“People respond differently to people who are grieving. They reach out. But depression is so very isolating. It's hard to explain to anyone who has never been depressed how isolating it is. Grief comes and goes, but depression is unremitting.”
“Psychotherapy is a sanctuary; it is a battleground; it is a place I have been psychotic, neurotic, elated, confused, and despairing beyond belief.”
“Lithium prevents my seductive but disastrous highs, diminishes my depressions, clears out the wool and webbing from my disordered thinking, slows me down, gentles me out, keeps me from ruining my career and relationships, keeps me out of a hospital, alive, and makes psychotherapy possible.”
“Lithium remains the gold standard, but many drugs now treat bipolar disorder. Medication is critical and should be combined with psychotherapy. Compliance is a major problem. Patients believe that once they're better, they no longer need the medication. It doesn't work that way.”
“Psychologists, for reasons of clinical necessity or vagaries of temperament, have chosen to dissect and catalog the morbid emotions - depression, anger, anxiety - and to leave largely unexamined the more vital, positive ones.”
“I love animals, and I was always attracted to the idea of being a zoo veterinarian or a veterinarian with the circus.”
“Moods are complicated and very much a part of who we are. People would be very boring without them.”
“Knowledge is marvelous, but wisdom is even better.”
“There are a lot of studies that suggest a higher rate of creativity in bipolars than the general population.”
“A possible link between 'madness' and genius is one of the oldest and most persistent of cultural notions.”