification of mania in bipolar disorder, I don’t find she quite fits this description. When someone is experiencing a manic episode they are described as feeling “euphoric and energized, they don’t eat or sleep, and are in perpetual motion.” And they feel “overly confident, important, and powerful.” I would say my mom has vigorous amounts of energy at times, and altered thought processes and cognitive impairment, especially memory impairment, but not overly confident or egotistical. She has trouble sleeping through the night, but I feel like besides work she spends a lot of time sleeping when she’s not in one of her high energy states. She refuses to get help because she feels there is nothing wrong with her. Does anyone know if this would be classified as having bipolar disorder and if so, which type? She’s been diagnosed with bipolar before by a previous doctor 30 years ago, but she laughed at them and walked out of the office. 

Thank you for your time