Hi everyone- I have Bipolar I with psychotic features and over the years I've had a number of manic and depressive episodes, and the one characteristic that most of these episodes have in common is that when I'm manic/depressed I say really out of character and sometimes nasty things to people, and I've lost friendships in the past because of it.

I've tried to explain that I wasn't in my right state of mind to other people, and some of the time they understand, but some people just didn't, and I'm worried that either this past manic behavior is going to be brought up somehow or there's going to be future instances of that behavior, and people won't believe me when I try to tell them I wasn't in full control.

How have you all dealt with this kind of issue before?